Cat Earth is a light, imaginative family card game that mixes simple card play with a surprisingly cut‑throat little spatial puzzle, all wrapped in artwork and components so charming and characterful that they become the game’s defining feature.
It’s breezy, colourful and visually alluring, with a streamlined design that makes Cat Earth far more accessible than many children’s games, yet still satisfying enough to keep adults invested alongside younger players. It can occasionally run a little bit long, but if you can get your children playing it among themselves, that can be quite the bonus!
Cat Earth begins with a wonderfully silly premise — that giant cats have taken over the planet — and the game runs with that concept right from outset. From the moment you open the box, the artwork sets a fantastic, silly mood: bright colours, expressive cat characters and a playful sense of humour that makes every component feel like part of the experience. Outset Games clearly understands how much visual identity matters in a lightweight title, and Cat Earth uses its art not just as decoration but as a core part of its appeal. Cat Earth is a game that literally stops people in their tracks as they walk past the table.
Mechanically, Cat Earth is very streamlined. Each turn you’ll draw, play and resolve one or more cards that help you take control of the post-feline apocalyptic Earth. The rules are light enough to teach in minutes, and the game wastes no time getting players into a steady rhythm of drawing a card, playing a card (or cards) and then moving the giant cat meeples accordingly. The object of the game is simple — to be the last player with any houses still on the board, and any time a cat would move into a space with a house, it simply pushes it in the direction that the cat is moving.
Cat Earth is a very, very accessible game. The setup — which involves placing a fixed number of houses on the board per player (increasing or decreasing based on player count) and then placing a cat in the middle can be done by anyone from about five years old upwards. Each player gets three cards and simply uses one of them per cat they wish to move on each turn. Per cat, you say? Yes, when the deck runs out, a second cat arrives, and then a third and possibly a fourth — and this helps accelerate Cat Earth towards its conclusion.
That said, as I hinted at in my opening paragraph, Cat Earth can easily take an hour with young players who make odd decisions, or sometimes simply because the cards don’t land how you want them to. With just one cat on the board, players often find that the cat moves back and forth or round in circles as players struggle to play cards that drive meaningful behaviours. Most kids that I tried Cat Earth with didn’t really care, but as a “core gamer” I will admit to finding this loop a bit mind numbing. With multiple cats, each player can play a card per cat (whilst still only drawing one) and therefore the game moves a bit faster and has more complex decisions.
Despite its mechanical simplicity, the expanding number of cats creates enough tactical nuance to keep things just about interesting enough — especially for kids. The excitement of pushing an opponent off the board (which is pleasingly three-dimensional) is one that kids relish, whilst the agony of seeing their own houses moving ever closer to the edge is a delightful kind of suffering. More mature gamers will lament the lack of control and the often poor card choices, but the best way to play Cat Earth is just to get on with it and keep the pace up.
Component quality is exactly what it needs to be and I’d say is good enough to elevate Cat Earth from a fairly average experience to a fun one. The cards are sturdy, the iconography is clear, and the layout supports quick reading and fast turns, but what really stands out are the giant cats that tower above the other wooden components (houses and trees) with all sat atop an upturned box insert that creates real presence.
Player count flexibility is fair. With two players, the game feels more calm and slightly more tactical but it’s where the randomness of the cards shows its worst behaviour, with the same cat moving back and forth turn after turn. With more players, it becomes livelier and more chaotic in a pleasant way that I think captures the spirit of the game as it was intended.
If Cat Earth has limitations, they stem from its randomness and the fact that the cards have been (fairly cleverly) designed to remain quite balanced. Sometimes games like this need a bit more chaos, but here we have cards that do things like moving a cat in a very tight circle so that it can work its way around the outside of a house and then push it off, whilst none (except the teleporter) move a cat more than three spaces. I think a “wacky” expansion deck of cards might work wonders here, but then again who am I to second guess a real designer?
Ultimately, Cat Earth is an affordable, premium quality kids game that just about transcends that label to offer a game that older players can enjoy. If only it could reliably be played and finished in maybe 15-20 minutes, it could be something of a hidden gem. As it happens, it takes a bit of patience and resilience to get through, but it’s still a fun, enjoyable experience that can generate a lot of laughs.
Cat Earth is available now, including from Amazon.
