Catmaze

released on May 24, 2018

Catmaze is a fairy metroidvania set in the universe based on the Slavic myths. Age-old tales will come to life in the unforgettable adventure of Alesta, a sorceress whose courage guides her through mysterious paths and dark forests in search of the lost road to Navi, the world of the dead.


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A serviceable adventure with Eastern-European faery and demon theming. The bland combat and uninteresting traversal leads to a very by-the-numbers Metroidvania, with the few neat mechanics showing some clear inspirations from Cave Story.

Catmaze is a charming Metroidvania that suffers from less than excellent gameplay.

We'll start with the bad. The controls are a unresponsive and floaty -- I've never walked off cliffs because of failing to jump so many times in my life. You fight using familiars, all of which have slightly annoying attack patterns. Enemy hit boxes are a bit rough around the edges. Don't even get me started on failing to drop through platforms while holding down and jump. All of this adds together to taking a lot of frustrating damage from enemies that would be easy to avoid and defeat in other games. I decided early on to just keep a full stock of potions, and I never had a game over as a result, but everything felt much more difficult than it should have. Honestly, if it felt a little worse to play, I probably would have dropped it in the first half hour.

That said, I still enjoyed my time with the game in the end. The map and exploration were, thankfully, well enough done. Nothing mind blowing, but nothing frustrating. There was an acceptable amount of backtracking, and the rewards for side quests were well worth it.

The pixel art was charming and was effectively created a nice variety of environments. The portrait art for main characters felt like something an amateur would upload to deviant art, but I wasn't too put off by it. Similarly the sound effects came across a bit amateurish, but not grating. The soundtrack was fairly limited, but the tracks that are there were plenty enjoyable.

I loved the Slavic mythology influences. The story was fairly basic, but it drew on different enough inspiration from the average game that it felt fresh. I really enjoyed the characters and their stories. You got to know about each of the antagonists and see them as beings with their own goals, which is fairly rare in a Metroidvania. I found myself feeling emotions related to the story during the ending, rather than just being happy I beat a game, which, again, is fairly rare for me in a Metroidvania.

In the end, I'd recommend Catmaze if you're in the mood for a bit of a different fantasy story along with your Metroidvania and don't mind putting up with the controls.

Alright. Not a barn burner, was enjoyable. Really like the themes of perseverance and understanding even though they were handled very typically. Just a fun albeit generic experience.

I feel like this game is looked over because it's not very pretty and because it seems very standard and boring for the first couple of hours. I know I felt that and almost quit the game within the first two hours, but I'm glad I stuck with it because this game has a few pretty neat ideas!

I really liked how the game puts dynamic markers on the map, so if you find someone and they give you a hint, the map is updated with a marker. I wouldn't want that to be the genre, but I like as a change of pace in one game. I also liked the idea that you can equip one of two amulets, which boosts your stats as long as you don't take too much damage. However, that functionality was way too generous and I never dropped a damage level since it takes so many hits to do so. Speaking of stats, I really enjoyed how your damage and especially speed stats improve as you play. The familiars are pretty fun as weapons, my favorite being the omnidirectional cat-swing (as in you literally swing a cat at your foes), as well as abilities. You gain your usual double jump and ability to swim and all of that, and it works and is fun and not completely predictable. This is one of those where you get the double jump very late, not as your second upgrade.

And then there's mostly dull combat, mostly dull bosses and some really frustrating rooms and sections, holding this game back quite a bit. And I'm deducting a whole-ass star, if not more, for the completely miserable wolf sections where you have to ride some dumb wolf that's almost uncontrollable and not at all fun.

All in all, not fantastic, but you could do a lot worse and this game does offer something for metroidvania cat lovers who already finished Gato Roboto and want more. Gato is probably the better overall game, but this is the more involved and classic metroidvania. Worth checking out if you feel like you've played every other famous game in the genre, and/or if you're obsessed with cats.

The game has it's charm, but you won't miss much by skipping it.

The controls are very basic and don't despise our character having lot of different weapons, don't feel good.
The balance is also pretty bad with early battles often being more difficult than late ones and levels feeling pretty dull.

I can see what they were going for with this, but this ain't it, chief. Confusing translation, questionable graphics, and poor physics make this more of a chore to play than anything else.