A game that combines cats and Kandinsky

thecatthatgotthemilk.com

By Matthew Hawkins

If you enjoy video games (perhaps a given, if you're reading this), as well abstract art, be sure to give "The Cat That Got The Milk" a look. It's a free game, available for PC and Mac, with an online version coming soon.

The premise is quite simple: "It's a night out on the town from a cat's abstract perspective" the game's Facebook page describes. The game's controls are equally basic; your cat moves forward automatically, just hit either the up or down arrows to make turns. But the challenge is anything but.

There are 18 levels in total, which the game's creators state should take only 15 minutes to complete. Those with less than cat-like reflexes may have a tad bit of trouble, but not much.

But aside from the surprisingly deep challenge is the visuals, which clearly takes it cues from modern artists, such as Piet Mondrian and Wassily Kandinsky:

The game was highlighted last night by Joystiq, and as result, download time?appears to be on the slow side. Still,?it's worth the wait.

"The Cat That Got The Milk" is not the first game to draw inspiration from an innovator of the modern art movement. The much-celebrated "Rez," which first came out for the PS2 in 2001 (and later for Xbox in 2008) was also directly influenced by Kandinsky (its working title was "K Project").

Visually speaking, "Rez" looked more like "Tron" and other examples of the early 80s computer graphics than Kandinsky's paintings. But it's the interplay with the audio that is the real connection; the artist had a form of synesthesia which allowed him?to visualize music ? something the game attempts to emulate:

Back to "The Cat That Got The Milk"; perhaps the only ones who will be disappointed by the game are cat lovers. Those who desire something less abstract need look no further than "ChatChat," the latest from Terry Cavanagh, the indie game developer best known for "VVVVVV" on the PC, Mac, and most recently 3DS.

As a multiplayer game about being a cat, it appears mostly to be a chat room, but certain functions can be enabled if one is familiar with text adventures. It can be played here. The instructions here are pretty simply as well: "Be a cat."

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Matthew Hawkins is an NYC-based game journalist who has also written for EGM, GameSetWatch, Gamasutra, Giant Robot, and numerous others. He also self-publishes his own game culture zine, is part of Attract Mode, and co-hosts The Fangamer Podcast. You can keep tabs on him via?Twitter,?or his personal home-base,?FORT90.com.

Source: http://ingame.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/02/06/10333696-a-game-that-combines-cats-and-kandinsky

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