Stray

Over the last 3 or 4 days I have played through Stay, a game which my friend Jamie recommended earlier in the year. As a cat lover I had my eye on Stray back in 2022 when it was first released, but for one reason or another I never got around to playing it. When Jamie said I could use her copy of the game in addition to a glowing recommendation, I couldn’t come up with any more reasons not to play.

Developed by BlueTwelve Studio using Unreal Engine 4, my first thought was that Stay is a graphically pleasing game giving modern triple-a games a run for their money. But Stay is much more than that. The protagonist, a cat, has been expertly developed by fellow cat lovers. Everything from the animations, behaviours and sounds are based off of real cats owned by the developers. There are even 23 cats named in the credits which I thought was really cool.

Set in a sort of post apocalyptic, perhaps even post dystopian futuristic city filled with robots, the game has a pretty decent (albeit short) underlying story to it. I found most of the robots really funny and I liked interacting with them. I also enjoyed the somewhat oriental atmosphere to the city which is filled with neon lights. The cat has a drone companion, B-12 (see what they did there?) which translates what the robots say and starts to remember things which it had forgotten before you met it. I can’t say much more without potentially spoiling the game for any reader who hasn’t played it yet, but I highly recommend that you take your time and explore every aspect of the game.

The only criticism I have is that the game is short. If rushed I think most people could complete the game in 6 hours, but if you take your time you could probably stretch it out to 9 or 10. There isn’t much replay value but I think that’s OK. For me Stay is a game best played when you’re ‘between games’ or as a way to take a break from a game you’re investing a lot of time. The game isn’t particularly challenging but it has a few puzzles to solve. I really enjoyed this play through and have added Stray to my list of completed games, something I am relieved to see growing steadily.