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brief adventure log - the cat lady
and just when i thought, two S tier games in a year? surely it can't get better that the drifter
thread theme: first 8 seconds of this, then this
if there's one recommendation to take from me, one and one alone, it should be this one
the cat lady is a game by rem michalski of harvester games. i first ran into this game when i was a kid, 12 years old or so. i was a big fan of LEVEL, a romanian monthly magazine about video games. i remember seeing a review of the cat lady in it. i don't remember actually reading it but the imagery at least stuck to me. i have not had any tangent with this game for another 12 years other than occasionally remembering the imagery and the thoughts i had about the game looking at it
it's now been 12 years. i've loved adventure games ever since i was a kid, 4 years old or so this time, when i played through the monkey islands with my dad. i've been playing adventure games every once in a while, replaying the monkeys and loom specifically every so often. it was only until about three years ago when i started delving into the genre deeper, more properly. a list was conceived, of titles that looked interesting. genre staples, indies, off shoots, anything i thought was even remotely interesting or had something to offer. the list stands at 83 titles today, some with a {NEXT} label on them that never seems to pull any weight. i don't remember how or when but eventually the cat lady made it to the list
come september this year. it's been a couple months since i played the drifter and it's only been boring, mundane, downright bad games ever since. something made my eyes land on the cat lady and consider it for a while, but i don't remember what. it doesn't matter, i end up playing it regardless
the cat lady has become one of my all time favorite games, favorite pieces of media really. it's one of the most well developed, emotionally mature titles i've ever experienced. it's heavy, but not in your face about it, it handles its subject extremely well. it connects with you in a way i didn't think was possible for games to do. i loved it, everything about it
i'm not gonna talk about the story as i don't want to spoil anything about it, it's too good to not experience it blind. it can be a tough topic though, and i've seen people recommend not delving into it if you're not in a stable enough place in your life. as weird as that can be to say about something. i'll talk about other aspects of it. i love how it doesn't try to confine itself to being a classic, standard point and click adventure game, it does its own thing. the control scheme is very interesting, and actually very suited to play with a controller (which i did and heavily recommend doing using AntiMicroX). the art direction is beyond any measure of fantastic, by eons the most unique and well carried out visual look of any adventure game i've played yet. it plays out... like a movie? but it's not too cinematic like, well, cinematic games tend to be, it feels like the perfect balance between gameplay and narrative. the music? pristine, it fits every moment, it blends in and flows with your actions, it elevates the game oh so much. the voice acting is great, you can tell so much from the tone and delivery of the actresses. you can distinctly tell when a little ray of sunshine beams through susan's heart at times, and it makes you get excited all the same with her...
i have honestly not a single negative thing to say about it. well, there's one part of it that's a little extra, but that's because it's really a reference or tie in to another game in the series. it's kind of unnecessary to me but i get why its there. it is a good excuse to talk about the series as a whole though. this game is part of a trilogy called "the devil came through here" formed of the cat lady, downfall: redux, and lorelai. i won't go over them since they're not required to get the full cat lady experience really. both happen in the same universe and have ties to each other as well as some overarching worldbuilding, but they're otherwise standalone titles. they're interesting playthroughs, and very interesting to look into if you want to dig more into rem michalski, but otherwise not aaaaaall that good. there may be a downfall redux and lorelai follow-up eventually since i have Thoughts and Opinions and generally a lot of talk in me
bottom line, i'd like to showcase this excerpt from my log:
i haven't been so consistently excited to keep playing a game in ever, since i was a kid probably. i feel like this game was my christmas present and it's christmas weekend and the only thing in my mind is how much i'm looking forward to waking up so i can just have nothing else to do but play it all day
i haven't been so consistently excited to keep playing a game in ever. in the drifter review i think i mentioned that if i'm enjoying a game i'll finish it very quickly. the cat lady took me a level above that, since according to my log it took like 10 days for me to go through it. it's probably because a lot of the time i would just reload and replay parts, over and over again, trying to see what would happen if i go about differently, trying to see everything this has to offer, or simply just to replay a part, like rewinding a song you really like so you can give it another listen. i've played it twice since september, but it's going to stay with me in a way no other media has
the cat lady on GOG
just two euro btw
bonus, girlfriend testimonial:
the lines you just read are coming from a guy who is not always affected by 'emotional gore'. these heavy things don't necessarily take him down as easily as they do me, and that lets him appreciate the broader structures of the game better. but me? buddy i was in the trenches, it was stressful, it was traumatizing, it was horrifying. i got immersed in the game, and once i got into it, it took me with it in this incredibly dark atmosphere and it's like i was right there with susan. and i am definitely not as strong as her. i needed to take breaks man, i never would have made it out alive if i were her. so i have immense respect, both for her and for the developer (who by the way made this without ever having firsthand experience of any of these existential horrors).
we did end up going to a christmas market yesterday. there's like 10 of them in bucharest now after how popular one of the usual ones has been in the past year. this one we checked out could be haaaaaardly called a christmas market, it was like 8 different food trucks with christmas lights and a merry-go-round in the middle. remove the christmas lights and it could've been the parking lot at comic con