Since the first time this game was announced, I was pretty excited to dive into this one. If you are a regular reader, then it isn’t a secret that I have a cat (put on display from my PokePet Something Cool piece). Given that, Stray is a game I have been looking forward to for quite some time! BlueTwelve Studio and publisher Annapurna Interactive have done a wonderful job with this title and I am even tempted to snag some of those neat physical goods they recently announced.

But I have to say that I do have a complaint with this game that lasted throughout the whole experience. Was it a huge issue? No, I guess not. Did it damper the experience I was hoping to have? Yes, a little bit. So, let’s dive into why this game is close to perfect, but not quite for me.

Story

Getting separated from your pack at the early stage of the game, you find yourself in the world of sentient robots. An apocalypse has taken place, thanks to the overwhelming swarm of Zurks, and what was initially a problem only for those of living flesh became a problem for the remaining society of robots as the Zurks evolved to eat metal as well.

As a little cat, you’ll be at the mercy of a ‘help-to-receive-help’ series of tasks where if you want to reach your ultimate goal of getting back up to the Outside then you’ll have to help some robots with a similar journey and goal. Luckily, you find a little robot named B-12 that helps with all the translations, reading, inventory, and reminder systems in place.

Gameplay

The intro for this game shows you the basics you need and pretty much all of the controls you will use throughout the game, aside from that which involves B-12. You have your movement, interaction button, running, and platforming action button. This is where I first saw the problem that I was a little bit upset to see. While I am fine with there being a single key for guided platforming in specific areas, there is literally no free-platforming controls. You have to find a spot that has the platforming action button icon on it before you can jump to that different spot.

After you are separated from the pack, you have your first encounter with the Zurks and your first series of puzzles which leads you to B-12. They don’t really tell you the controls for him, but you have a flashlight button, can access your inventory and memories pages with the up directional button, and get a refresh on your current objective by pressing the down directional button.

With these controls in mind, the game is all about exploring the area and finding ways to interact with everything. You have your basic cat activities such as knocking stuff off ledges, interrupting a board game, meowing, cuddling against legs, finding a place to take a nap, and as a fun suggestion - in a later chapter, look for the robot laying on a couch with a cowboy hat and interact with him (you’re welcome).

Other than the cat activities, you will be able to meet robots and they will sometimes have information or tasks to help you progress forward in the story. By completing various tasks, you will be able to move parts of the world into specific actions that open up more pathways and opportunities for yourself. With the help of B-12, you can even collect items to deliver to different robots, trade with a barter, or simply use them to help a robot so they will help you in return.

As for the memories I mentioned, you will find glowing areas in various parts of the map. By going up to them, you can collect a memory for B-12 which will help him remember his past better. There are five big memory bars on the top of the memory box which are kind of an indicator of how far through the game you are. But if you look at the box when you are in a new free roam area, you will see that some of the gray boxes are a bit lighter which indicates that you will be able to find those memories in that area you are currently in. This game doesn’t let you backtrack once you move forward to the next area, so keep that in mind when progressing.

Audio and Visual

Even with an apocalyptic cyberpunk glow and styling to this game, it manages to present a somber and dim atmosphere. They do a good job at keeping things mostly lighthearted, but the truth in the scenario and actions of the robots speak louder than the atmosphere and there is definitely an air of melancholy to the game. All-in-all, the aesthetics of this game are sublime and surreal as they did a beautiful job mixing the dark essence of the story with the bright glow of lights which filled gave an expression of hope throughout the game.

As for the audio, the music is all very subtle and they made a mechanical or computer-like gibberish for the robot’s voice work. This definitely made things simplified and accurate at the same time, especially since we have a little robot companion to do all the translating for us. However, they definitely used actual cat sounds for everything your little kitty is doing because my cat was acting strange every time I played the game, especially when I would have the cat meow.

Replayability

This game is actually pretty short and even has a trophy to beat it in under two hours. My first playthrough took just about four hours. That said, I didn’t find every memory there or complete all the little tasks, so there is more to do in the free roam areas. I can see people playing this game more than once, even though it doesn’t offer a ton of actual value to the replayability. It just offers something everybody wanted - to play as a cat without the constraints of survival and overly difficult mechanics.

What It Could Have Done Better

Why didn’t they give us the chance to do free-play platforming in this game? It really was something I was hoping for and they could have easily designated a different button on the controller to be the guided platforming button. You can’t even so much as jump unless there is a ledge or something you will be jumping up on. This takes the whole platforming aspect out of the game completely and as a cat… that’s a bit of a missed opportunity.

Verdict

Stray is a wonderful game that has filled everybody’s desire to play as a cat simply out to do cat things. This is definitely a must-play title for anybody who enjoys a calm, exploration game with light puzzles and guided platforming. It really is all about the experience of being a cat! Even though I wish they would have included the free-play platforming, this is a title I can’t recommend enough.

Stray is available now on PC via Steam, PlayStation 4, and PlayStation 5.