In a far-future world where sci-fi cats rule the universe, you’re responsible for making worlds with the help of spiritual technology as an employee of Nekokami Co. By placing tiles to increase the size of biomes you empower them to get larger and more complex, providing more habitat for the Kami, the nature spirits that empower your efforts. Also, for whatever reason, all the most powerful gods seem to be cats too.
Nekokami looks like it’ll be intriguing for fans of tile-placing games like Dorfromantik, though with a more objective focused set of challenges and puzzles rather than open-ended score chasing.
The currently released demo, called Nekokami: Internship, has you get into the groove as a world-crafting servant of the spirits. It has about three or four hours of gameplay to enjoy, starting from very simple worlds with predictable twists and ending with a few more challenging tests of your knowledge.
Nekokami is made by indie studio Rocket-in-Bottle, based in Fukuoka, Japan. This will be their first release, though the studio intends to specialize in “small and beautiful wonders on PC/Steam Deck.” Their design philosophy seems to emphasize the idea of “small but wonderful,” meaning that “games with a small budget should neither be shallow or mundane.”
You can find free demo Nekokami: Internship on Steam, as well as the page for Nekokami proper.