Smash Cat Heroes Review

Get your claws at the ready as cute armour wearing kitty cats’ scurry into battle in this adorable button mashing game, available on the Nintendo 3DS eshop.

As a fan of hack and slash video games, such as; Dynasty Warriors and Samurai Warriors I had a good feeling that I would enjoy this condensed version with tiny feline heroes and I was not wrong! Once I loaded the game, the cat puns just kept on coming with the instructions to ‘Purress the A button!’ blinking at me on the touch screen. Once purressed (sorry, not sorry), you will be taken to a character select screen with three different cat warriors to choose from.

After the difficult selection of adorableness, it’s time to enter the first level of your epic journey! However, you are given the options to shop! (X button on stage select) or to equip! (Y button on stage select), but because you are fresh and new to the Smash Cat Heroes world, you will need to defeat some enemies first before you can do some shopping.

The game will show you the controls before you start and like in all hack and slash games, button mash for the win! They are very simple controls; use the joy stick or D-pad to move and depending on the situation and your spirit bar (which is displayed underneath the HP of your feisty feline) you can either use a normal attack which is the Y button or a Special which is the A button. If you are lucky and have enough spirit, then you may be able to activate your hero’s hyper move! But never fret if you don’t have enough spirit! If you’re in the clear, you can recharge by holding your L and R buttons. If you’re trying to escape from a tight spot then by pressing the B button you can dash away as quick as a flash to avoid any unnecessary harm to your kitty.

Playing the first level, I was quite surprised how hard the enemy cats hit, they really put up a fight as I had to try a couple of times before I could defeat the end boss. Maybe I’m losing my touch, who knows, but it did feel good playing a game similar to the popular Koei games. I did forget which buttons did what but it was very useful that by pressing ‘paws’ (it’s the game not me, honest!) I can click the Y button to open the guide to refresh my memory. For each mission there are side missions which you can choose to complete and they will earn you different amounts of cash when done. These are definitely worth doing if you can as your furry friend will become a lot more powerful the more money you have.

The story revolves around the samurai cats’ who are in search of the legendary Super Cat Food that was rumoured to grant its eater all the power in the world! As you progress you will meet more and more evil alley cats and the difficulty and missions will be a lot more challenging. There are also other playable cats you can unlock as you play through more of the game so try and get them all, the more the merrier!

As Smash Cat Heroes is based on samurai’s and ancient Japanese history the music is very oriental sounding and matches in well with the game. The characters are not voiced so you would have to read the text yourself, but the upbeat style music will get you pumped as you enter the battlefield. The art style is what enticed me to play the game, I absolutely adore anything cute and if it has animals involved too, then that is just the cherry on top for me. The graphics are simple yet elegant, with enough detail to make it a visually attractive game.

After playing through more levels and trying out the different characters, I am pleased to say that although it is not as intense as Koei’s Dynasty Warriors and Samurai Warriors, it is a nice hack and slash game to have on the 3DS. So if you are a cat person but also like to battle with them, then this game is the perfect combo for you.

REVIEW CODE: A complimentary Nintendo 3DS code was provided to Brash Games for this review. Please send all review code enquiries to editor@brashgames.co.uk.