Beginner Guides
What Are Cat Arcade Games? A Complete Beginner's Guide
What actually makes a game an arcade game, why cats suit the format so well, and how to choose your first one.
Guides
Cat Game Guides & Tips
How these games work, and how to play them better. Written from the source code and from playing them a great many times.
There are two kinds of writing here. Mechanics articles explain what a game is doing underneath - how obstacles are generated, why difficulty curves flatten, what decides that you hit something. Tips articles explain what to do about it.
Both are written the same way: by playing the games repeatedly and, for the games on this site, by reading the code that produces the behaviour. Where something is a judgement rather than a measurement, it says so.
Start with these
The longer guides that cover a topic properly.
Beginner Guides
The Best Types of Cat Arcade Games to Play Online
Six types of cat game, what each one actually asks of you, and how to pick the right one for the time you have.
Game Mechanics
How Endless Cat Runner Games Work
The cat never moves. The world does. Here is how that one trick produces an entire genre.
Game Mechanics
Cat Jumping Games: Mechanics and Strategies
The three jump models, the invisible helpers that make good platformers feel fair, and how to practise landings rather than launches.
Tips & Strategy
How to Improve Your High Score in Cat Arcade Games
Most players plateau for the same three reasons. Here is how to diagnose which one is yours and what to do about it.
Beginner Guides
A Beginner's Guide to Browser Cat Games
How browser games work from a player's point of view, and how to tell a good browser game site from a bad one.
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Beginner Guides
Start here. What the genre is, how the games work, and which one to open first.
Beginner Guides
A Beginner's Guide to Browser Cat Games
How browser games work from a player's point of view, and how to tell a good browser game site from a bad one.
Beginner Guides
The Best Types of Cat Arcade Games to Play Online
Six types of cat game, what each one actually asks of you, and how to pick the right one for the time you have.
Beginner Guides
What Are Cat Arcade Games? A Complete Beginner's Guide
What actually makes a game an arcade game, why cats suit the format so well, and how to choose your first one.
Beginner Guides
A Casual Cat Gaming Guide
Not every player wants to improve. This is the guide for playing these games purely for enjoyment.
Beginner Guides
Cat Games for Quick Gaming Sessions
For when you have five minutes and want something that will actually be finished in five minutes.
Beginner Guides
Collection-Based Cat Games
Score comes from gathering rather than surviving, which changes the whole shape of the game.
Beginner Guides
Endless Cat Games Explained
No finish line, no levels, no unlocks - and a structure that keeps working anyway.
Beginner Guides
Frequently Asked Questions About Cat Games
Short answers to everything we get asked, with links to the longer explanations.
Beginner Guides
Platform-Based Cat Games
Endless climbs and designed levels are both platformers and they ask for opposite things.
Beginner Guides
Reaction-Based Cat Games
Which games here test reaction, what that actually means, and what to play instead if it is not for you.
Beginner Guides
The Best Short-Session Games for Browser Players
Matched to the time you actually have, including which games can be abandoned without cost.
Game Mechanics
How the machinery works underneath: physics, collision, generation, difficulty and scoring.
Game Mechanics
Cat Adventure Games: Gameplay Mechanics Explained
Designed levels, checkpoints and optional collectibles - the machinery behind games that have an actual end.
Game Mechanics
Cat Jumping Games: Mechanics and Strategies
The three jump models, the invisible helpers that make good platformers feel fair, and how to practise landings rather than launches.
Game Mechanics
Cat Puzzle Games and Timing Mechanics
Two kinds of challenge sit side by side in this category: knowing something, and doing something at the right moment.
Game Mechanics
Cat Runner Games vs Platform Games: What Is the Difference?
One takes away your control over where you go. That single difference changes everything about how the two genres play.
Game Mechanics
How Collision Detection Works in Arcade Games
Four number comparisons decide whether you died. Here is exactly which four, and why the box is smaller than the cat.
Game Mechanics
How Endless Cat Runner Games Work
The cat never moves. The world does. Here is how that one trick produces an entire genre.
Game Mechanics
How Progressive Difficulty Works in Runner Games
One number drives almost all of it. Here is how that number is shaped, and why it stops climbing.
Game Mechanics
One-Tap Cat Games Explained
One button should be trivial. Here is why the best one-button games are not, and how they get depth from a single input.
Game Mechanics
Understanding Score Systems in Arcade Games
A scoring system is a set of instructions about how to play. Here is how to read one.
Game Mechanics
Cat Game Power-Ups Explained
A power-up does not make a game easier so much as it changes what every gap in it means.
Game Mechanics
How Collectibles Affect Arcade Scores
The arithmetic of whether a coin is worth it, and why the answer is usually no.
Game Mechanics
How Combo Multipliers Work
A multiplier does not change the obstacles. It changes your relationship to risk, which is a cheaper way to add tension.
Game Mechanics
How Endless Games Generate Obstacles
Pure randomness produces unplayable games. Here are the rules that make generated levels fair.
Game Mechanics
How Game Speed Changes Difficulty
Speed does not change a single obstacle. It changes how much time you have, and that changes everything.
Game Mechanics
How Jump Mechanics Work
Three jump models, two invisible helpers, and the reason a good jump feels responsive while a bad one feels stiff.
Game Mechanics
How Platform Collision Works
Overlap is not enough. Landing is a direction question, and getting it wrong produces every classic platformer bug.
Game Mechanics
How Random Number Generation Works in Arcade Games
Randomness is used far less in arcade games than players assume, and almost never uniformly.
Game Mechanics
Runner Game Physics Explained
Two numbers and one rule produce every jump arc in every runner ever made.
Game Mechanics
Timing-Based Arcade Games Explained
Four properties separate a timing challenge that feels fair from one that feels arbitrary.
Tips & Strategy
Practical techniques for playing better, drawn from playing these games a great many times.
Tips & Strategy
How to Improve Your High Score in Cat Arcade Games
Most players plateau for the same three reasons. Here is how to diagnose which one is yours and what to do about it.
Tips & Strategy
Cat Adventure Game Tips
Adventure levels reward patience in a way runners never do. Here is where to spend it.
Tips & Strategy
Cat Dash Beginner Tips
The seven things that make the biggest difference in your first dozen Cat Dash runs.
Tips & Strategy
Cat Game Challenge Ideas
Twelve ways to make a game you already know interesting again.
Tips & Strategy
Cat Platform Game Tips
Platformers reward planning rather than reflexes. These habits are where the planning goes.
Tips & Strategy
Cat Puzzle Game Strategies
Four techniques that reliably improve memory game results, and one claim we are not going to make.
Tips & Strategy
Common Beginner Mistakes in Runner Games
Eight predictable mistakes. Most players make at least five of them, and all eight have quick fixes.
Tips & Strategy
How Scoring Differs Across Cat Arcade Games
Twelve games, five scoring models, and a different correct strategy for each.
Tips & Strategy
How to Avoid Losing in Runner Games
Most runs end in one of four ways. Here is what each one looks like and how to stop it.
Tips & Strategy
How to Avoid Obstacles in Endless Runners
Stop identifying obstacles and start identifying the empty space. It is faster and it always works.
Tips & Strategy
How to Beat Difficult Cat Game Levels
When a section keeps beating you, the answer is almost never to try harder. Here is what it is instead.
Tips & Strategy
How to Get Better at One-Tap Games
One button, and still a real skill ceiling. These are the five things that raise it.
Tips & Strategy
How to Improve Reaction Time in Arcade Games
Raw reaction time is largely fixed. Nearly everything else that makes you fast is not.
Tips & Strategy
How to Jump Over Obstacles in Cat Runner Games
Almost every failed jump in a runner is a late jump. Here is how to fix that specifically.
Tips & Strategy
How to Practise Timing in Arcade Games
Playing more improves you slowly. Practising a specific thing improves you quickly. Here is the difference.
Tips & Strategy
How to Set a Personal High Score
Technique is one thing; running a session well is another. This is the second one.
Tips & Strategy
How to Use Power-Ups Effectively
Most power-up mistakes are spending it at the wrong moment rather than not having it.
Browser Gaming
The browser as a games platform - HTML5, Canvas, performance, controls and saved data.
Browser Gaming
Cat Game Controls for Desktop and Mobile
Keyboard, touch and mouse are genuinely different inputs. Which games suit which, and why.
Browser Gaming
How HTML5 Browser Games Work
From URL to playable game in about a second. Here is every step of what happens in between.
Browser Gaming
How to Play Browser Games on Mobile Devices
Phones are excellent for arcade games and have a few specific traps. Here is how to avoid all of them.
Browser Gaming
Browser Gaming Performance Tips
A small Canvas game is not demanding. When one stutters, the cause is almost always something else.
Browser Gaming
Canvas Games Explained
A rectangle the browser hands to the game, repainted sixty times a second - and completely opaque to screen readers.
Browser Gaming
HTML5 Games Explained for Beginners
"HTML5 game" names a combination of browser features rather than any single thing. Here is what is actually in it.
Browser Gaming
How Browser Game Sound Works
Every sound in these games is generated on the spot. No files are downloaded, and there is a good reason audio stays silent at first.
Browser Gaming
How High Scores Are Saved in Browser Games
Your score is on your device and nowhere else. Here is what that means in practice.
Browser Gaming
How Mobile Game Controls Differ
Four concrete differences, and why each one changes what a game should ask of you.
Browser Gaming
How to Play Browser Games Without Downloads
A browser game is a web page. Any site asking you to install something to play one is telling you something important.
Browser Gaming
Keyboard Controls for Browser Games
The conventions everyone assumes but nobody writes down, and the hardware quirk that eats your inputs.
Browser Gaming
Touch Controls for Mobile Arcade Games
Good touch controls are designed for the specific game. Here is what that means in practice.
Game Design
Why games are built the way they are, from level layout to the invisible helpers that make them feel fair.
Game Design
A Guide to Collecting and Power-Up Systems
Collectibles are level design in disguise. Here is what each kind is actually doing.
Game Design
Designing Fun Cat Game Levels
Level design is mostly arithmetic and rhythm. Here is the method we used for the levels on this site.
Game Design
The Evolution of Cat-Themed Arcade Games
A look at how the mechanics evolved with the platforms - and an honest note about what this article deliberately does not claim.
Game Design
Why Simple Arcade Games Are Easy to Learn
No tutorial, no manual, and understood within ten seconds. The techniques that make that possible are deliberate.
Game Design
Cat Game Level Design Basics
The starting points for anyone laying out their first arcade level, in the order they matter.
Game Design
Cat-Themed Browser Game Ideas
Ten ideas we have not built, with an honest note on what makes each one hard.
Game Design
How Checkpoints Work in Platform Games
A checkpoint sets the price of failure, and the price of failure decides how hard a section is allowed to be.
Game Design
Simple Arcade Mechanics Explained
Eight mechanics account for nearly every arcade game ever made. Here they are.
Game Design
Understanding Arcade Game Lives
Lives are a pacing tool inherited from coin-operated economics. Some games still need them; most do not.
Game Design
What Makes an Arcade Game Engaging
Why you press restart. The mechanisms are specific, and a game missing any of them feels flat.
Game Design
Why Arcade Games Use Increasing Difficulty
Rising difficulty solves four problems at once, which is why every arcade game has it.