Robot Wants Kitty

Welcome back to Big Mean Flash Gamer, and after last week's vitriol I'm sure you're all set for awesomeness. Well, I've got it in spades with today's game, a wonderful little puzzle/platformer from our good friends Max Games entitled Robot Wants Kitty.

Sometimes it really is the simplest concepts that make for the best games. Take Robot Wants Kitty, for instance. There's a robot and a cat. The robot really wants the cat. Like, really wants it. But there's a snag. The cat is stuck at the end of a hallway which has been bricked over by monsters. Why did they do that? They're just assholes, I guess.



When the game begins you're not able to do much more than run left and right. You don't even have the ability to jump, so all you can do at first is try to avoid the baddies completely. Fortunately there's an upgrade that gives you a spring in your step not too far away; others are dotted around the large, labyrinthine level and you'll need every one if you're going to rescue that kitty. Better get a move on, though, because time is of the essence and your score is dependent on how quickly you can complete the game. The bad news is that dying adds twenty seconds to your final time. The good news is that you can cut a second for every monster you kill with the laser upgrade.



As if I ever needed a reason to shoot red monsters with a laser gun. But once you've got the laser in your little metallic paws none of the beasties are particularly troublesome, allowing you to figure your way around the many twists and turns of the level as you try to locate keys, upgrade your system and get to that cat.

Which isn't to say Robot Wants Kitty becomes a cakewalk as soon as you have some firepower. You still need to watch your step, lest you fall into a pit of boiling acid or get caught off guard by a roaming monster. But checkpoints have been kindly placed throughout the game to save you having to march all the way across the level to get back to wherever it was you died. Other games should take note of this - it saves time and keeps the player from screaming curses to your good name late into the night.

Don't tell me I'm not the only one who does that because I'm not.



The look and feel of the game is charmingly retro, with clunky 8-bit graphics and a plinking MIDI soundtrack that amazingly doesn't make one want to swallow their own tongue in annoyance. I will admit that if you don't pay attention you can get the controls mixed up; on more than one occasion I rocketed towards an enemy when I had planned to vaporise it. If you ever kicked back on a Spectrum or Amstrad, however, Robot Wants Kitty should bring back fond memories.



Death is naturally inevitable and, to be honest, some areas just set you up to fail. For example, don't shoot at the giant multi-eyed blue blob that spits laser bubbles into the air. Just don't do it. You can't kill it, even with rapid-fire shots. You're just going to piss it off and then it's going to crush you. Likewise, the ceiling decked out in acid-spitting stalactites is just taking the piss. You can get through there with a rocket pack but if you don't figure out the almost non-existent pattern of drops you'll be melted before you ever get close to the other side of the room. And no, you don't have to run through that room, but what are ya, chicken?



Still, it's all worth it when you reach that end game scene and see the robot happily hugging his kitty. Squeezing it ever so tightly, kitty's eyes bulging out of its sockets... um, maybe we should take the kitty away from the robot? We can't? The lasers? Oh, right.

So, yes, Robot Wants Kitty - proving once and for all that even metal men are capable of love.

Sushi Cat

I don't know what it is about the Japanese and extreme weight gain. I mean, I know compared to some of the things you find in Japanese media, that's pretty damn vanilla, but it's still kind of weird. Ironically, becoming ridiculously fat is the goal of this week's good game, Sushi Cat. A product of Armor Games, who rarely put a foot wrong when it comes to their titles, it's a Flash version of Plinko with the disc replaced by a gelatinous blue cat. This is not as terrifying as it sounds.

Said cat is trying to meet the tabby of his dreams, but through several twists of fate he can never seem to reach her. His solution is to become incredibly fat. No, I don't know what the thought process is there, but it is a cat, so naturally we're not going to understand everything he does. Actually, there are real reasons as to why he attempts to grow bigger, but I just find it more humorous if you think the cat's just weird and his would-be girlfriend is a feeder.



The game is composed of fifteen levels; in which one you must eat thirty pieces of sushi to continue to the next. This is done by deciding a place to drop your cat and releasing him with a click of the left mouse button. Down he tumbles, bouncing off platforms and nomming his way through many a piece of raw fish. I am always amazed at how fattening sushi is in these games. I can only assume it's based on reality, though I always thought fish was a pretty low fat dish. Still, there are other elements that might contribute to the high calorie count...

Big Mean Flash Gamer - where pointless tangents equal good copy.



It must be said that Sushi Cat looks very, very pretty. The levels are grouped together into three separate zones and each zone has a distinctive look. They also have bonuses and obstacles specific to their zone, helping to deflect accusations of repetition and giving the player a real sense of progress.

The cut scenes are also wonderfully rendered and tell a charming tale that starts out cute but actually becomes slightly disconcerting by the end. When the cat loses sight of his love, it's kind of strange that his reaction is to try collecting lots of dolls that look like her. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with that, but... no, wait, that is what I'm saying. That's kind of creepy, Sushi Cat.



Of course, good looks don't mean squat without good gameplay, and here Sushi Cat acquits itself well. This is a game that's easy to learn but hard to master, and especially around the halfway mark there are a couple of levels that might prove difficult. But, in all honesty, this isn't a hard game to beat. If you've got fifteen or twenty minutes you shouldn't have too much trouble completing it. Fortunately there's enough to hold your attention for that long - in the latter levels, certainly, watching your tubby kitty get squeezed, stretched and bounced around is amusing. It's also pretty crazy to watch just how fat this cat can get. I mean, this is one cat who needs to run his ass around the block a few times.



A combination of cute and creepy, then, Sushi Cat tells us that it's OK to become morbidly obese for the one you love. I'm not really sure if that's a message we should be telling our children, but at least the game is fun. If you're a fan of Japanese cuisine, Plinko or Tarepanda, you might be a fan of Sushi Cat.

LOLCat Escape

So I didn't post a review last week, probably due to fatigue and/or laziness. OK, laziness. Unfortunately, while I was away the Internet got all freaky with its bad self. LOLCat Escape is why you don't let memes breed. It takes two random items and throws them together in an attempt to be funny but is eventually nauseating.



LOLCat Escape combines something I find harmless and sometimes funny (LOLCats) with something I generally find annoying (escape games.) I don't hate all escape games, you understand. What irritates me the most about them is that the puzzles so often lack any logic. Without a walkthrough there to guide your way, you can often find yourself randomly clicking on every available spot in the hopes of finding some clue as to what the next move is. Now add to that cat macros, which by their very nature are nonsensical, and you have a recipe for disaster.

The goal is to locate nine cats hidden somewhere around an MS Paint house. I know it's pointless to say, but God damn, this is an ugly game! Most escape games have the simplest graphics possible, but Jesus! It didn't help that the music from the "Hamster Dance" played over the title screen. If you're looking for a game that slowly leaves you rubbing your eyes and nursing a migraine, then LOLCats Escape is the game for you. God, I can't even look at these screenshots!



LOLCats Escape lulls you into a false sense of security. The front door is locked, so you look for a key. Where is the key most likely to be? Under the welcome mat. Along the way, random points on the screen can be clicked to reveal LOLCats. These are, by and large, the best thing in the game. I wound up searching for these pictures, because God knows I couldn't figure out the puzzles. I'd throw random items at more random items and hope something happened. I'd try to determine whether certain macros were clues and later find I was right, but I was clicking the wrong spot on the screen so nothing would work. I was left as confused as a pensioner looking at 4chan. I had almost no clue how to get anywhere in this game, even when I could see the solution right in front of me.

My only other option was to try the game's walkthrough, but you look at that thing and tell me if it's of any benefit! Look, I already feel like crap having to use a walkthrough; I don't need the walkthrough itself talking to me like I'm a retarded Muppet.



Wandering aimlessly around a badly drawn house full of LOLCats for twenty minutes is not fun to me. I don't think it's fun to the people who made this game. This is yet another shoddy, confusing, illogical puzzle game, and really, those guys at Addicting Games have only themselves to blame for being mentioned in another review. A little quality control never hurt anyone, fellas. To them and the game's developers I have but one thing left to say.

Warriors

I was originally going to review a game that puts you in the cockpit of a Russian bomber and then asks you to apply the same skill required to fly the actual thing in order to play for more than ten seconds. But I've forgotten the name of it (if you know what it is, please do tell) so I've had to resort to plan B. Warriors is one of those games that straddles the middle ground of my own personal tastes - it's not awful, it's not great, it's a little weird and is overall largely irrelevant.

By the way, I know what you're thinking. This is either a Flash version of the Warriors video game, which itself was inspired by the Seventies cult classic movie, or - if the fantasy-style lettering of the title is anything to go by - some kind of medieval hack 'n' slash epic. But I'm afraid unless your answer was "A game about cats," you are greatly mistaken.



Yeah, that's right, cats. Why? God knows - I certainly didn't. But here's what I did learn from the instructions: each cat belongs to a different clan. Your goal is to go through each clan's territory and catch a certain amount of prey there before the timer runs out. Pressing down on the right arrow key will make you run faster, while pressing the up arrow key will naturally make you jump. While in the air, press the Space bar to attack and hopefully catch a tasty treat.

It's all very simple and it doesn't take a cat lover to get the hang of it. You get to decide what clan you want to join, though I doubt it really makes much of a difference. I went with the River Clan, because once you go black you never go back.



So here we are, running across the level, chasing down rabbits. It all looks pretty nice, though the animation is either clunky or non-existent. You have to hop over dogs who are out to maul your ass while also trying to grab rabbits from the air. This isn't very hard - as long as the prey is in your general area, you can catch it. What annoys me is how often these animals will wait until you're right on top of them before they make a move. Because they're so close, you can't react fast enough to catch them before they're gone, which can start to grate after the fifth or sixth time in a row.



Anyway, from there we move on to the next level, where you have to catch... frogs while avoiding... badgers.

What?

Why is the cat trying to catch frogs? Cats wouldn't want to eat frogs! And what did they do to piss off the badgers? Regardless, stay out of their way, because those little buggers are tough!



OK, fish. Yeah, I can understand fish. And trying to avoid rivers, since cats hate water. Sorry, I'm still trying to get my head around frogs and badgers. Those two things just don't go together!



The final level is the territory of the Thunder Clan, which reminded me of Thundercats. Man, I loved that show. I even had a Lion-O action figure with swiping action. That thing was badass! Pretty much the opposite of this game!

But at least I'm hunting birds, which means jumping is a necessity. The main enemies here are foxes, which I admit are probably the meanest of the bunch. But to be quite honest, no hazard is any more dangerous than the others. You have a five lives in every level and infinite continues, which is pretty nice of the developers. I think if you didn't have the option of continuing from your last level I'd hate this game a whole lot more.



As it stands, the game is somewhat boring, but with only four levels to play it doesn't outstay its welcome. There's no real reason to play Warriors, unless you really love cats or you really have to know what the point of a game like this is.

And, crazy as it may be to believe, there is a point. Warriors is an "advergame" (a new word I discovered today) designed to promote a series of books about several clans of wild cats and the numerous goings-on within their intricately-structured society. There are eighteen books, six Mangas, one "Deluxe Edition" and two guides.

As former pro wrestler Ron Simmons would say, "Damn!"