STRAY’S feline protagonist seems to be as popular with players as it is with their pets.
The latest indie darling which has soared to success in all the gaming charts is Stray, a game where you can play as a stray cat in the city.
A grey tabby cat watches its owner play Stray
As a completely new property, Stray‘s popularity was hard to predict.
The internet has always enjoyed kooky kitten antics, so it made sense that a game with a cat at its core would see such success.
The game has not only been popular with the people playing, but the little ones actions on screen seem so lifelike that cats can’t stop watching either.
On social media cat owners have been sharing their pets’ reactions to the kitties on screen.
Many are simply curious and their heads bob and weave keeping track of their polygonal feline friends.
Others try to reach out and interact with the cats on the screen.
Twitter and other social media accounts such as @CatsWatchStray have been collecting all these images and clips together so feline fans can watch their antics.
What seems to have captured these cats’ imaginations is the dedicated meowing button.
While many games feature cats and other small creatures few put them as the focus.
On PlayStation 5 the cats’ meows can be heard directly from the controller.
This has led some players to film their kitties pawing at the controls, looking like they want to play.
Stray was originally developed by two ex-Ubisoft developers living in the South of France.
The main inspiration for the protagonist was one of their cats, Murtaugh, an orange stray which they found under a car in Montpellier.
Their other cat Riggs and the in-house cats at the studio, Oscar and Jun, also served as inspiration.
The team spent a long time analysing cats actions and movements in order to make the in-game models feel as real as possible.
Their hard work seems to have paid off as many pets can’t tell the on screen kitties from the real thing.
Stray is available now on PC and PlayStation.
Written by Georgina Young on behalf of GHLF.
