Stray

Genre: Misc.

Players: 1

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Review:

Stray, released on PlayStation 4 and PC in 2022, ported to Xbox one in 2023, and then ported to Nintendo Switch in 2024, is difficult to describe to those who haven’t played it. When Stray was first announced in 2020, many didn’t quite know what to make of this game where you apparently played as a cat in a cyberpunk-style post-apocalyptic city. What sort of game was this, exactly? And now that I’ve spent hours playing it, I can say… that is a very good question.

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Mrow?

There’s a lot of jumping from platform to platform here, but it’s not really a Platformer because the platform-jumping is context-sensitive and partly automatic – unless you’re scripted to fall, you won’t. There’s a decent amount of searching for items needed to solve puzzles much in line with a Graphic Adventure, but that doesn’t seem to be the meat of the gameplay. There are elements of Horror here, in an ever-present enemy that seems harmless at first but it doesn’t take long to see them for the horrible threat they really are. Action? Action-RPG? There are good arguments for and against both, I suppose.

While playing Stray, there was one point of comparison I frequently found myself thinking of, and that is the Half-Life series. Unlike those games, Stray is decidedly not a First-person Shooter nor are its puzzles physics-based, but Stray gives the same feel of gradually moving through a world in a mostly-linear fashion, with each new area presenting a different style of gameplay challenge.

In one area, you may find yourself carefully finding your path along the side of the messy structures that form the game’s cyberpunk-style city, while another might have you searching a small community for clues to the fates of a robot’s friends. Next you may find yourself sneaking past a deadly threat, and then not long after running for your life to escape that threat in a massive action set piece. This game is tremendously good at providing the player with a variety of gameplay, all in a world with phenomenal level design.

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Hssssssssss!

Not everything works perfectly, though. The context-sensitive jumping is the culprit much of the time here, because the game gets finnicky when you have multiple potential platforms you can jump to, with the slightest movement shifting the cursor from one to another. This can be particularly frustrating when you need to move quickly to evade an enemy, but can’t rely on the cursor going where you want it to in the heat of the moment. Another issue is that the game chooses for you what platforms you can and cannot jump to, and while this does ensure that you’re not led astray (ha) from the game’s intended path, it can feel arbitrary when the game will let you jump here but not there.

Also, I have to point out that sometimes goals could stand to be a little clearer. The game does provide a hint system to tell you where you need to be going next, but a few times this wasn’t enough to properly guide me. At one point in particular I was trapped in a small room with seemingly no way to escape, and had to search online for the solution – an environmental interaction I overlooked because 95% of the time in the game it’s purely aesthetic and has no effect on the gameplay.

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Purrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Finally, let’s talk about the presentation. Stray has naturally seen a significant downgrade from other platforms – there’s aliasing and pop-in, some textures are blurrier, the volumetric fog that made a huge impact on the original release’s atmosphere is gone here, and the resolution has been reduced to 720p docked, 540p handheld (thanks to Nintendo World Report for the numbers).

Yet despite all of these changes, the game remains a graphical marvel on Nintendo Switch, and it’s surprising how little these changes affect the overall look of the game. Stray’s cyberpunk-style environments are still absolutely gorgeous and full of plenty of incredible detail that really builds out the world, whether you’re in a room absolutely filled with stacks of books that move with real-time physics when you interact with them, moving through concrete canyons lined with thousands of leaves growing off of the sides, walking through neon-lit streets with buildings cluttered together and the ground littered with trash and sprinkled with puddles that reflect the world above, this game’s world is gorgeous. What’s more, this game has outstanding lighting and shadows, and players can see architecture at an impressive distance despite the aforementioned pop-in issues. In other words, despite the laundry list of downgrades from other platforms’ versions of Stray, the Nintendo Switch version of the game is still an absolute feast for the eyes, and it’s a feast that does an incredible job building up the lore of the game’s world.

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Mew… Mew mew rrowr meow mew

On that note, I should talk about the story. As mentioned before, you play as a cat, and although this is a cat that has the advantage of your human intelligence, it is otherwise a normal cat, unable to speak, open doors, or use complex technology on its own. After getting separated from its group of cat friends (or family, perhaps?), it sets out to explore in search for a way to rejoin them, though this soon leads to encounters with the AI-controlled denizens of the city, and you’ll soon find yourself working alongside them to help them in their own struggles.

The game does find a cheat to give you some semblance of conversations with these machines, with players early on getting an AI companion who can translate their language for you, allow you to interact with tech, and to digitally store and use quest items. This element sacrifices some realism for videogame convention, but so too does a videogame that has an otherwise realistic cat going on quests and completing tasks.

Still, the game’s robotic characters are adorable, with stories it’s easy to get engrossed in. What’s more, seemingly every element of this game is steeped in wonderful lore that makes it hard not to get engrossed in the game, curious to discover the history of this strange place: What is this city? Where are all the humans? Where did these strange little creatures come from? Who built the robots and why? What’s the deal with your semi-amnesiac AI companion? And why would anyone just randomly have a backpack designed for a cat laying around their apartment? At least some of these questions have answers, for those willing to seek them out.

Finally, we need to talk about sound. While this game doesn’t have voiced dialogue, your cat makes plenty of cat noises, all of the game’s robotic characters make different sorts of electronic noises that suit them well, and the critters you encounter will make cute squeaky noises that will have a different effect on you when you hear them later in the game. These sounds join the creaking sounds of a city rusting over and falling apart, often joined by dripping water coming from leaks, making for a unique soundscape. And this is enhanced further by the game’s low-key synthesized soundtrack that keeps the game grounded in its futuristic setting even as you’re digging through a pile of trash or sploshing through a sewer.

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Meeeeeow

Overall, I think Stray is an outstanding game, one that’s so unique it’s hard to pin down to a genre, but one that I found it very difficult to put down because of the incredible world design, the great gameplay variety, and the engrossing story and lore of the world, and these strong qualities made it easy for me to overlook some occasional frustrations with the controls and at times unclear goals. And while the Nintendo Switch version is clearly a downgrade from other platforms, it ultimately doesn’t seem to have lost too much in the transition to Nintendo’s underpowered hardware, resulting in a game that is still visually-stunning. If you have another platform to play this game on, that’s probably a better bet, but if your primary platform of choice is Nintendo Switch, I do not think this version of the game will let you down, and I absolutely recommend playing it.

tl;dr – Stray is a game that has players taking the role of a cat exploring a post-apocalyptic cyberpunk-style city, and while it is difficult to pin to a genre, it shines through with its blend of superb level design and gameplay variety, its engrossing story and lore, and its impressive graphics that, while clearly downgraded from other platforms, still looks fantastic on Nintendo Switch. And while I have some nitpicks with controls and occasionally unclear goals, overall I think this is a magnificent game that absolutely needs to be played.

Grade: A-

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This game has been nominated for one or more of eShopperReviews 2024 Game Awards:

Winner:

Best Port/Remake – In a year where Nintendo Switch is showing its age more than ever before, Stray is a lone example of a port from modern platforms that still manages to sacrifice very little in its trip to Nintendo’s underpowered hardware. This game still looks and plays fantastic on Nintendo Switch, and this alone is an incredibly impressive feat that seems increasingly rare.

Runner-Up: Best Misc. Game, Most Original, Best Sound Design, Best Graphics, Best Story

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