$10.99Is CATO: Buttered Cat worth it?
CATO: Buttered Cat is worth it if…
- you like puzzle platformers that stay cute while the puzzles get genuinely tricky
- you want a relaxed local co-op game to play with a friend on the couch
- you enjoy collecting outfits and poking around for hidden rooms
- you have a soft spot for retro pixel art and a good silly premise
Screenshots
Two heroes, one paradox
The cat runs left and right, climbs scratching boards and squeezes through pipes, but it cannot jump. The toast cannot walk, but it leaps like a projectile: hold the button and it flies farther. Each one's weakness is the other's strength, and every puzzle is built around that trade.
Then there is the paradox. Strap the toast to the cat's back and the two spin in place forever, which means infinite mid-air jumps. A door only the cat fits through, a ledge only the toast can reach, a gap that needs the combined pair: you decide when to split them up and when to put them back together.
Five worlds of contraptions
The adventure runs across five worlds, each packed with its own machines. Toasters (the toast has opinions about these), buttered trampolines and speed-boosting space pipes all bend the rules in new ways, and later worlds mix them together until a simple-looking room becomes a small Rube Goldberg machine.
Most of the time this is a puzzle game, not a reflex test: you can take it slow and think. A few pesky enemies do stand in the way, and your abilities are enough to deal with them. Mysterious companions show up along the route to lend a hand with the trickier setups.
Secrets, skins and a cozy hideout
Beyond the 140+ main levels there are more than 60 side levels, many tucked behind secret passages. Hidden rooms hold Easter eggs from other worlds and mysterious drop items, and finding a passage you walked past twice is its own little victory.
Everything you collect comes back to your hideout: a cozy little base where you can put on your favourite outfit and set off again. There are more than 70 skins for cat and toast to collect, and the mini-games you unlock can be installed on the console there and played anytime.
A puzzle night for two
The whole game works as local co-op: one player takes the cat, the other takes the toast. Since the two move in completely different ways, you naturally start talking things through. Which one goes up the scratching board, who takes the pipe, when do we meet to combine and float across the gap.
It makes a easygoing couch session: puzzles you solve together, silly moments when a plan falls apart, and boss fights and mini-games to share when you want a change of pace. Nothing here needs fast fingers or a headset, just a second controller and someone to blame the toast.
Quick questions?
Can you play it solo?
Yes. The game is built as a singleplayer puzzle platformer first: you control both the cat and the toast yourself, switching between them as each puzzle demands. Local co-op is there if a friend wants to join, but nothing in the game requires a second player.
How hard is it, really?
It starts gentle and teaches each new mechanic step by step, so early levels feel light. From the middle worlds on, the puzzles ask for real thought, and a few sections want some timing and dexterity too. There is a hint system when you get stuck, and failure is never punishing, so the challenge stays friendly.
Is there a story?
There is one, told in pieces. Cat and toast are searching for something, and fragments of what that is are scattered along the adventure for you to piece together. Expect a light, jokey thread rather than a heavy plot: the puzzles are the main event.
