Matthew Inman – the developer behind the hit game “Exploding Kittens” – today launched a brand new free game that is a mix between Scrabble and Clash Royale. “Kitty Letter” looks like a new super fun twist on the word game genre, check out all the details below.
See how developer / artist / creator Matthew Inman, who founded The Oatmeal, describes his innovative new wordplay that he partnered with Matt Wood in:
I have a new game for you. It’s free. In this game, you decode words. These words are transformed into armies, which advance and attack your opponent. It’s like Scrabble combined with Clash Royale. It can best be described as “words with enemies”. Because you use your words skills to blow each other up.
In addition to the versus mode, which is sure to be popular, there is a fun campaign option. Matthew calls the campaign mode “a giant playable Oatmeal comic”.
Kitty Letter looks like a lot of fun (smart name too 😂) and is now available for free for iOS and Android. There are some in-app purchases available as well.
Take a look at the new game below!
If you’re curious about the backstory of Kitty Letter’s creation, Matthew shared the whole story:
How Kitty Letter emerged
A practice that has served me well is to create things that I really want to consume. I write comics that I want to read. I make games that I want to play. Most of the time, this practice works. Sometimes no. And that’s fine.
2020 was difficult. I recently moved to an island in Puget Sound. I moved from the hectic bustle of Seattle life to the peaceful life of living on a cold, rainy island. And in the midst of this transition, COVID appeared and I found myself isolated from everything and everyone, living under a gray sky and trapped in a perpetual Groundhog Day to wake up, work and worry.
This would not normally be a problem for me. I’m fine alone. I thrive on that. I have many ways to make my life meaningful. Design. Writing. Running. Cycling. Reading. Petting.
But I felt like I had completed the ultramarathon equivalent of those activities. Even my dog seemed sick of me. I needed something new. And what better way to find something new than to do something old.
So, I started programming. I used to be a developer, so I dusted off my programming skills and built a game. This game had to satisfy a very specific objective: I wanted to be able to destroy an opponent with my vocabulary. It’s not that I have an incredible vocabulary – I would say it’s pretty mediocre. But I love word games. I also love games like Quake, Clash Royale and Fortnite. So, the big idea was to merge the two categories. I wanted to combine sophisticated crosswords with simple fighting games. I wanted to build Battle Royale Boggle. Or “words with enemies”. Or Fortnite finds the New York Times crossword puzzle. This game is my attempt to merge Earl Gray tea with Mountain Dew: Code Red. It is my attempt to put a bow tie on a Juggalo.
After a week of drunkenness, code and enthusiasm, I finished creating a terrible, yet functional prototype in PHP, Javascript and HTML. It was a mess full of errors. But it worked, and the prototype did its job: it proved to me that the game was fun. So, I ended up connecting with the ridiculously talented Matt Wood, a former Valve developer who now runs Double Dagger Studio. He took time off from work in Little Kitty, Big City to help me, and we ended up building Kitty Letter together. The last half of the development was done by a handful of wonderful developers (Evan Losi, Yu Tak Ting, Matt Stokes and Junho Choi – THANK YOU.)
I put a lot into this game. It has multiplayer modes so you can fight against friends or strangers, but the real gem is single player mode. I wrote the equivalent of a dozen Oatmeal comics packaged in a story about a crazy cat owner who moves into the house next door.
I hate free games. I hate games built entirely around retaining players and deceiving people into keeping the app open as much as possible. I hate coins, coins, chests and other money printing schemes disguised as fun. For Kitty Letter, I just tried to make the game as fun as possible. This means that sometimes the chapters are long and almost seem to discourage you from playing. There is an entire chapter built around slapping on a trout to thaw it out, and some musical deer that make sexy moans for a long time. I just tried to build a nice, short game, instead of a medicore game spanning months of free garbage mechanics. Fuck withholding. Fuck the game coins. Hug the trout, I say. Embrace the moaning deer.
Basically, I am very proud of this game. It is still full of errors, so please bear with me while we release updates. About that, please leave a kind comment on the App Store or Google Play, if possible.
Eskimo hugs and kisses,
-The oats
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