Catherine is an experience like no other: the game is so immersive and fresh, it's hard to not to recommend to people...
I am not going to lie: I was SUPER HYPED FOR THIS GAME! Even when the game was only going to be released in Japan only, I was still planning on getting the game, even if it meant importing a new PS3. Luckly, Atlus noticed how popular the game had become, and decided to port the game over to the states, and at the moment, I hoped on Amazon and payed for it completly on the spot. What the game was promising was something not to many games offered and I was one of the few to get the game at launch and finish the game completely. I have had about a month to play this game, so I feel I am a good fit to review the game. Alright, enough chit chat, we all know what you are asking yourselfs? Is Catherine really worth it or should you regect her right on the spot? You will just have to read to find out...
____________________
CATHERINE REVIEW
____________________
Graphics - 10/10
____________________
This game is just... what's the word I am looking for... BEAUTIFUL! This game is simply something that HAS to be seen on a HD TV, espically if you are into Animation and Art Style. The game has A LOT of personality, yet keeps it's artistic edge chosing to use colorful colors for character with dark and gritty backgrounds, which can be seen intesnly in the nightmare sequence. The visuals is like a good anime come to life, taking a note from the sometimes overlooked Dragon Ball Z games with how animey it looks, yet still manages to draw in people that aren't into the anime scene. It just something one needs to see for themselves to be honest. You are actually doing yourself a disfavor by not at least seeing the cutscenes online :)
____________________
*Special Extra Points* - Music +1
____________________
If you haven't figured it out yet by reading my reviews, I AM A HUGE FAN OF VIDEO GAME MUSIC! I don't know what it is about it, but it helps me a lot, and as a writter, it just is so great to have looping tunes that I can just zone out too to get in my "writting zone". This game is really on here because it reminds me a lot of one of my favorite anime soundtracks: Welcome to the NHK. It's a quarky soundtrack that fits the show well, and this game is the same. During the day, it's a lot of hip-hop jazz tunes and at night, you have a lot of hip-hop variations and remixs of classical masterpieces like Beethoven and Mozart... and trust me, these tunes do a amazing job bringing in the atmosphere, going from depressing to creepy to blood pumping to relaxing. Again, it's just something you have to hear for yourself as it's hard to talk and describe good music. I hate to sound like a broken record, but you are actually doing yourself a disfavor by not at least listening the music online :)
____________________
Controls - 7/10
____________________
This is where the game begins to trip over itself IMO. The controls are fine during the day levels as the days level aren't very demanding, but when you get to the actually night levels where tough puzzles dwell, you expect the game have tight controls that allow you to do exactly what you intend to do... basically, do what every Mario game does, espically with a puzzle game like this where every little move can either make you or break you. Sadly, Catherine does not offer these kind of controls. The controls are lose and they take A LONG TIME TO GET USED TO. After around 40 hours of playing the puzzle parts of the game, I still can say that I make moves that I do not intend to make souly because the controls are bad. In a game with good controls, you can't blame it for the reason you failed as it is usually your fault anyways... this game unfortunetly does the opposite. The controls are so bad that it isn't playable, but it still could use much improvement. Despit my complaints, the controls are bareable and you WILL GET USED TO THEM FAST due to the games harsh punishment for failure, it's still something we shouldn't have to deal with in this day and age, especially form such a high profile game :(
____________________
Story - 11/10
____________________
THIS IS THE REASON TO PLAY THIS GAME! The story in this game is like no other game, and goes more on lines of fallowing a visual novel rather then the action puzzle game it strives to be, but it works so well. To sum up the story simply, you play as Vincent, a 32 year old engineer who has been dating his girlfriend Katherine for almost 6 years. One night, Katherine begins to talk about the possibility of getting married, which you quickly shot down, saying how comfortable you are with the way things are now. After a meeting at the bar with your friends, a few cocktails, and a horrific block-puzzle nightmare later, you wake up the next moring with a huge headache and what is there to surprise you? Well, it's a young naked girl named Catherine, and now you are stuck between a horribly twisted love triangle. I use YOU because it is almost impossible to take this story in a non-personal mater. The way the game integrates situations such as deep questions during nightmare segments or mulitpule responces to text messages from the girls, it's hard not to put yourself in Vincent's shoes. I feel this really helps the story, as I am huge sucker for games that try there best to include you, and this brought to a whole new level thanks to the sence of immurtion you get playing through the story. The plot twists are plenty and depending on how personal you take it, you might find your decisions difficult to make, and at moments will go, "wait, what?"... of course in a good manor. In my case, I took it super personal at Katherine reminds me a hell of a lot of a ex-grilfriend I dated for about 2 years. I would love to talk in huge detail about how great to plot is, but it's something I don't feel I should spoil, espically since the game's story is so good, which is rather odd considering the fact that the story is actually very normal comapred to most video games, and that is what makes it so appealing in my opinion. You aren't play some space marine trying to end a war, or a swordsmen saving a princess, or leading a group of warriors to stop a great evil. You are just some dude who is caught up in a afair and is only dealing with it as best as humanly possible. Of course, there is a demonic element to it, but depending on how you take the story alone, this will very on heavy it actually plays in the actual story. I know to some people this game seems like one of those erotic visual novels, but it's not. People who hate anime that I have recommended the game to have come out the story satisfied and end up putting up with the harsh difficulty to see the end. I can safely say that this game has one of the best stories I have every experienced in a game before, simply because of how immersive it is with the player. This story is something that you just need to be a part of, and should be the number one reason you buy this game :)
____________________
Gameplay - 8/10
____________________
To make this as simple as possible: If you have played any game in the Personna series, you will be very familiar to this type of brackdown that is the gameplay, which isn't that big of a surprise considering Atlus is the creator of those games. The gameplay has two different types: The "Social Mode" and the "Puzzle Mode". In "Social Mode", the player is simply going around talking to NPCs. This element is more in play during the daytime segments when you walking around the bar interacting with everyone and everything, but there is a brief area between Nightmare levels that you do the same thing. "Puzzle Mode" is where the actual puzzles come in, which is more to actual "Gamey" part of the game, and althought it's deeper then some imagine, it's not very practicle. The Block Puzzles can be interesting and it can get a little complicated, but to be honest, there are better games out there that do the whole Block Puzzle thing a lot better. It's enjoyable and although I will admit it does take a while to grasp you mind around every rule in this puzzle aspect of the game, it can be very rewarding if done right, but I think the gameplay might of catered more towards another style personally :(.
____________________
Difficulty and Replay Value - 7/10
____________________
Something else this game lacks is stable Difficulty and Replay Value. The Difficulty is frustrating and most people will find Easy challenging enough, as Normal was a pretty big challange for me personally, and I enjoy challenging games like DMC and Fire Emblem. It's just seems to fendish a lot of the times, as the only hard part is the puzzles. It would be nice if there was opition on easy to skip the stages all together to just play the story, but this opition is only available to those who recieve a Gold Rank on the missions, which most people will not recieve on the first try without a visual walkthrough. As for Replay Value, the game makes a effort to give you multipule endings, with stuff like medals, a random puzzle mode that keeps track of your high score and what not, but because the gameplay for the puzzles arn't that great, your only drive to keep playing will be to see all the endings, which you can easily view online for less of a hassle and to be honest, Catherine is one of those games you can only really play through twice: Once as a blind play with doing whatever you want, and one to get whatever ending you want to see. It's sad to say, but the replay value on this one isn't that great :(.
____________________
Final Score - 9/10
____________________
Personally, I really loved this game, but I will be the first to admit that not everyone will agree with this review. I was very generious with some of the scores and if you don't enjoy the games story, then you will most likely not enjoy this game all that much, and $60 might be to much for people right now as the game is about 7-10 hours long on easy, but I still think the game is worth at least renting. It's something like no other game out there with a story that is so immersive and well put together, that alone is reason to give this game a shot. Even though tthe game isn't the masterpiece I had hoped for, it's still enjoyable and is really something everyone should at least give a rent. I am pleased to give Catherine a very rewarding 9 out of 10!
____________________
I am sora_heart and I hope you enjoyed this review. If you liked this, be sure to check out my blog and other reviews on my page. So until then, I will see you all in my next review, whenever and whatever that is... Well, I am going to sleep now since it is almost 12 in the morning... I just hope I don't have any nightmares... LOL!