As a cat person and a human of great taste, I have to say that Mewgenics is something I’ve had my eye on for a while.
Mewgenics is the latest game from the minds of Edmund McMillen (best known for Super Meat Boy and The Binding of Isaac) and Tyler Glaiel (The End is Nigh, Aether). Indie hits with proven success in captivating a certain type of audience and vibe; difficult gameplay combined with a rather distinctive art style.
It takes the session-based, pick-up-and-play appeal of those titles, and combines it with a rather compelling roguelite format in which you’re creating an adventuring party of feline warriors to take out on a series of missions.
If you’re familiar with McMillen and Glaiel’s style, which often blends cute character art with dark, sometimes grotesque visuals, then you should know what to expect from Mewgenics. Cats, blood, gore, yeah this all sounds par for the course when it comes to these types of games.
From what I’ve played so far, I’ve come away feeling rather impressed by the sense of scale here. The Binding of Isaac was a game you could spend dozens or hundreds of hours in, playing it over and over again even after seeing the endgame content. Mewgenics is going to feel a lot like that, where you might not even be able to beat the final boss until your hours are logged into triple-digit figures.
After playing for a couple of hours, I’m certainly seeing how much of a timesink Mewgenics may become for the players it can enthrall. Each run takes you through a series of levels, with various enemies, bosses, and mini bosses preventing you from progressing. Once you get to the end of a run, your current cats are forced to retire and you need a fresh bunch of kitties to set out on the next adventure.
In that way, Mewgenics encourages you to consistently adapt to an ever-changing party. Your group of cats won’t remain the same all the way through an entire playthrough, meaning you only need to have them survive to the end of a run. Beyond that, you’ll need to adapt to a new party you’ll take into the next run.
These cats can either be the offspring of your current party, which may result in them inheriting certain traits or abilities from their parents, or you can chance it with a stray from off the streets. With how many different unique items and abilities there are (over a thousand of both, according to Mewgenics’ developers), running into certain ones feels special due to how rare they can be. And sometimes it can make or break a run, where success happens when everything comes together perfectly, or failure happens because of a stroke of bad luck.
With thousands of abilities to choose from, there’s a huge amount of variety that can come when building your team. There are some abilities that are as simple as being able to move a unit in a certain way, or dealing a special attack that deals a large amount of damage. But McMillen and Glaiel also get creative with this, featuring special attacks and moves that can alter enemy behaviour, cast unique effects on them, massively buff your party, or even use the environment to change how you play.
Let’s actually talk about combat, too. Mewgenics uses an XCOM-style turn-based stage to host each battle, where you take turns between yourself and the enemy in making a move. Your cats can move, attack, or use one of their special skills or abilities all within the same move. What feels rather relieving about this is you can use these abilities independently of each other, so you can move, attack, and use a special ability, or do the same in reverse order. Unlike some turn-based tactics games, it feels like you have a bit more freedom over how you want to control your units, and the game doesn’t necessarily punish you for assigning orders in a specific sequence.
Anyway, that might be because Mewgenics already feels punishing enough. After just a couple of hours with the game, I feel like I’m only inching closer to mastering it. Mewgenics is difficult, it’s punishing, and you should expect to fail several runs before you can really get to grips with it. And that’s why I like these types of games, in all honesty.
This is just part of the roguelike appeal of games like Mewgenics, or the previous games McMillen and Glaiel have worked on. You need to learn the language of the game rather than the game itself. Early on, you may be having a rough time trying to figure out how it works, but after spending enough time with it, it’ll suddenly click and you’ll have a better understanding of how to enjoy your time.
Although I’ve played my fair share of The Binding of Isaac and The End is Nigh in the past, Mewgenics feels like a game I can see myself properly engaging with. Turn-based tactics is one of my favourite genres, with games like XCOM, Into The Breach, and Fights In Tight Spaces remaining some of the best.
I’m looking forward to seeing where Mewgenics ranks among these titles, whether it’ll be something in the genre hall of fame, or just fall short of the moniker. Given the success of this duo’s previous titles, I’m inclined to lean towards the former.
