There are plenty of games in which you have to carefully plot your next move, but Cat Lines has perhaps one of the cutest protagonists we’ve seen in a while. This little kitten leaves a trail of yarn wherever it goes, and your job is to make sure that trail covers every block in each puzzle.
Sounds simple enough, right? Well, this particular cat has a habit of making things rather more complicated.
Available now for £4.19 on Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S, Cat Lines is a puzzle game from Tribus Games Indie that previously made its way to PC. It mixes straightforward ideas with directional blocks, portals and an editor that lets you create your own challenges.
At A Glance
- Game: Cat Lines
- Developer: Tribus Games Indie
- Publisher: Tribus Games Indie
- Platforms: Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S
- Price: £4.19
- Genre: Puzzle
Getting This Cat From A To B Isn’t Quite So Simple
The premise behind Cat Lines is wonderfully easy to understand. Move the kitten around the level and leave enough yarn behind to cover every block. The trick is working out how to get there.
Certain blocks restrict the direction in which the kitten can travel, meaning a route that looks perfectly sensible at first can leave you stuck later on. You need to think about the whole level rather than simply concentrating on the next move. One wrong decision and your furry friend can find itself backed into a corner with no useful way out.
Then Someone Added Portals
Because apparently getting a kitten through a room full of yarn wasn’t enough.
Portals add another wrinkle to the puzzles, allowing the cat to jump from one block to another. That opens up new routes, but also means there’s another thing to keep in mind when planning your path.
Cat Lines doesn’t stop once you’ve worked your way through its own puzzles either. Editor Mode gives you the tools to create your own levels using the various pieces available in the game. That includes directional blocks, portals and level endings, so you can put together something straightforward or try to make life considerably harder for anyone brave enough to play it.
A Small, Cozy Puzzle Adventure
Cat Lines isn’t trying to reinvent the puzzle genre. Instead, it takes a simple idea, gives it a cute feline twist and builds some increasingly thoughtful challenges around it.
For £4.19 from the Xbox Store, and in two versions, Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S players can now see whether they have what it takes to guide this particular cat home without getting completely tangled up along the way.
And if nothing else, there’s something rather appealing about spending an evening telling a virtual kitten where to go – while knowing full well that the cat probably has absolutely no intention of listening.
