[h1]Invasion of the zombie cats :o[/h1]
[h2]Introduction[/h2]
[i]Hidden Cats: Zombie Hunter[/i] is a cat-themed, hidden object game developed and published by Sons of Welder and FM Simple Games Studio. An epidemic has broken out all over the town, and the cats have been turned into zombies. Your mission is to take down the cats and clean up the town.
As for the gameplay, the controls work pretty much the same as in the other cat-themed games by the developer. There's only one scene, but you can choose between full screen or windowed mode. Two kinds of objects can be found: zombie cats and pumpkins. With the pumpkins, you simply click on them with the left mouse button. Now, with the zombie cats, you have to first find ammunition boxes, which will supply you with a certain number of bullets. Then you shoot at the zombie cats and use up the bullets to do so. There are a total of 200 zombie cats and 30 pumpkins, and you level up in rank as you take down more zombie cats. The usual Steam achievements are present as well although they won't count towards a user's global total until the game is out of "Steam is learning about this game".
[h2]Review[/h2]
I've played (and reviewed) both the cute cat-themed HOGs and the scary, horror-filled HOGs by the developer. However, this is the first game in which I see the two genres combined. The story is pretty basic. It's your standard zombie apocalypse, but the poor cats are infected. I found the premise to be interesting although I don't like that it's the poor kitties who are the victims. T_T
As for the gameplay, I didn't run into any technical issues. However, I feel like this game is a bit of a step back from the developer's previous games. First, there's only one scene available, whereas in the most recent games, there are usually two scenes, at least. Since there is an achievement for finding 400 cats but the scene only has 200 cats, you need to replay it to get that achievement. I would have liked another scene to add a bit of variety. However, a bigger issue I have is how you go about finding the cats. Instead of simply clicking on the cats, you have to first find and click on ammunition boxes and then shoot the cats with bullets. Granted, the cats are infected, but this still seems a bit cruel to me. Suffice it to say that it's definitely not for those who want a cozy, cute experience. Nevertheless, I like that the zoom functions are present, which makes finding the cats and pumpkins pretty doable, and all Steam achievements are obtainable.
With the art, it doesn't come off as cozy, but at the same time, it doesn't quite hit the mark of being scary. If taken from a particular perspective, I'd say that it comes off as humorous. The sprites and background are drawn and colored well, though, which I've gotten used to from this developer.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3549848286
In regards to the music, this is one of the more positive points of the game. The tracks give off that scary, horror-themed vibe that you'd expect from movies or TV shows of that genre. The music can be initially blaring to the ears, though, so I had to go into the settings area and turn down the music. Also, the meowing sounds are back, so they make it easy to let you know that you found a cat.
[h2]Conclusion[/h2]
Would I recommend [i]Hidden Cats: Zombie Hunter[/i]? It's probably obvious that I have mixed feelings about this game, and if I could, I'd give it a neutral rating. Although I admire that the developer did something different with the cat-themed HOG genre, the execution could have been better. Still, since I played some of their other games and they have been solid, I'll give this a slight thumbs up. If my guess is correct about the price point, then it's fine to pick this up and it won't take long to 100% complete the game.
Finally, I'd like to give a thank you to Sons of Welder and FM Simple Games Studio for the review copy. ^^
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