Spotcat VS The Cheddar Mafia In Space Review

First Impressions

With a name like SpotCat Vs The Cheddar Mafia In Space, initial impressions of this game didn’t scream anything too ‘serious’ to begin with. However, after you spend a little bit of time with it and start working through the levels, you will find a fair bit of a serious challenge ahead of you.

Obviously with this being the fourth game in this ‘spot-the-difference’ series, I was worried there was going to be some world building or story or lore behind the game that I would have to read up on before going in blind. Fortunately, while there is a ‘story’ running through these games, there isn’t any real need to have played any of the earlier games in the series. This makes it a perfect and fun ‘pick up and play’ style game for a spot of light gaming goodness and easy 1000G Gamerscore if that’s your thing too.

Plot

What plot?

Seriously though, apparently there’s a story about Cheddar Mafia Mice originally trying to steal all the cheese on Earth or something, and now they’re trying to steal the Moon as we all know the Moon is made of cheese. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to foil their dastardly plan and bring back justice and normality to the galaxy by spotting 10 differences between 2 almost identical scenes over 25 levels. This makes totally sense I suppose.

Gameplay Overview

The main menu consists of only three options. Obviously, there’s ‘Play’ which allows you to start the game or continue from whatever level you’re up to. Next ‘Arrested Rats’ will show you the members of the, ahum, Cheddar Mafia you’ve caught from each level. This is a nice touch but then the game doesn’t allow you to highlight any of the members or give you any information on them, which seems a bit of a shame and makes the option kinda redundant. Finally, we have ‘Quit’ which as you might expect, quits the game back to the Xbox Dashboard. So there’s no need to Xbox Guide Button and Home need to exit this game.

When you start a level, the majority of the game screen is taken up with, what at first, appears to be the same picture shown twice. But on closer inspection there is 10 sneaky hidden differences between them. Handily, the complete control scheme to the game is shown on the bottom left half of the gameplay screen on each level. Left stick moves the cursor, while the A button selects the spot you’re currently hovering on to see if you’ve found a, well, difference. Finding a difference results in a satisfying ‘pop’ sound and that part of the screen becoming coloured in. This continues until all 10 differences are found and both pictures are shown in full colour. The game does have a zoom in function using right trigger, with left trigger reserved to zoom back out. This is vital as some of the variations are often minuscule requiring very close inspection and pixel perfect clicking.

As previously mentioned, there are 25 levels. Each with 10 differences to discover, with each level becoming increasing more difficult and elaborate to spot all the differences. As you discover a difference and click on it, the picture begins to colour until the whole scene is coloured. This is obviously a great design mechanic I thought as you know what area you need to focus your efforts on finding the last one or two to complete the level rather than spend hours combing the screen inch by inch for that last, elusive one.

However, after finding all 10 differences, you’re not quite done yet. as the level isn’t classed a complete until you also find the hidden ‘Mafia Rat’ somewhere in the picture too. Initially, this sounds easy but the Mafia Rats are transparent, like a watermark and can only been seen when the pictured is fully coloured, technically they’re ‘invisible’ to the naked eye until having the picture fully coloured allows you a chance to find them. And trust me, they’re deviously well hidden. So unless you’ve got eyes like a falcon or just plain lucky to click in the right place, these are usually going to be your last find of the level.

The only minor gripe I had with the game’s interface was that the cursor movement speed feels sluggish, like it’s dragging as you move it across the screen. With no option to change the speed, this can often make the experience slow and clunky to navigate the screen.

Presentation

The title definitely fits into the ‘cosy’ vibe of videogames with its simple single screen levels and cartoony look. The overall look of the game is low key, with lovely detailed hand-drawn scenes depicting anthropomorphic animals in various space related scenarios.

Although with only 25 levels though, the game will not take someone with a relatively keen eye long to get through, especially when you start to get into your groove and learn how the game ‘thinks’ in regard to the placement of differences. And afterwards, when all levels are done, there’s no real point to any sort of replay as once a level is done, it’s done. Repetition in these games is always going to either be a big plus to the gameplay and player, or a major downside. Depending on your perspective on these kind or titles.

The musical score can best be described as smooth jazz with a definite 1920’s detective vibes to it. But with the same 30 seconds or so of the same music playing over and over with no variation, it can become quickly tiresome and bordering on annoying. More tracks to cycle through with the levels would have been a bonus, or even just an option to turn the music off.

The Bottom Line

As a final thought, S.V.T.C.M.I.S. (I had to start abbreviating the name as I started developing RSI through typing the title so many times), is perfect for casual players who love a fun visual challenge, with some surprising twists. Nothing about this game is hardcore or taxing, but that’s not a bad thing in my book. It’s a perfect antidote for gamers just wanting or needing a game to just play to unwind after a long day with a different type of hidden object type title.

But if I had to sum this game up (probably the whole series to date) is by saying this. Simple to pick up, devilishly addictive and sometimes impossible to put down.

Often simplicity is all you need with a game, and S.V.T.C.M.I.S. is a perfect example that sometime less is more when it comes to playing a game. It won’t win over any new fans to this genre and is classed as a definite ‘only buy if this is your sort of game’ but at the low price point on the Xbox store, I can recommend if you’re looking for something new or different to try.