Super Catboy is a 2023 retraux indie game made by Pixelpogo, an indie German company whose programming staff consists of two people, developers Arthuer Eickmann and Thomas Flachs.
Paying homage to pixel art-style of 90s-era platformers, the player-controlled protagonist, Super Catboy, is a sentient, anthromorphic feline fighting against the canine soldiers of Dr. Ungefug, a Mad Scientist who intends to create his own private army of obediant soldiers, made from converting animals into half-humanoid forms.
When Catboy was captured alive by the canines to be developed into a Super-Soldier, Catboy unexpectedly awakens in the transport plane assigned to deliver him to the canine headquarters, and performs a daring escape that sends the canines' aircraft into crashing in the midst of a dense jungle.
Shortly after his breakout, Catboy then rendezvous with his (human) liaison and sidekick, Weapongirl, and realize the jungle is canine territory. Now he must fight his way through legions and legions of hostile dogs, moles, and assorted animals.
This is one SUPER feline...
- Abandoned Mine: There's a stage set inside one, which introduces the mole monsters and leads to a Minecart Madness sequence.
- Acid Pool: The factory level have pools of green acid that costs Catboy a life if he falls in one.
- Auto-Scrolling Level:
- There are stages where Catboy rides behind on a motorcycle with Weapongirl in front, speeding down a street with canine mooks on motorcycles trying to stop him. Catboy's pistol will have unlimited bullets in areas like these, since he's swapping lead against the canines instead of punching and kicking.
- The Minecart Madness half of the underground stage also counts, with Catboy on a speeding cart and trying to avoid obstacles. He doesn't have any weapons with him this time and can't attack enemies, save for jumping above carts containing hostile dogs.
- Boss Rush: Prior to reaching Dr. Ungefug's lair, Catboy needs to battle the first three bosses, Mole, Rottweiler and Bull in a rematch in three separate areas, though this time he can choose the orders to fight them with.
- Brutish Bulls: The Canyon's boss is a bull who attempts squashing Catboy to a pulp using it's horns, and a literal Bullfight Boss - it's invincible when charging, and Catboy needs to trick it into tacking the boss arena's walls so it gets Left Stuck After Attack allowing Catboy to throw some punches in.
- Cat Ninja: The first boss is a feline ninja named Catgirl who can spam a Flechette Storm of knives all over the place, besides being insanely difficult to hit because she can Teleport Spam all over the place. It turns out she's a Hopeless Boss Fight - Catboy is supposed to lose, so Weapongirl can arrive to provide backup via bazooka.
- Double Jump: Catboy can jump twice while in mid-air.
- Evilutionary Biologist: Dr. Ungefog, the game's Big Bad who creates his personal army of hyper-obediant soldiers by experimenting on animals like cats and dogs. For some reason, cats are consderably on the "superior" side, with felines like Catboy being reserved as Super Soldiers.
- Exploding Barrels: Oil drums appears in a few areas, which can be triggered to blow up via shooting, with a wide radius damaging multiple enemies. In typical Artificial Stupidity fashion, enemy dogs will blindly run near a barrel allowing Catboy to take down several of them in one go.
- Furry Reminder: After defeating the Cat Ninja last boss, Catboy promptly celebrates victory by... cleaning himself. And licking the inside of his legs, just as Weapongirl shows up and arrest Dr. Ungefog. He's still a cat, after all.
- Gatling Good: The Champion boss is a bipedal Rottweiler who carries a massive Gatling gun to assault Catboy with. No surprise that a stereotypically fearsome canine gets to wield the largest gun in-game.
- Goomba Stomp:
- Like most platformers, Catboy can take down canine enemies by jumping and landing on their heads. Despite the fact that Catboy can use his fists and firearms.
- The bull boss will either tackle Catboy, or jump up and down the arena trying to squash Catboy underfoot.
- Gotta Catch Them All: The Maneki Neko bonus, where each and every level contains four pieces of a Maneki Neko Catboy can collect. Complete a full Maneki Neko nets Catboy a higher bonus at the end of each stage.
- Happy Dance: Dr. Engelfug performs a happy, improvised jig once his Cat Ninja henchwoman defeats Catboy. In contrast, the ninja doesn't react to her victory. And then Weapongirl barged in...
- Helpful Mook: Beagles manning hovering platforms are the only canine enemy that doesn't actively pursue Catboy, and in contrast they serve as a Goomba Springboard for Catboy to cross pits or obtain bonus items.
- Heroic Canines, Villainous Felines: Inverted, Catboy is the good guy here, while the enemy mooks are mostly dogs. There is a hostile Cat Ninja serving as Dr. Ungefog's henchwoman who doesn't serve any purpose other than being a boss though.
- Heroic Mime: Catboy doesn't have any lines, even though his partner Weapongirl, the villain Dr. Ungefog and other human NPCs does. It might be due to Catboy being a cat - none of the animal characters and bosses have dialogue, either.
- Improvised Zipline: Shows up in multiple areas, where Catboy use ropes slanting downwards to cross pits and traverse chasms.
- King Mook: The Mole King boss Catboy fights to exit the mines is a size-up boss version of the regular moles.
- Locomotive Level: The desert chase have Catboy boarding a locomotive filled with canines, and fighting his way across leading to a Traintop Battle.
- Minecart Madness: The second half of the underground mines have Catboy kicking ass on a speeding cart and trying to avoid hitting obstacles and jumping before he falls into bottomless shafts. Be wary of tunnels and get ready to duck!
- Mirror Boss: The Mole, Rottweiler and Bull bosses are huge and absolutely towering over Catboy. The Cat Ninja, on the other hand, have a sprite size roughly the same as Catboy's, and moves with roughly the same speed, with both her battles being Catboy fighting a boss his own size.
- Mole Monster: The underground level contains literal moles, who pops in and out of their holes and attacks Catboy with flung dynamites. Only their helmets are visible when they slinks underground, and they can't be attacked unless they're outside their holes.
- Non-Action Big Bad: After Catboy defeats the Cat Ninja, Dr. Ungefug lets out a lengthy rant that it's impossible his creations lose to Catboy... right before Weapongirl suddenly barges in. And just like that, Dr. Ungefug surrenders and turns himself in without a fight. Then again, it's not like an elderly Evilutionary Biologist can actually put up any sort of fight...
- Ocular Gushers: Basically all the bosses, who lets out two waterfalls of tears after being defeated. They even let out the geysers after their rematch in the Boss Rush!
- People Jars:
- In the opening FMV, Catboy was floating in a stasis tank in the dogs' laboratory aboard a transport plane, when a malfunction casues him to unexpectedly wake up. He then breaks loose, forcing the plane to crash, and cue gameplay.
- Later in Dr. Ungefug's underground lab and sky fortress, Catboy can come across stasis tanks containing dogs being experimented on to be added into Ungefug's private army.
- Rope Bridge: In the first stage, Catboy was halfway through a rope bridge when a dog mook cuts the rope, causing the whole thing to collapse and sending Catboy to the stage's underground portions.
- Slide Attack: By pressing the attack and jump button at the same time, Catboy can perform a sliding punch that knocks canines off their feet. He can even send enemy canines backwards, into pits and chasms.
- Slippy-Slidey Ice World: There is a winter-set stage where Catboy will often need to travel on frozen surfaces. He'll accelerate forward faster than usual if he's running, and if he's using slide Catboy will speed ahead too quickly for players to control. Unfortunately a lot of the slippery areas tends to be located near killer pitfalls.
- This Cannot Be!: Dr. Ungefug drops this trope, nearly word-for-word, combined with Punctuated! For! Emphasis! when Catboy defeats his giant mole in the mines.Dr. Ungefug: What? How?! Can?! This?! Be?! ...that this little feline creature just sauntered in and vanquired my BEASTS?
- He says it again after Catboy defeats his last and most powerful creation, Catgirl, the Cat Ninja who's supposed to be undefeatable. Before surrendering without a struggle once Weapongirl shows up.
Dr. Ungefug: You are utterly useless, Catgirl! No! No! No! This is preposterous! This is simply not fair! - Uplifted Animal: As it turns out, the various canine enemies used to be regular dogs, before they're experimented upon by Dr. Ungefug and gained humanlike intelligence, as well as the ability to walk on all fours. The titular character is among Dr. Ungefug's attempts at uplifting a feline, but doesn't work as Catboy begins thwarting the villains' plans.
- Wrench Whack: Weapongirl always carries a wrench with her, and isn't afraid to use it for smashing canines in cutscenes.
