Little Kitty, Big City Review – Feline Fun

Reviewed on: Xbox Series X/S
Platform: Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, Switch, PC
Publisher: Double Dagger Studio
Developer: Double Dagger Studio
Rating: Everyone

Little Kitty, Big City puts players behind the paws (and toe beans) of an adorable black cat in a city reminiscent of Tokyo's residential areas. After falling high from the comfort of their home's window, the unnamed feline finds itself on the city's streets below. With one thing on their mind – returning home to the perfect spot for a nap – this cat goes on its biggest adventure yet. Admittedly, Little Kitty, Bit City didn’t need to do much to impress me. I love cats, and it immediately nails why I and other cat lovers enjoy these furry friends. But developer Double Dagger Studio also created a cute and funny exploration of our world through a cat’s eyes that doubles as a delightful puzzle game. 

Immediately, Little Kitty, Big City is brought to life with a visual style that sits somewhere between traditional animation and anime, enveloping the entire three-hour experience like a warm blanket. Controlling the titular cat is a joy, too, thanks to mechanics that only make sense in a game like this. This cat doesn't sprint – holding LB on the Xbox controller unleashes their "zoomies." The triggers swipe left and right, perfect for knocking that plant on the ledge to the ground. Holding the A button to jump allows you to aim the pounce, which is great for catching birds and reaching new heights, and holding Y opens a wheel of emotes for things like a "Biiiiig Stretch," nap, a scary face, or something else. It felt like I'd discover some new endearing mechanic or collectible like wearable hats that reminded me of my own cat, Bonny, here at home every few minutes, and it kept me exploring the city beyond the golden path. 

The mainline quest is just as enjoyable, too, as it brings you across various other animal characters like a duck who keeps losing their ducklings, a crow obsessed with shiny things, a dog who can't find his favorite balls, an engineer tanuki messing with timelines and the physics of the world, and more. Between hilarious dialogue and the bite-sized quests each doled out, running into new friends and helping them out never felt like a chore. For the most part, completing these quests is simple: explore the area using clues or a map, find what’s needed, and bring it back. Sure, these are fetch quests, but none took more than 10 minutes, and because Little Kitty, Big City constantly encourages exploration, I always found new things that caught my eye along the way. 

 

The overarching narrative is even more straightforward – get home. To do that, though, you must find and eat four fish spread across the city because each one gives you more energy to climb higher. Each fish builds on the last, unlocking additional climbing energy and, subsequently, new areas of the vertical city you haven't visited in a satisfying, lightly Metroidvania-esque way. And after collecting all four, it’s time for your most treacherous climb yet. While I felt most frustrated with this final climb, largely because the climbing is finicky, slow, and imprecise, it's also one of the most heartwarming moments of the game, thanks to reflective run-ins with everyone you've met thus far.

Little Kitty, Big City could have easily over-relied on its cute cat, forgetting that controlling it and interacting with the world around it needs to be just as pleasant. Instead, a perfectly paced runtime, feline-forward mechanics, and engaging exploration coalesce into a reminder of why we love these animals so much in the first place.

Score: 8

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Crow Country Review – Comfort Food Horror

Reviewed on: PlayStation 5
Platform: PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, PC
Publisher: SFB Games
Developer: SFB Games

The Resident Evil series has redefined and refined survival horror in recent years, arguably single-handedly. However, as the venerable series continues to push the genre forward, a growing number of indie games are looking back to survival horror’s late ‘90s heyday for inspiration. Crow Country joins those ranks, offering a respectable nostalgic homage to the past. Veterans won’t encounter anything they haven’t seen, but the experience is comforting in its spooky familiarity.  

Developer SFB Games clearly understood its self-imposed assignment. Crow Country’s grainy, low-polygonal presentation faithfully evokes the PS1/N64 era while still establishing a unique charm, thanks to its doll-esque character designs. Thankfully, the studio stops short of replicating more archaic elements like the static camera angles of the time, opting for a much preferred 360-degree camera and free movement instead of tank controls. The presentation adds a nostalgic sinisterness to the game’s setting, a derelict amusement park called Crow Country. 

As agent Mara Forest, you arrive in search of the park’s missing owner, Edward Crow, and quickly find it overrun by grotesque monsters of an unknown origin. Despite the game’s eerie vibes, scaredy cats shouldn’t fret; Crow Country isn’t anywhere near as terrifying as its Silent Hill/Resident Evil influences. That may be disappointing to horror aficionados – I count myself among them – but I didn’t mind. Outside of a few decent jump scares, the game is more about establishing an intriguing, oppressive mood, and that’s enough for me. The creatures look appropriately gross and unsettling despite having a strange cutesy charm due to the art direction. The writing has a good sense of humor that contrasts nicely with an otherwise dark and generally enjoyable mystery highlighted by a cool story twist. 

Blasting monsters with various firearms, such as a pistol, shotgun, and, if you search well enough, a magnum, feels adequate, and attachable laser sights add a contemporary assist. Evading enemies to conserve ammo is relatively easy, and the game is generous about keeping your clips full. This speaks to Crow Country’s wide approachability. It’s not challenging in regards to combat and inventory management, making it a great introduction to the genre for newcomers or a good option those wanting a lighter take on a typically tough gameplay style.

Another aspect in which SFB Games commits to Crow Country’s old-school approach is exploration and puzzle-solving. The game’s elaborate puzzles are generally clever and well-designed, but the real challenge is keeping track of over two dozen notes containing hints or solutions. That’s because you can only view these messages in save rooms, which creates a lot of backtracking to double-check an employee memo. The game’s condensed level design means a save room usually isn’t too far away, but running around did feel less convenient as my notebook expanded. To mitigate this, expect to jot down notes or take photos of clues with your phone. 

 

Additionally, intentionally cluttered environments easily hide useful items and clues, meaning it’s easy to miss things. Expect to hug the walls of every room to thoroughly comb them of their interactable elements (though the game does track how many secrets you find). As a long-time fan of the genre, I didn’t mind this nostalgic approach, and it never became a true hindrance. Consider this less a critique and more of a PSA to those hoping for a streamlined experience. 

Speaking of save rooms, the game’s intentional lack of autosaves means dying results in losing progress between your last visits. I was burned by this initially, having died before reaching the first save room and replaying the first 20 minutes. Again, your tolerance will vary; losing chunks of progress rarely becomes an issue if you’re diligent about saving. But if you’d rather not deal with that, Crow Country may be too faithfully retro for you. 

As reductive as it sounds, when it comes to delivering a classic survival horror experience, Crow Country is a good “one of those.” Familiar elements and tropes are well executed, and the succinct runtime of five to six hours is perfect for its smaller scope. I had fun reliving the genre’s golden years through Crow Country’s eyes; playing it feels like relaxing under a warm, blood-stained blanket. 

Score: 8

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With My Past Review – Puzzle Therapy

Reviewed on: PC
Platform: PC
Publisher: Edigger
Developer: Imagine Wings Studio

Everyone can empathize with waking up late at night and sitting in agony as your brain forcefully makes you relive a traumatic, embarrassing, or heartbreaking moment. Our past is with us forever, and how it manifests in the present is a toss-up from day to day. With My Past, the debut game from developer Imagine Wings Studio, attempts to blend those feelings with platforming-puzzle gameplay and does so excellently. The result is a therapeutic five-hour adventure I'll be thinking about long after today. 

After being startled awake at 3 a.m. by her past, an unnamed blue-haired girl goes on a journey through her labyrinth mind, which is holding her back. This translates to six distinct chapters of gameplay, each with a unique theme in narrative and mechanics. The first introduces you to her "Past," the throughline mechanic with which With My Past shines. Your past is just you, but two seconds prior. If you walk forward and jump, two seconds later, it will too. With My Past playfully builds upon this in its opening moments as it teaches you the ropes, but by the end of the game, I was pulling off moves that bent my brain in all directions.

As you progress through each chapter, With My Past introduces new mechanics, like a Kiwi fruit that lets you teleport to your past's location or a way to solidify your past and climb on top of it to reach new heights. It's hard to describe how unique this mechanic plays in With My Past because it's genuinely unlike anything I've played in a puzzle game, but Imagine Wings Studios excels at adding new layers to its depth each step of the journey. I'm reminded of 2018's Celeste, which does the same, incorporating narrative elements into the game's mechanics. 

On that same note, With My Past is more vague than Celeste's journey of transformation and self-love, instead allowing players to graft their own past onto the protagonist here. But it works well. As on-screen words that tell the story dive into self-hate, the ways our past bubbles up at the worst times, and the loneliness sometimes felt even when surrounded by love, I found myself thinking about my past, and it was wondrous to watch how With My Past suggests tackling those issues through gameplay. 

 

Your in-game past transforms from a mysterious specter, to an enemy on the hunt, to an ally you must reckon with and understand as a part of what makes you. And it does so while With My Past serves up great puzzle after puzzle. A handful of the 150+ challenges left me more frustrated than satisfied, but a skip option allows players to keep the story moving along. My only real dissatisfaction happened in the game's final (and only) "boss" fight. Perhaps I missed the point, but in an otherwise cohesive experience, it felt unattached to everything else I played through. 

Void of voice acting, with a minimal soundscape coloring the protagonist's steps, With My Past's score does the talking here, and the result is one of my favorite scores of the year. It's grand, sweeping, and almost feels more at home in a movie theater than coming from my desktop screen, but the game's music is as integral to this journey as the story and its puzzles. 

I began With My Past yesterday on a whim and finished it later that afternoon with an aching smile on my face; that "hurts so good" type of smile. With My Past is a short but powerful burst of emotional storytelling on top of excellent and intuitive puzzle design. With few misses, it's an impressive reminder of the power of games and how savvy developers can blend storytelling into how we play.

Score: 9

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