The Cat Lady

***The Cat Lady*** is an indie graphic adventure game with psychological horror elements developed by Remigiusz Michalski under Harvester Games. Released on December 1, 2012, it is the second game developed by Harvester Games and the first game in the Devil Came Through Here trilogy. The game features Susan Ashworth, a middle-aged cat-loving woman suffering from depression, and Mitzi Hunt, a young woman bent on avenging her lover's suicide.

It was originally released in English, and now has eight available text translation options including French, German, and Spanish, among others. On May 4, 2013 an album was released featuring the outsourced music in the game by Warmer, 5iah and Tears Of Mars.

### Summary

**“***Susan is just a person next door, the kind of neighbour we never pay much attention to because they keep to themselves. We all know people like that. We just assume they like their privacy and have their own set of friends they like to hang out with… but in fact, they have no one.
 She’s very lonely, but she thinks she likes it like this. Or even thinks she deserves to be lonely. She made a mistake in her life and now she’s paying for it.***”**
―Remigiusz Michalski
Susan Ashworth, a lonely "cat lady" suffering from depression, attempts to commit suicide by swallowing an overdose of sleeping pills. She wakes up in an alternate world and meets The Queen of Maggots, an enigmatic old lady who claims to understand Susan's distress. The Queen of Maggots grants Susan immortality and gives Susan a mission that she must fulfill to become happy: find five evil human beings called The Parasites, and kill them. Susan returns to the world of the living despite her wish to die forever.

A young woman called Mitzi Hunt rents a room in Susan's apartment as part of her mission to take revenge on the man who encouraged her boyfriend to commit suicide. Susan and Mitzi slowly become close friends and look after each other as they try to further their goals.

There are different endings that the player can obtain. Michalski, the game's creator, has stated in an interview that he considers one of them to be canon.

## Gameplay

*See also Achievements for a list of achievements available in the game.*
The game is plot-heavy, and motion takes place in a side-scroller mode. Options to interact with objects pop up when Susan approaches them. An inventory bar at the bottom of the screen displays the objects in Susan's inventory. Dialogue trees appear in certain conversations, allowing the player to choose the direction of the conversation.

Certain options allow the player to "style" Susan's background and character to their taste, while some options have an impact on the ending the player receives.

There are some choices that influence the game ending.

## Development

*The Cat Lady* was developed by Remiguisz Michalski using the Adventure Game Studio platform.

A demo was released on September 15th, 2012, and pre-orders were made available on the same day. The game was released on December 1st, 2012. Several trailers were made to promote the game's release and its Steam Community Greenlight.

## Reception

*The Cat Lady* has an 8/10 ranking on Gamespot and an 81/100 Metascore on Metacritic.org, with a 8.4/10 user score.

The game won "Best Story" at the 2012 Aggie Awards, hosted by Adventure Gamers and Innovation, Indie Adventure of 2012 and Best Game Environment .

The game also won "Adventure of the Year" from the editors of Adventure-Treff, a German gaming website. It also received 6 nominations in the Adventure Game Studio awards for 2012.

## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 INTERVIEW – In Conversation With Remigiusz Michalski (Harvester Games, *The Cat Lady*) (12 July 2013) *Alternative Magazine Online*. Retrieved on 2014 February 11.
2. ↑ *The Cat Lady* *Adventure Game Studio*.
3. ↑ "Big night tonight: the demo is officially out" *Facebook*. Retrieved on 2014 April 1.
4. ↑ "*The Cat Lady* is OUT!!!" (01 December 2012) *Facebook*. Retrieved on 2014 April 1.
5. ↑ Kevin VanOrd. *The Cat Lady* Review *GameSpot*. Retrieved on 2014 February 11.
6. ↑ AG Staff (20 February 2013). 2012 Aggie Awards FEATURE *Adventure Gamers*. Retrieved on 2014 February 11.
7. ↑ Adventure des Jahres 2012: Ergebnisse der Redaktion *Adventure Treff website*. Retrieved on 2014 February 12.

## External links

* Official website
* The Cat Lady on Steam