Mewgenics Review: Cat hoarding has never felt better 

Mewgenics is a game few thought they’d be playing on their PCs, 14 years after designer Ed McMillen announced it as a follow-up to Super Meat Boy. However, from February 10 via Steam, it will be available to all. Players can breed and raise cats to progress through three acts and more, all wrapped within a turn-based strategy game.

I’m not new to McMillen, having played his previous games such as Super Meat Boy, The Basement Collection, and The Binding of Isaac. Every one of them has showcased a part of him in some way, and Mewgenics seemingly carries this on by caring for cats, raising them, and finding solutions in difficult situations. I’ve come away satisfied, but with a lingering feeling that we’ve only seen a taste of what the game has to offer.

Cats as Tamagotchis in 2026

You begin the game with a fun tutorial, having you follow certain instructions to get to grips with the basics of Mewgenics’ mechanics. Straight away, you’re drawn into the art style that McMillen is known for, along with Tyler Glaiel’s humor coming through when you decide to do the opposite of what Butch says. Soon enough, you’re left to your own devices, rescuing and raising cats to learn certain skills as you fight your way across the many boards in every level.

You’re given a choice of moving across the board to get close to an enemy, using a melee attack, or using a special one that could affect everyone on the board, or just one enemy. The number of attacks is simply incredible. You may come across a feline that can shoot an arrow to an enemy across the board, or summon a wave that confuses other enemies.

The user interface works great here, though you may need to re-familiarise yourself with some of the icons. It’s moments like these where it could be great to have everything display with a name below, just to help remind players what certain icons mean. Otherwise, the mechanics in Mewgenics are simple enough, but that’s only the start of it.

You’ll also retire to your house, where many of your cats live. Sometimes, you’ll spot strays to the left. With the mouse, you can drag on these and rescue them. If you click on ‘End Day’, there may be some cut scenes where a couple of cats start liking each other too much, resulting in some offspring appearing.

This is another part of Mewgenics’ appeal. You find yourself taking care of all of these cats – raising their stats, cleaning up their ‘presents’, almost as if it’s harkening back to the games of Tamagotchi and Chao Garden from the late 1990s. It’s fun enough, with the art style again shining through, especially when it rains.

However, when you decide to carry on with the game, you have to place your chosen cats into a box on the right. We found this surprisingly awkward, with the cats falling past the box as we tried to place them exactly right so we could get out of the area. It became frustrating after a while, and again, having everything named would have been a help as well.

Procedural catnip

Mewgenics is an interesting game, especially as you progress further through its levels. But you won’t experience the same game as others, due to how the engine generates cats. Every feline has different skillsets that could require players to use certain items for others to boost their stats, especially when facing certain bosses.

We’ve found ourselves restarting the game just to see what the different outcomes could be, and it’s always felt fresh and fun. It’s why using guides and walkthroughs feels pointless for Mewgenics – you’re going to experience different ways to defeat the enemies on every board.

But there can be a steep learning curve, especially because it’s strangely difficult not to quickly check what an item or move means to help refamiliarise yourself. Also, it’s a shame that Mewgenics is only on PC at launch, as its user interface feels perfect for a touch-screen or mobile device, such as a Nintendo Switch 2 or an iPad.

But another point is how we believe that Mewgenics has the potential to form its own community. Much like Pokémon Go, there’s scope here in showing other players your cat collection and how they fare in PVP battles. Winning these fights could give you unique items that your cats could equip, or even ways of decorating your house.

The more you play Mewgenics, the more you think it’ll head in this direction as a separate mode, and it feels right. For a turn-based title, that feels exciting, and it taps into McMillen’s mantra of Mewgenics, representing making the best of things. Sometimes, you do that with the support of friends or others whom you’ve not met before.

Perhaps that’s what Mewgenics is all about – taking care of one another, and perhaps in 2026, it’s something many need more than ever. The game is a fantastic representation of that. Overall, small faults aside, Mewgenics is a standout title from McMillen once again, supercharged by Glaiel’s personality. If you’ve been waiting for the game to come out, we can confidently say that it’s been worth it.

The code was supplied by the PR and ran on a Windows PC.