It has been a long journey for the Gentlebros ever since their first Cat Quest game back in 2017. Now, seven years later, the Singapore-based game studio has finally graced us with the biggest and arguably the best Cat Quest game yet, Cat Quest 3. Their craft has been excellent and persuasive, and they converted me into a cat person. Also, their first two Cat Quest games have had millions of players worldwide.
Now, I’m even more ecstatic after having interviewed The Gentlebros about Cat Quest 3, the future of the series, and the feline sub-genre of gaming.
Cat Quest 3 Interview with Desmond Wong, The Gentlebros CEO
The following interview has been lightly edited for clarity and flow.
Sid Natividad, Senior Writer for The Nerd Stash: What was the major factor in choosing the new pirate setting for Cat Quest 3? After all, cats and water often don’t mix well together (based on my experience).
Desmond Wong, The Gentlebros CEO: Even as far back as the first Cat Quest game, we came up with a road map of nine CQ games, because cats have nine lives, right? The first one would introduce cats, the second iteration would bring in dogs, and the third was always going to be about rats (or pi-rats)!
Because of this, we knew we had to base it on a pirate setting. Not only did pirates provide a fresh new experience for Cat Quest fans, but they also allowed us to add in mechanics we never could before, like ship sailing! And yes, cats don’t go well with water, which is why ours uses a float!
Sid Natividad, Senior Writer for The Nerd Stash: So, Medieval fantasy, then Pirates! What’s the next horizon for our cat questers? Any new setting you have in mind?
Desmond Wong, The Gentlebros CEO: Yes, we most definitely do! We don’t want to spoil the surprise though, but we don’t think it’s something people would expect. We hint at this in Cat Quest 3 though, so eagle-eyed players may know what’s coming next!
Sid Natividad, Senior Writer for The Nerd Stash: Seeing as Cat Quest 3 is currently the biggest game in the series, have there been challenges or roadblocks to developing something with a bigger scale and a longer playtime? Which among those challenges would you say held you back the most?
Desmond Wong, The Gentlebros CEO: In terms of design, Cat Quest 3 has the most varied selection of gameplay elements. There are almost no two quests or dungeons with similar gameplay, and we think that half the fun is finding out what the next area holds in store.
That being said, I think the biggest challenge was not only creating a bigger world, but a bigger world that players can see all at once. In previous iterations, because of the camera angle, players could always only see a little bit in front of them. However, in Cat Quest 3 we moved the camera a lot lower so players can see much further into the distance. This offered many new explorative opportunities that we could not do before, but it also created a huge technical hurdle that we had to overcome.
In order to make this possible, we revamped most of our tech and created many new systems to accommodate this. We made new shaders that could display far-off islands realistically and created a 2D sprite LOD system that could not only display sprites correctly based on distance but also control how much AI is being run at any one time.
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The First Descendant Interview: Lead Developers Talk Monetization, Pay-to-Win, & Post-Launch SupportSid Natividad, Senior Writer for The Nerd Stash: For a game like Cat Quest 3 and the other Cat Quests, who did you keep in mind as an audience aside from cat lovers? Was it adults or children? Or if it’s a mix of both, how did you balance out the gameplay to appeal to a diverse demographic?
Desmond Wong, The Gentlebros CEO: Our design mantra is to always keep things accessible for a Cat Quest game. We want to reduce as much friction as we can from the controls, gameplay, and design so players can get into the fun bits as quickly as possible. We believe that if a game is easy to control and understand, more people will not feel overwhelmed when playing it.
So in a way, we aren’t targeting a specific audience, but targeting a specific design goal instead. With an accessible game as the foundation, we’re now able to add depth and complexities in other ways, and we believe this is why the Cat Quest games appeal to such a diverse demographic.
Sid Natividad, Senior Writer for The Nerd Stash: The multiplayer potential for Cat Quest games, to me, appears quite promising. You even included a seamless couch co-op. which was really thoughtful. I was wondering if you’ve ever explored the idea of a multiplayer Cat Quest game. Or maybe even a social game where players could re-create their pet cats and race for the treasure like in an MMORPG?
Desmond Wong, The Gentlebros CEO: The idea has definitely floated around the office. We had a prototype for a gladiator-esque Cat Quest game where players could engage in PvP or PvE matches, but it ended up being too crazy to do with our team size back then.
That being said, we think a mainline Cat Quest game would stay the way it is– a great single-player or co-op experience, but we’re always brainstorming on what spin-offs we can make in the CQ universe!
Sid Natividad, Senior Writer for The Nerd Stash: When I first saw and played games like Stray (2022), I thought that while it was cool, I couldn’t help but yearn for something grander for feline-kind (just as they deserve). Perhaps even an open-world sandbox (or litterbox). Now, seeing as Cat Quest continues to evolve and improve upon itself with each iteration, as is evident in Cat Quest 3, do you think it might be feasible for the series to eventually grow into a 3D open-world sandbox cat RPG or something similar?
Desmond Wong, The Gentlebros CEO: Absolutely! This is our ultimate vision for what the Cat Quest games can be! Ultimately, our initial inspirations were Final Fantasy and Elder Scrolls, and our goal would be to reach those levels in the future!
Sid Natividad, Senior Writer for The Nerd Stash: That’s very promising. I wish we could talk more about cats! But I understand you’re busy managing Cat Quest 3‘s release. It was a pleasure talking to you!
So, the cat’s out of the bag, folks. Cat Quest 4 is bound to be more exciting, and Cat Quest 9 is on the horizon, more or less. But for now, let’s enjoy Cat Quest 3 in its open-world and open-water glory. Cat Quest 3 is coming out on August 8, 2024 (aka International Cat Day) and it will be available on PC, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4 & 5, and Xbox One & Xbox Series X|S.
