Note: This is an old review the the game Catherine that I wrote for a gaming site a couple years ago. I'm putting it back up just to have, and also to start back into reviewing games when I can. By now nothing here is relevant, but maybe some people still haven't heard of this game, or will just find it fun to read.
Where do you start when
explaining a game like Catherine? The
easy way out would be to simply call it a puzzle game, and while that wouldn’t
be a lie, the game is much more than that.
Catherine is a game that wants to throw the player into a situation to
make them chose how they would react if it was happening to them, and the
elements of the game such as the questions you are asked between the puzzle
portions, and how you interact with the other characters, determine how the
story progresses. It’s one of, if not
the most, original game I have seen come out in recent memory in terms of both
game play and story. The game calls
itself “an unconventional romantic horror”, which is probably the best way to
describe the genre. Because it is so
unique, it might be a little hard to grasp what the game really is, so we’re
going to take it one “block” at a time.
That’s a pun...you’ll get it later.
Strap in, this is going to be a long one.
Let’s begin with the main
character, Vincent. Vincent is a 32 year
old office worker who is currently in a 5 year relationship with his girlfriend
Katherine (and no, the K is not a typo).
She has begun pressuring him to take their relationship to the next
level and get married, but Vincent isn’t too sure about that. He likes the way his life is, and doesn’t
want to change it. This is just one of
the things he discusses with his drinking buddies, who he goes out with every
night. I found Vincent to be a very
sympathetic protagonist (ahh big words!).
He is a flawed and conflicted individual who really doesn’t have a clue
half the time. It’s hard to imagine
players not feeling for the guy as his life only spirals more and more out of
control. If you compared him to other
video game characters, then you might just think he’s sympathetic because he’s
sort of an underdog, but if you take him just as a person, then that’s all
you’ll find. Vincent is just a man with
flaws that are no different than ones you or I may have.
The story begins, spoiling as
little as possible, with Katherine giving hints to Vincent that they should get
married and settle down. Vincent is
resistant, and later goes to the “Stray Sheep” bar with his friends. After some talking and drinking, (alright, a
lot of drinking) his friends go home and leave Vincent to continue drinking
alone. That is until an attractive young
woman asks to join him. This is all
Vincent remembers, at first, before entering his nightmare. When he wakes up the next morning, he finds
this new girl named Catherine (What are the odds?) lying next to him in
bed. From there things only seem to get
worse for Vincent, such as hearing rumours of how nightmares are killing men
who are cheating, as he, or rather you the player, have to decide what he
should do about cheating on Katherine. This
is a game that really emphasises its story, and tries to minimize areas where you
are doing things unrelated to what is going on.
That being said, if you are not at all interested in the story or
characters, there is still fun to be had, but you may feel short changed. Also, since the game has 8 endings (did I
forget to mention that?) there is plenty of incentive to replay it to see what
other ways the story can unfold, but aside from upping the difficulty, the
puzzles will stay the same.
Now we reach the game play,
which is split into two parts. The first
is when you play as Vincent while he is awake at the bar. While here, you are encouraged to talk with
not only your friends, but all the other patrons, about their problems. Every once in a while, they will ask you a
question where you can pick one of two options as a response, and depending on
your response, a little meter will move toward the blue or red side. Because of the way “karma” bars have been
used in games before, you will probably think that the blue side is good, and
red is evil or bad, but that isn’t exactly true in Catherine. Most of the time the questions you are asked
have no clear right or wrong answer, but are just meant to try and judge who
you are as a person. Personally, I think
two neutral colors should have been used here, just so players wouldn’t be
conditioned to think one side is the “bad” side. In addition to these questions, you will
learn about all these other character’s lives, and hear how they all seem to
have started having nightmares...interesting.
While you are talking with people in the bar, time is passing, and
different people will come and go throughout the night so it is beneficial to
stay a while if you want to hear everyone’s story. Also as time goes on, you will receive text
messages, mainly from K/Catherine. If
you chose to respond to their messages, you get to chose between usually 2 or 3
options for each line of text. Depending
on what line you chose to begin the text with, the next lines options will be
different, so cycle through them to be sure you are saying what you really want
to say. How you respond will continue to
move your “karma” meter. If talking to
the other people in the bar isn’t interesting to you, you can always throw back
your glass and hear Vincent do a little monologue about his situation. After three sips, your glass will empty and
you will be given a bit of trivia about whatever you were drinking
(obviously). These bits of info have no
in game importance, aside from an achievement to hear them all, but could be cool
if you’re into that sort of thing. You
will notice three little beer bottles on the bottom left of the screen filling
up each time you finish a drink. Once
all three are full, you are completely drunk, but you could still drink more if
you really wanted to... After becoming
fully drunk, Vincent starts walking around in a slow stumble that is pretty
funny to see the first time, but there is an even better advantage than seeing
him nearly trip over his own feet. The
drunker you become before entering a nightmare, the faster you will move once
inside it (Makes sense...right?). Once
you have done as much or as little as you want in the bar, you can chose to
leave and return home where the nightmares will begin.
The nightmares are where the
puzzling begins. Each night Vincent will
have to climb a tower of blocks to reach the top, but naturally it’s not as
easy as just walking up. The fact that
he is in his underwear, clutching his pillow, and has sheep horns only adds to
the nightmarish atmosphere he is in. The
blocks are not positioned to allow you to walk up with no problems, but require
you to push and pull them into useable arrangements. While you are doing this, the lower levels of
blocks are falling away, so time is of the essence. At times, this fear of falling may make you
want to act swiftly, but it is all too easy to move the blocks in such a way
that you trap yourself. Also, each night
a new block type is introduced that can radically change your current
techniques. It can be something as
simple as an immoveable block, or one that shoots spikes up if you stand on it
for more than a second. If you want to
survive, you will have to adapt your strategy almost every night. You may not think it at first, but there are
a lot of techniques to learn in order to progress through the game. For example, gravity doesn’t work the same in
the nightmares (as it often doesn’t) so blocks with nothing below them can
hover in the air as long as they have another block connected at its edge. This allows you to effectively push a block
off the edge of the one below it to make a stepping block. Since Vincent can only pull himself up one
block at a time, you will be constantly pushing and pulling blocks in new ways
to make a staircase to the top. Aside
from just being able to move blocks, Vincent can also hold onto the edge of
blocks to shimmy around them. While this
can be used to save you, it can also cause you extreme aggravation and
death. Whenever you are shimmying around
the edge of a block on a side that is not facing away from the camera, the
controls reverse. That may not sound too
terrible on its own, but when you throw in the fact that you can’t move the
camera to see the back side of the blocks, you will effectively be reduced to
guessing which direction to press to guide Vincent back into view. After you reach the top of each block tower,
except the last one for each night, you will find yourself on a landing. Here you get to rest briefly between puzzles,
save your game, and talk with the other sheep.
These sheep see themselves as people and everyone else as sheep, so no
one knows who the others really are, but as you talk with them you should start
to figure out who the sheep are in the real world. Aside from just conversations, some sheep
will show you valuable techniques you can use to climb more efficiently. Pay attention to these techniques, you will
need them. When you are ready, you can
then enter the confessional booth where you will be asked one question. As I’m sure you could guess, your answer will
move your place on the “karma” meter. I
was quite surprised by the number of questions the game has in it. Even when I died in a stage and had to go
back through the same confessional booth, I received a new question. Not all are great, but some actually require
some self reflection and thought, if you want to take it seriously that is. After you answer, you will be shown a pie
chart of what the other players online have answered. On the last section for each night, Vincent
will face a “boss” level. The basic
concept is the same; manipulate the blocks to make a climbable way to the top
before the bottom falls out from beneath you, but with the added stress of a
hideous monster chasing after you. These
creatures are very reminiscent of things you would see in a silent hill
game. Not only are they big, scary and
hell bent on killing you, but they are also based off of the current crisis
going on in Vincent’s life. This can
make the boss segments even more intense if you have let yourself become
immersed in Vincent’s life. Each boss
will chase you as you climb, so you will have to move faster than you have in
the earlier stages unless you want to see Vincent suffer a bloody death, but
later bosses will also have special attacks that can knock you off your block,
reverse your controls, and more. These
boss levels are incredibly intense, but can also be quite frustrating. It isn’t frustrating to the point where you
will want to give up, but just enough to motivate you to try again and
again. Somehow the game never makes you
feel like it’s impossible, but still presents a challenge that you just know
you can overcome if you tried again one more time. When you do make it to the top, and hear
Vincent cry out “Yeah, I made it!” while holding his fist in the air as the
sounds of a cheering crowd come out of nowhere, you will feel just as much
accomplishment as he does. More than a
few times I found myself standing up and mimicking his actions after some of
the harder sections. As an added bonus,
after the boss is vanquished, a chorus of “hallelujah” chimes in while your
score is tallied.
Speaking of your score, at the
end of each section you are given one of three trophies depending on a few
factors. There are the usual bronze,
silver, and gold trophies you can earn, but don’t expect to get many trophies
higher than bronze on your first play through.
The first factor in calculating your score on a stage is the
difficulty. I played on normal, and have
gotten about half the gold trophies so far, so it isn’t necessary to play on
hard to get gold medals. As you are
climbing, you will notice little piles of coins on some blocks. Collecting these will add 1000 enigma coins
to your final score, which is a good amount.
Next, you get coins for how much of the level is still intact when you
finish, or in simpler terms, how quickly you completed the level. The last addition to your score is what is
known as your “step counter”. This meter
on the top right will count how many upward steps you take before a little
timer runs out. Continuing to climb
before the timer expires resets it, and increases the multiplier for your
score. Not allowing your step counter to
drop will drastically increase your score by the end of a stage.
Whew, now that the basic game
play is explained we can talk about some of the extras in Catherine. The good news about the extras could also be
considered the bad news. It’s all more
block puzzles. This could be great if
you are looking for more puzzles after playing through the game, but if you are
looking for a little variety, there isn’t very much. The first little extra that is open to you is
the arcade game “Rapunzel” which is located in the “Stray Sheep” bar. When you first approach it in the game, it
will inform you that you only get to play it three times per night (ok, dad),
so you will probably have to go back on different days if you want to complete
all the levels, and there are a lot. 128
of em. Yup, go crazy. There are 64 standard stages that you need to
complete in order to unlock the 64 extra stages (if you really want to, that
is). The difference in this little
arcade game is that the ground is not falling out from below you, but you do
have a limited number of push/pulls you can perform. The other mode you can play around with is
called “Babel”. There are 4 different Babel
stages which require you to get gold medals in the story to unlock. The modes are called Altar, Menhir, Obelisk,
and Axis Mundi and you will need 1, 3, 5, and 9 gold medals to unlock each one
respectively. Each mode is randomly
generated block towers, but they each get longer and utilize more of the trap
blocks. If, or rather when, you die in
one of these modes, your best height and time will be sent to an online leader
board. There is one definite, glaring
flaw with Babel mode. Despite how far
you have gotten in previous attempts, the game will announce “new record!” each
and every step you take. So, you better
get used to hearing “new record!” nonstop for a long time if you are planning
to reach the top. These modes can also
be played co-operatively, although I found having another player to be more of
a hindrance since you cannot stand on the same block, and if one of you drops
down on top of the other, you will automatically smack them off the block and
down to almost certain death. That and
the fact that it is all too easy for one of you to fall behind and become
trapped and if one of you dies, you both lose.
If multiplayer is what you are
looking for, the coliseum mode is probably the best option for you. It is only unlocked after fully completing
the game once. This mode is a competitive
mode where you each try to climb the same tower at the same time, like Babel,
but rather than trying to work together (as impossible as that can be) you are
encouraged to work against your opponent.
You win this mode by either killing your opponent, or reaching the top
first. Just so there is no confusion,
all multiplayer modes in Catherine are local only. Only the leader boards and graphs utilize
your online connection.
Alright, just two more quick
points I want to hit before my conclusion, so if you have read this far, just
bear with me a little longer. The first
one being graphics. The in game graphics
are decent enough that they won’t distract you, and all the bosses come across
as monstrous and scary, but won’t impress you in terms of detail. The character models, while a bit stiff
during cut scenes, still have a lot of expression, at least in Vincent’s
case. The other characters barely seem
to change their expressions at all.
Where the game really comes alive is when it changes into anime cut
scenes. These scenes, while
unfortunately scarce, are visually appealing and feel very fitting for the genre
of the game. Catherine certainly would
have benefited if each cut scene was made this way. For one thing, while Vincent’s in game model
is nearly identical to his anime style; other characters such as Catherine
don’t translate as well. Since Catherine
is supposed to be very attractive (to say the least), it is a little disappointing
to see how oddly shaped her head looks in game compared to her anime
counterpart.
Before I get into the voice
acting, I should confess that I have a strange love for voice acting. I can’t explain it, but there is something
very appealing to me about giving voice to another person, and that is exactly
what the voice actors in Catherine have done.
First, I have to give props to Vincent’s voice actor Troy Baker. He does an excellent job voicing Vincent, and
giving him life and personality. There
are a few times I thought Catherine sounded a little too over the top, but
otherwise the entire cast gave strong performances, which is somewhat expected
from such experienced voice actors. I
won’t gush over this topic any longer because I know it might not be as
interesting to everyone else as it is to me.
Bottom line though, the voice acting is solid.
Whether or not you will enjoy
Catherine really depends on if you are ready to play something different from
most games being released this generation.
It is uniquely difficult, and at times is fairly thought provoking. I wish there was a game I could compare it
to, or say if you liked this game you will like Catherine, but I just can’t
think of one. Hopefully what I have said
here already helped you make up your mind, but if you are still on the fence
there are free demos available on both Xbox360 and PS3. Even after I played the demo, I still wasn’t
sure about this game, but picked it up not only because I wanted to support
developers who were doing something different, but because I couldn’t really
get a grip on what the game really was and was curious to find out. If you find yourself curious as well, this is
a perfect game to try before all the huge winter releases eat all your
money.
-J. Lennox
