It’s a classic, colorful platformer with far more playability than a first look would suggest
Price: $1.99 / £1.49
Version: 1.0
Size: 102 MB
Platform: iPhone & iPad
Developer: MildMania
On its surface Cattch is a bubbly and cuddly platformer with clear nods to the 90s genre-heyday when the likes of Rayman or Bubsy were popular titles. For the twenty-teens this receives an upgrade in the form of super-smooth visuals, brighter colors and extra-slick gameplay.
Despite these upgrades Cattch doesn’t feel that special on first play. The story is set up via some beautifully-rendered comic panels, but it doesn’t indicate you’re about to play something you haven’t seen before. Essentially, you play a cat. A cat with a backpack, and a super gnarly green scarf. The premise is that a bunch of your furry friends have been captured and locked-up – not unlike the Sonic approach – and you’re task is to free them, grab some gold stars and finish the level before the timer runs out in order to get the classic three-star rating per-level that many iOS games employ.
These fuzzy blue things put extra seconds on the clock
Many games on the iPhone or iPad fall over themselves either trying to explore some entirely unique concept, or simply try to emulate another successful game. Cattch does neither of these things, but once you dig down into the gameplay, and crack through some levels, it becomes clear that what Cattch specialises in is truly fun, well-designed gameplay, just unique enough to want to keep playing, but simplistic and familiar enough to become engrossed.
Clinging to the edges of platforms with your cat claws is essential to move around the levels
The controls are simple, you can move around with onscreen controls, jump, double-jump, punch and grab onto things. But it’s all done via two buttons and complicated moves or sequences aren’t introduced like other iOS platformers. Grabbing onto things is the key move in Cattch. It’s how you’re able to move around the levels and reach the end. The levels themselves are also incredibly well-designed. They’re neither long nor short, but they do jump around a bunch. There’s useful signs telling you which way you should be heading, but the levels do feel more open than your typical 2D platformer. There’s other gameplay mechanics introduced and levels are often turned on their heads, mixing up the approach.
There are 50 levels across three worlds. There’s a forth listed as coming soon, but it’s still a significantly-sized game
Overall Cattch is a beautiful looking, very well-designed, but most importantly its key strength is its playability – so often we get platformers for iOS that just don’t have that magic touch, where there’s something frustrating about the gameplay that takes away the fun. Cattch is easy to get into, challenging to master, but fun the whole way. Take a shot, and enjoy yourself with some classic platform action.