Fort Meow showed up as part of a feline styled bundle over at Bundle Stars. I like kitties =^.^= which meant I was pretty much obligated to buy it and try the games out.

You play as a kid who -- -- - --- - -- Well the intro just stuttered too much. But you sit in the attic of your grandparents' house and have to build forts to prevent cats from sitting in your lap.

What kind of terrible human being does not want a kitty cuddle?

The basic game is one of the many physics/balance puzzlers out there, the twist here being that cats 'fly' at you from the screen edges and attack the fortifications you have made out of furniture and household objects.

Each cat has an Attack Score, each item has some Hit Points. Cat attacks wear down the HP until the item vanished in a puff of smoke and YOU'RE A KITTY.

There's no bone-weight to each item, they're all rigid, but they wall fall towards gravity and slide along each other if placed at a rotated angle. Or if lower portions are hit by cats.

You start off with a couple of couches, some brooms, and mattresses. A small number of cats will 'attack' you and try to get to your lap. The aim is to place the fort pieces in purfect placement so that you can read a chapter of a book and learn more about the grandparents and their cats. Simple, right?...

As the game progresses you eventually hear a ding-dong of the house doorbell and find a present waiting for you. A small limited use item that can be used during the gameplay level to assist surviving fluffy felines. This might be a tool to repair damaged fort pieces, a super-soaker to spray cats and weaken their attacks, catnip to distract them, and more.

It is somewhat random on what one you get, but they are also not required to be used and you can just leave them sitting in the attack until you get to a level where you need the extra abilities. The next few deliveries show up as an icon on the game screen, and you no longer need to go down stairs.

This type of thing is where I would expect microtransactions, and there does appear to be an iOS port. Thankfully there is none of that catshit in this game, not even remnants like I saw in Cat on a Diet.

Instead, you just face off the RNG and trial end error. If you think a level should of worked, it might be worth just running the same simulation again as the very slight apparent randomness in the physics engine may of just caused a cat to blast off in a different direction.

Different cat types show up over time too. Classic internet meme callbacks like limecat show up as a melon-cat. A melon wearing cat that shoots across the lower field of the attic. While Meloncat does high damage, you can sacrifice a low level item to it as it only has one shot of getting in your lap...

Until the later levels where several meloncats appear. From both sides of the attic.

There's also a giant purple cat that will hulk-smash its way through your fort, determined to get to you. What's a person to do? Well...

The second part of the game involves building a robot from random gift drops, and exploring the house looking for extra items. It's not a hidden object game, and each item is obvious in that you can pick it up. But you have to use the robot to get the item. Even things what would weigh less than a kilo. And the robot has a limited charge... Wait... You will carry a package all the way upstairs, but not a pillow from the floor below you?

Anyway, this adds a nice little bit of choice to a game that would otherwise be a rather bland physics game (albeit one with cats). Do you grab the beanbag to deflect the large cat? What about the catnip to distract them? Or the yarn-catapult?

Sure you could get the other item when the robot charges next time. Or you could let the bot charge to 200% power and grab both at once... But still, I liked exploring the house for fort parts.

Additionally to this is finding light globes from VERY BASIC PUZZLES. Puzzles where you are directly told what to click on. I never got far enough into the playthough to see if there was anything truly hidden, and this part of the house search felt more like the waste of time I was anticipating.

Is it anything special? No. But it is charming fun and gave me a good distraction.

There's nice little bits like the attic changing over time, and the way things are introduced is at a slow and easy going pace. If you like simple physics games and cats, I say to check it out.

Game Acquisition: On Sale (Bundle Stars).
Platform Used: Steam
Tweet Threads: 1 - 17 December 2016
PC Used: Scorptec Venom 2009 MK2

OS: Windows Vista
Processor: Dual-Core 2.0 GHz or better
Memory: 1 GB RAM
Graphics: ATI Radeon X1300/NVidia GeForce 6600 GT or better
DirectX: Version 9.0c
Storage: 160 MB available space
Sound Card: DirectX-Compatible Sound Card
Additional Notes: Windows Media Codec required for cutscene videos

Ois' note: On my system the intro video just stuttered ever second or so. Once in game everything ran smoothly.