Kitten Match (app)

Apps cover such a huge range of ideas, styles and target audiences, from hobby projects to multi-million-dollar media properties.  The games can be rock solid or full of bugs or holes, they can be dead serious or some of the weirdest, funniest things you will ever see, some are meant for laughs while others cater to the most specific interests or fetishes.

This weekend, Anne & I were in the mood for cats and kittens.  After looking at the previews of a few games, I started poking at one called Kitten Match, which was quite simply a match-3 puzzle game full of adorable kittens.  Duh.  Part of my brain asked why bother with something so trivial, but we were enormously entertained going through level after level with little cat dialogs in between.  It really is just a series of match-3 puzzles, but as usual, the strange obstacles and power-ups are a fun mix.  

Technically, the whole home repair storyline and dialog is just a super-graphical representational scoreboard: instead of just having "you're on level 44", each level unlocks a few bits of kitty dialog, as they get you to fix up their house for them one thing at a time.  "We'll make you a cup of coffee," they say ... yeah, but only if I play another level and go out and buy them a coffee maker.  It's a funny set of first-world fantasy cat situations, where nothing in the house is ever good enough.  If you fix the floor, they will want a carpet.  Fix the window and they want a snooker table -- I'm not kidding.

The cats themselves are adorable and well animated, and somewhat responsive to being poked or rubbed.  In the main story, each time you get a new piece of furniture, there are only three possible variations, so while you share photos of your rooms or get on a team and view other player's kitty playrooms, they all do look the same, the same selection of objects at the same locations.  And you either have that one funny hat or you don't.

Even the little interstitial Loading windows can be heartwarming or hilarious, like this guy trying to get out of the tub:

Or the cat who pops up to deliver power-ups for the first few hours and hasn't been seen since...

On the downside, sometimes a level gets hopelessly stuck.  I stopped by after work one night, and in my limited nightly time slot, we figured we would do one more level ... but it turned out to be one where it does not appear solvable at all without a lot more power-ups than we were willing to buy; I think it was level 149.  But as far as balance goes, out of the first 100+ levels there were only two real stumpers.  Sadly, one was level 9 of 20 in a side quest ("kitty date") that we had to abandon three or four times.  Sometimes, you learn more tricks and can solve the level later, but if the main progression gets stuck, you're stuck, you can't go back to earlier levels at all.

Still, it's a fun thing that made us smile or laugh many times.  Again, it's more of a set of puzzles than an actual game with strategic decisions and victory conditions.  Some of the little dialog bubbles and extra antics are just there to make you feel good about yourself, but I can't argue against positive feelings the way the world is right now.  There is a real danger of getting sucked into a lot of purchases, throwing harn-earned cash out for imaginary trinkets, but in moderation, I think it's harmless fun that kept us smiling for a while.  I'd say it's worth maybe $10 or $20 to see a few extra things in action.

A few nights later they added a bonus game board event, so as you complete levels you also move around this game board collecting bonuses...

The cleverness of the endless development can really make a game like this work.  It feels like it's always growing and developers are out there working on new ideas that will be worth waiting for.

It's a mix of feelings, whether these games are "worth the time" or not.  What else might we have been doing for that hour?  Would staring at Youtube or Netflix have been any more "worth it?"  Either way we live in a strange world of overlapping bubbles of shared media.  I can talk Battlestar Galactica with the guys at work, or share grins with my girlfriend about that Loading-screen cat trying to get down from the book shelf.

An odd side note: the only other games by this developer on the Play Store were naval and submarine battles.  How did they hit such a home run with this cute pet theme?  I would like to hear the backstory.