Catherine Review

How do you begin to describe a game like Catherine? Is it horror? Comedy? A puzzle game? An RPG? Is it about love? Sex? Responsibility? Freedom? Actually, it's all of the above. A patchwork of seemingly disparate game-types, Catherine is part hard-as-nails puzzler and part story-heavy adventure - you'll bounce between them according to what time it is in the game. The days and evenings consist of cinematics and visits to the Stray Sheep bar for adventure-style interactions, while sleepy-time is reserved for battling "nightmare" tower challenges.

At the game's start, you know only as much (or as little) as hapless man-child hero Vincent Brooks. Living a life of semi-slackerdom, he's a 32-year-old schmoe shrugging his way through a vaguely-defined job while dodging commitment to his longtime girlfriend, Katherine. She, however, is ready to kick things up a notch. Maybe.

You see, no one in Catherine says exactly what they mean. Instead, they skirt around issues like... well, just like people do in the real world. But then Catherine arrives at his local watering hole, dressed in a barely-there outfit. Cue the potential infidelity, crisis of conscience and dead bodies.

Vincent's existence becomes one long nightmare of screwball booty calls, sussing out what's real and what's imaginary, and fighting in a string of bizarre, sheep-filled dream sequences where his fears are out to kill him. On one hand, you're responsible for guiding him through tough, block-riddled puzzle segments.

On the other, you'll spend alcohol-fuelled evenings at the bar with his similarly troubled bros, making multiple-choice decisions that'll determine his fate, as well as that of the other emotionally stunted men he bumps into both inside and outside of his nightly dream-state sojourns.

Sound bizarre? Well, it is. Yet the madness is spell-binding - if you have the stomach to survive Catherine's gruelling tower-puzzle scenarios. Even with the game's countless helpful tutorials and technique-laden tips, you'll tax your dexterity in pushing, pulling, and climbing blocks to reach your goal far above while juking crazed sheep and hazardous obstacles - all within a very tight time limit.

Death is no stranger to those who brave Catherine, and neither is hitting the Retry option over and over again. It's frustrating on anything but the Easy setting (which grants more retries and a slightly more forgiving time limit outside of boss stages). And even on Easy, these puzzles can crush the toughest of souls. This game is not for the undetermined or those seeking cheap thrills. But for the right gamer, the chance to unravel the mystery - and horror - of Vincent's mid-life crisis becomes worthwhile.

Outside of the love-it-or-hate-it puzzles, it's everything else you do in-game that makes Catherine so deliciously unique. Each of the nine in-game days goes through a pattern that allows you to hang out at the Stray Sheep pub each night withyour buddies, talking to the regulars, reading and replying to texts on your phone, and messing around in a 64-stage 8bit version of the puzzle segments called Rapunzel.

You'll even find sheep versions of the folks you talk to at the bar wandering the interstitial "landings" between nightmare tower floors. Both are important, as what you say to them can affect which of seven endings you receive - they're determined by a Law or Chaos meter that swings to and fro with each decision you make throughout the game. The cleverness, paired with the real-world setting, makes for a tale that's never been told before in a game. And it's a blast to participate in, even if you'll chafe at the one-dimensional nature of Vincent's love interests or the somewhat dudebro-skewed view of Catherine's world.

As a character, Vincent's personality, reactions, and dilemma ring exceptionally true, metaphorical sheep-deaths and all. Letting us playfully poke around his paralysed psyche makes for an absolutely ridiculous but surprisingly insightful ride, well worth taking for anyone with a taste for the truly odd.

Catherine hits Europe today. Are you buying it? Let us know what you think.