Hidden Cats in Barcelona

[H1]Cozy cat hunting with unexpectedly aggressive marketing lore[/H1] Alright, I’ll probably get tomatoes thrown at me for reviewing a Nukearts Studio game, but my mission to review all hidden cat games continues, so here we are. That said, I do want people to make informed choices, so the situation around this studio deserves to be mentioned. Recently, Nukearts Studio patented the expression “Hidden Cats” for video games, which led to a bunch of other devs suddenly changing their titles to things like “Hidden Kitties” or “Find the Cats”. They also reportedly pushed for retroactive enforcement and copyright strikes on other games using the term. In a genre that’s usually extremely cozy and collaborative, it landed like a steel chair to the face. A lot of players are boycotting the studio because of it, and honestly, I completely understand why. Now, purely as a game? I completed this one in moderate difficulty in about an hour (idle time excluded). Compared to previous entries from the studio, this is way easier, and that really hurt the experience for me. Their older games usually lasted much longer and had more satisfying hunts, while this one felt weirdly lightweight despite still asking for the same price tag. The maps look nice enough, cats actually look like cats this time (always a bonus in this genre), and the zoom works well overall. You’ve also got a ton of accessibility options: dark mode, fullscreen, separate audio sliders, edge scrolling, camera sensitivity, UI toggles, etc. There are also two difficulties for most levels, plus a hint system (though I never touched it since using hints disables achievement completion). The main issue is that there’s almost no challenge. I maybe had to properly search for 1-2 cats per map, and that was it. Veterans of the genre are probably going to fly through this at alarming speed. On top of that, the first level throws way too many special cats at you immediately. Achievements are decent in concept, but forcing players into a no-hint run for full completion feels unnecessarily strict in such a casual genre. Even without the controversy surrounding Nukearts Studio, I already found this entry disappointing because of the shorter runtime, low difficulty, and pricing compared to their previous work. The whole “Hidden Cats” trademark situation just makes it even harder to feel excited about supporting it. If you’re brand new to hidden cat games, you’ll probably still have a decent time because the core formula works, but there is no reason to pick this one in particular. And for long-time fans expecting something on par with older entries, you'll leave feeling more frustrated than relaxed. [quote]For more reviews like this one, please check out [url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/45639970-Ele%2527s-Little-Recommendation-Corner/][b]Ele's Little Recommendation Corner[/b][/url]! For a smol bat streamer with a side of ADHD yapping, look up [url=https://www.twitch.tv/eleanoramanticore/about][b]here[/b][/url]![/quote]

[b]PSA: Go read some of the February/March 2026 Negative reviews in Nukearts other Hidden Cat titles before you make the decision to buy this game.. They asked Valve to mark them 'off topic' so they are hidden from view.[/b] Nukearts have retroactively claimed ownership of the 2 words 'HIDDEN' 'CATS' and sent out copyright strikes to developers on Steam and they've since doubled down on it after the fact.. this is a friendly reminder of just how pathetic they are as a development team. Again, you did NOT invent this subgenre or descriptor for these types of games and you never will.

These games have definitely gotten easier. At this point, they feel more like a quick cash-in aimed at achievement hunters than properly fleshed-out hidden object games. Most of the earlier entries took over 2 hours to finish, but this one only lasted about 90 minutes, or less even. I noticed the same trend with the previous release, though I gave that one a pass since it was a smaller Halloween/Christmas special. The Tokyo game was the best one lasting maybe 4hrs and I think the Rio game that came after it was 3hrs. It peaked there and they started getting much shorter after that. I’m also frustrated with NukeArts over the trademark trolling surrounding the “hidden cats” genre. They weren’t even the first developers making these kinds of games, yet they’ve tried to monopolise the space anyway. Hopefully they reconsider this approach, drop the ridiculous trademark grab, and focus on making better games again.

Of all the games in the series (and yes, I own them all), this is the worst. First, there's the reduced difficulty (or have I gotten that much better now?). At the same time, I miss the meowing sound as a hint that there's a cat hidden in the picture. Oh well, whatever. It was the last game from this developer that I bought (and I returned it!!!).

因为分割越来越碎（找个2-3只一块区域就变色了）难度就越来越低。 以前最后一关找人也是能把人找晕的，现在的最后一关要找的人数也就50，外加区域分割细，流程就显得越发短，40多分钟就能搞定，性价比很不香了…… 选哪种模式（小区域变色的简单模式，以及找全才变色的困难模式）都不影响全成就，只要不用提示完成游戏就行。

[ENG] Let's start with the technical problem: This game doesn't have the option to change the language like other games in the franchise. But that wouldn't be enough for me to give a negative review to a game. But then we move on to the second category of problem. The ethical problems! I imagine they didn't pay much attention to the translation of this game, but they paid a lot of attention to patenting the simple phrase "Hidden cats," forcing many companies and developers to change their titles under the "small" threat of being removed from Steam. But you might be wondering, "but maybe Nukearts Studio came first with this title and several companies copied it." Just being a small niche would already be wrong, but you know what's incredible? They weren't even the first game of the genre with this title! But even so, they made an entire industry work to avoid being screwed over by a petty decision from a certain company that thinks it's the Nintendo of the genre. You managed to become a bad joke for the entire industry. Where have you ever seen words that already exist in the global vocabulary being misused? If your title was "Kittenmoon," I don't know, and you wanted to patent it. Fine. But you shouldn't have the right to patent the dictionary and thereby ruin several studios in a, I repeat, tiny niche of games. Do you practically want to own the niche? Again, you're a bad joke. Because a niche that is uniting companies to make games together or even donating part of their profits to animal welfare NGOs is being harmed by petty idiots like you. https://steamcommunity.com/groups/Sentinels_of_the_Store/announcements/detail/506233956051452482 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- [PORT] (Para os falantes da minha língua, traduzirei para vocês. E acho importante vocês lerem para se inteirarem do que está acontecendo e o quão absurdo isso é) Vamos começar pelo problema técnico: Esse jogo não tem a opção de mudança de lingua que nem os outros jogos da franquia. Mas isso não seria o suficiente para eu dar uma avaliação negativa para um jogo. Mas aí vamos para a segunda categoria de problema. Os problemas éticos! Imagino que não tiveram tanta atenção a tradução desse jogo, mas tiveram bastante atenção a patentearem a simples frase "Hidden cats" e fazendo muitas empresas e desenvolvedores mudarem os seus títulos, sobre "pequena" ameaça de serem retirados da Steam. Mas você pode estar se perguntando, "mas talvez a Nukearts Studio veio antes com esse título e varias empresas a copiaram". Só por ser um nicho pequeno isso já seria errado, mas sabe o que é incrivel? Nem como primeiro jogo do gênero com esse titulo eles foram! Mas mesmo assim fizeram uma industria inteira trabalhar para não se ferrarem por uma decisão mesquinha de uma certa empresa que se acha uma Nintendo do gênero. Vocês conseguiram se tornar uma piada de mal gosto pra toda industria. Onde já se viu patentear palavras que existem no vocabulario mundial? Se o seu título fosse "Kittenmoon", não sei, e quisessem patentear. Tudo bem. Mas vocês não deveriam ter o direito de patentear o dicionario e com isso arruinar varios estudios de um, volto a dizer, nicho minusculo de jogos. Vocês praticamente querem se tornar donos do nicho? Novamente, vocês são uma piada de mal gosto. Pois um nicho que está unindo empresas a fazerem jogos em conjunto ou até doando parte de seus lucros para ONGs de cuidados animais, está sendo prejudicado, por idiotas mesquinhos como vocês. https://steamcommunity.com/groups/Sentinels_of_the_Store/announcements/detail/506233956051452482

Too easy and too short You can get 100% in under 2 hours

[h3] [b] HIDDEN CATS IN BARCELONA [/b] [/h3] Relaxing and funny game where you just need to find hidden cats and people. Once you find them all, you just completed the whole game. Sounds easy right? Some cats are really tough to find but you will figure it out. If you can´t find some of them there is hint system that will help you. Art and music fits together nicely. In case you are still missing some cats or people, just take a look at my guide. :) Overall it is a good game to decompress. For sure you will spend couple of hours on this game because it has more levels. GL & HF.

Another high quality hidden object game, the (somewhat) new sectional coloring is so nice even if it makes the game shorter. Though I suppose I could always replay in the moderate mode. Barcelona is a particularly pretty location, I ended up looking up a few of the locations to see the real life versions.

I came for a chill game, stayed because I couldn’t stop hunting “just one more cat”… for way longer than I’d like to admit. Super relaxing, surprisingly addictive, and somehow turning grayscale into color feels like a life achievement. 10/10 would lose track of time again 🐱