It's my 20th day as a Cat Cafe Manager and I can't get a rating above a C. The eclectic menagerie of clients, which ranges from punks who only drink herbal tea to vagabonds content with a glass of tap water, seem to be mostly happy with my service, but my grades refuse to reflect that. As a result, the plucky lo-fi plinks of Cat Cafe Manager's score don't calm me, but instead, feel like they're mocking my mediocrity.
Cat Cafe Manager isn't easy - which makes sense, as I'd imagine managing a cat cafe in real life isn't easy. You have to keep track of your inventory, clean the floor when Chicken Nugget decides to rebuke the litter box, and chat with clients for painstakingly too long during peak lunch hour. But despite its refusal to grade me above a C and my often panicked gaming sessions, Cat Cafe Manager has me hooked with its claws.
Welcome to Caterwaul
Cat Cafe Manager starts just like a really good Lifetime movie would: you, a young person from the city, head to a remote village named Caterwaul to run your late grandmother's cat cafe. Caterwaul is full of fishermen, artists, punks, witches, and businesspeople all looking to satiate their appetites for Italian espresso, pretzels, and cat snuggles, and it's your job to provide all of that (and more). The lore here is adorably in-depth: a fisherman named Bonner is a forgetful older gay man, a spacey witch named Carla-Lalla wonders aloud about the quality of her life choices, a chipper businessman considers selling the town's soul to a big bad shadow corporation. The story helps make Cat Cafe Manager even more delightful, especially as you learn that there's a mysticism to the feline denizens of Caterwaul, an ancient power lying dormant in its fields.
Your cafe begins modestly: you, the sole employee, in a cafe built from some starter materials, serve water to vagabonds and pretzels to witches until you can earn enough to buy more equipment and ingredients. Each visitor pays you in a different currency which can be used to buy different things, so if you're especially low on fish and really need a new litter box, you can advertise your cafe to just fishermen in the hopes you'll make up the difference quickly.
The mechanics are incredibly simple: use your WASD keys to walk up to a prompt and long press to complete tasks. This is how you clean up cat piss, serve drinks, tidy the bathroom, and make food, with your skill level determining how long it takes you to do each. You can use the map in the bottom left-hand corner of the screen to travel to shops in order to buy furniture, food, and cat supplies, or head to the cat shrine to choose your next project to work towards. The projects help you grow your cafe, whether that's by adding new menu items, more seats, or staff - the latter becomes necessary rather quickly.
The cat cafe life
The modest beginnings of my cat cafe (which I name Feline Fine) mean that my first few in-game days are relatively chill. I put out food for the town's strays, pet them to earn their trust, and quickly get two roaming about the cafe charming clients while I serve tap water. But after adding an espresso machine and working my way up the surprisingly extensive project paths, my cafe quickly becomes hectic. Townsfolk come in and out, cooing and psspss-ing at the cats that howl and meow for attention. They demand lattes and conversation and frown at my crappy bathroom, my coffee machine breaks mid-shift and I have to drop everything to slowly fix it, a cat yowls because his food bowl is empty, I run out of coffee beans and haven't had enough witches in (whose currency is used to buy ingredients) and have to serve tepid glasses of H2O to frowning businessmen who asked for black coffee.
By day 10 and my 10th D rating in a row, I'm frustrated as all hell and somehow sweating IRL. When I can't get above a C after day 20, I'm apoplectic. Our own Rachel Weber said she's never seen me angrier while playing a video game, and I usually play Warzone and Apex Legends. It's clear that I need help, fast. While you can't choose to go down more than one project path at the cat shrine, you can swiftly progress through a project if your cafe is busy enough, or if you use the town board (which needs to be unlocked through a shrine) to adopt out a cafe cat.
After finishing a project that lets me add milkshakes to the menu, I'm able to work towards a project that will let me hire staff. From there, I work towards hiring more. In no time, Feline Fine is a well-oiled machine, with four employees bustling about, taking orders, and - after some skill point spending - cleaning up piss and chatting with customers. Within just a few game days, Feline Fine is consistently getting A grades and serving upwards of 25 customers a day.
But there's more to do. I want to serve fancy drinks and have more cat companions wandering about underfoot. I want to add extensions to the cafe which I can do with lumber (the punk's currency) and buy better furniture at the local store to help improve the ambiance. And the promise of an intriguing story, teased by the occasional appearance of an ethereal-looking cat, has me wanting more even after consistently getting A grades. Cat Cafe Manager is surprisingly in-depth and hilariously hectic, and it's my current catnip of choice.
Cat Cafe Manager is available on PC and Nintendo Switch.
