A Cat in Dungeons

[quote]For more puzzle game reviews, news & everything puzzle-related, follow [url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/25928931-Puzzle-Lovers/]Puzzle Lovers[/url] & check out our [url=http://steamcommunity.com/groups/puzzlelovers]Steam group[/url].[/quote] I did not enjoy [i]A Cat in Dungeons[/i], and so I don't recommend it. The 50 bland levels took me 82 minutes, and a good portion of that playtime was caused by (a) painfully slow walking speed, and (b) [b]No Undo[/b] (though you can reset). There are probably worse titles out there, but there are also certainly better. There are [b]5 mechanics[/b] in the game. (1) Step on small yellow "turntable" symbols to rotate the board. (2) Click arrows on the side of the screen to rotate the camera. (3) Step on purple portals to teleport to another portal. (4) Step on buttons to open gates. (5) Some blocks drop away after you walk across them once. These are indicated by their placement next to pillars that have bright icons on top of them. A small "parchment" in the bottom right of the level tells you on hover which blocks near those pillars will drop. Mechanic #1 is the key, since you always need to rotate the board to arrange some path to the exit. Layering other mechanics on top could have worked well, but it didn't. Several reviews suggest that the puzzles get challenging as the game goes on. But [b]levels don't get challenging in any interesting, logical/puzzley way[/b]. Mechanic #2 is just used to add a dash of "hidden object"/memory to the game: you can't see the full board without rotating the camera. It costs you nothing to rotate the camera, so it's just a thing you need to do and then remember what you saw. Mechanic #3 collapses a great deal of gameplay into brute-force trial and error: all the portals are purple so you don't know which one goes where, you just need to try them and then remember. Annoyingly, sometimes Portal A goes to Portal B but Portal B doesn't go back to A. Mechanic #4 is fine on its own but often made into just one more chore by the others. Mechanic #5 probably goes the furthest of any to build in [i]some[/i] strategic thinking (it's also what makes an Undo option worthwhile). But: why aren't the blocks just shown in a different color? Why add in the arbitrary lookup task of hovering over the "parchment" in the bottom right corner to see which blocks will fall? Again, information is hidden so that the real task isn't [i]thinking[/i] about the information, but rather [i]remembering[/i] it. Overall, [b]gameplay feels like completing a simple maze while having your working memory overburdened[/b]. The "challenge" on some later levels is simply an increase in trial and error. No individual task is cognitively taxing. Stopping to pull them apart isn't tricky and doesn't take long. The only way you can mess up is losing track of information that's always there. There's never any real positive "Aha!" of "Oh, [i]now[/i] I understand," but there is often the negative "oh, I didn't know/forgot -- guess I'll try roughly the same thing again." There are a few resolution options but its [b]fullscreen only[/b] -- you can't even ALT+ENTer out -- a single fiddly slider in-game to handle all volume, Arrows or WASD to walk and [b]no rebinding[/b].

Great game. Very good puzzles and music.

Finishes all levels of this game on 83 minutes! (An average of less than 2 minutes per level), and it was very cute! The cat goes to sleep when you do not give a command on a long time

Estou gostando do jogo. Ele tem uma ambientação bem legal e uma mecânica interessante. A progressão dos levels também ficou bem legal, com níveis cada vez mais desafiadores. Recomendo para quem gosta de um bom puzzle com gatinho.

The game starts easy, but the difficulty increases a lot, sometimes I can't foresee a solution before trying a few paths. It's very relaxing, a little to much slow for me, but the puzzles are entertaining so worth the play.

The kitty left the dungeon unharmed in the end, yay! I was worried about those sharp blades and nasty traps at first but, even though the game is 100% learn by death type, the kitty isn't harmed once throughout the game, rather "trapped" and forced you to reset being the failing point... and all the dungeons have multiple solving methods/routes... so yeah... it's not that hard to clear imo... Just that i really really hate that "low tension" background music, that one track playing all through this whole game really pulling the mood down... It's not a "relaxing" music, but rather the "depressing" music. Not a good choice imo... Other than the music part, the game is passable as a good puzzle, just that it's mostly linear and as soon as you learn where is the mechanisms you can easily solve it, in a straight line. Some even comes with super short cuts.

Amazing relaxing game for the cat lovers! It's looks easy but that not true! The difficult of the puzzles increase while you complete the levels! Very challenging and cute! Beautiful graphics!

I really liked the game, the levels are well built, and there are paths that it seems to go, but it is a trap

Great game! If you like puzzles this the right game for you.

Great game. I'm so dumb to finish it