Stray

 

So, it's been about a week since I finished the game. It's gorgeous. And adorable! But!!! It's also a tear-jerker. And I'm not kidding about this. It will make you cry. Unless you have the emotional range of a rusty spoon or something. 

What's it about? Well, if you don't know, you play as a cat that got separated from its other cat friends and fell down into this city filled with humanoid robots and Zurks - little critters that try to eat you.

It all takes place in some kind of a dystopian future where there are no longer any humans and the robots live in this walled city they have never been out of. 

As the cat, you get to explore this city and meet a group of bots trying to get out of it and see the outside. With their help and the help of a little bot called B-12, you manage to get the city open. 

But!!! The little companion bot dies in the process! And it will make you cry. And, if you're like me, the first thing you will do after finishing the game, is go on AO3 and look up some fics where B-12 either survives or the humanoid bots the cat befriended manage to save him. 

Also, in the game, you never see the cat actualy reunited with its cat mates. You just see him run out of the now open city and then the game ends. 

All in all, it's a very cute game, it's also very emotional. I love it but I had to go and look up some fanfics after finishing it. However, I know I will go back to the game eventually. There are collectibles as well as memories for B-12 who was, spoiler, originaly human. And these memories help him remember that. Regardless of whether you collect all of them though, the game only has one ending. So if you're not into collecting those, you can just go with the main story. The only thing you'll miss that way, is a bit of lore and some backstory that, while interesting, is not vital to understanding the game. 

I do like collecting however, so when I eventually go back (there is chapter select), I'll try to collect all of it.

And as far as I know, the game is available on Steam as well as PS5. If it's on any other platform (not impossible), I haven't heard about it. I have it from Steam and I know it's on PS5 because Eurogamer played it on it as well as Ellen from Oxtra.

Oh, and one more thing. Ian from Eurogamer named the stray Colin in his playthrough. And I like that name so much for the little kitty, I started to call him that as well. Not in this post as I didn't want to confuse anyone, but yes, In my mind, the cat will forever be Colin now. Just look at him! He looks like a Colin.

I would love to read what your thoughts on the game are so if you could leave those in a comment below it would make me happy! 

See you in the next one. 

Bye!

~AnnElfwind