While Fort Meow seems like a simple game, it's a lot of fun. The story is easy to follow, but it's interesting. You get to play as a little girl named Nia who goes to visit her grandparents, but finds them missing and a house overrun with cats. Nia explores the house and finds her grandfather's journal. As Nia starts reading to find out what happened, a bunch of cats start attacking keeping her from reading. This is where Fort Meow begins.
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| Nia is surprised by a group of cats. |
Fort Meow is essentially a tower defense game, but the simple charm of it is Nia building a fort out of pillows, furniture, and various household items to defend against the army of cats attacking so she can read the journal and solve the mystery of her grandparents being gone and why there are so many cats. Different cats have different abilities which means certain types of furniture have a defense against each type of cat. If a cat lands in Nia's lap, it's game over.
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| Nia starts her fort defense from the cats. |
The game makes you think about strategy in the build of your fort because you don't have a limitless supply of building materials. For each level you have a set amount of points and each item you place costs points. The game is pretty forgiving with each level if you fail. You can clear everything out and rebuild, trying different items and figuring out new strategies for building your fort. Certain objects do better against each type of cat. For example, bean bag chairs work great in defending against fat cats. With each successful victory, Nia gets to read more of her grandfather's journal and see more of the story about him being an inventor and reveals in the story about the cats.
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| Reading the journal to solve the mystery. |
As the story continues, Nia is able to explore other rooms of the house to find useful objects she can use to build her fort. There are small puzzles in the rooms that unlock things like batteries to power some of the gadgets she finds to help her out. As you progress, you are able to unlock more of the rooms which gives you access to more items for your fort. Sometimes the fort building could be challenging when I failed a level, but I found myself enjoying trying again because of the relaxing whimsical atmosphere and the charming art style of the game. The music in the game adds to the overall feel of the game as well.
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| Exploring the house for fort building items. |
Fort Meow is not a long game, easily finished in three hours. However, don't let the short gameplay fool you. What it lacks in length it makes up for in a good story, fun gameplay, and lots of different ways to try fort building. It shines in its simplicity because it's something you can play in short bursts or one long sitting and have a great time doing it.
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| Having a great time in Fort Meow. |
*Fort Meow is available to play on Steam and iphone/ipad
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