Kiwi behind Street Fighter with cats game

Homepage Editor·NZ Herald·

23 Jun, 2016 03:00 AM2 mins to read

Cat Puncher, a game created by Tommy Ill, aka Tom Young, for iOS and Android.

Cats fight all the goddamn time, so it's only natural they should have their own fighting game.

Wellington rapper Tommy Ill - real name Tom Young - is here to fill that niche with Cat Puncher.

The button-mashing fighting game, released on iOS and Android, pays homage to 1991's Street Fighter II and even includes the infamous opening cut scene, albeit with cats.

While the game is a parody of Street Fighter II, a classic beat 'em up remembered fondly by arcade dwelling teens of the '90s, Young believes there are no copywrite issues as Cat Puncher is "an original piece of work".

Another Street Fighter mainstay, the bonus round in which you beat up a car, has been converted for kitties too.

"I decided that instead of a car it should be something that a cat would be likely to beat up, so I ended up going with a bonus round where you beat up a couch," says Young.

"The cushions fly off, lost coins go flying everywhere and eventually it catches on fire."
There's even a volleyball mode a la Dead or Alive: "It's not nearly as sexy as the Dead or Alive version though... and that's probably a good thing."

There are no hadoukens or shoryukens at the cat's disposal yet, but Young says he'd like to add new cats, moves and stages in future.

Young spent the past six months piecing the game together by hand. He did all the art, code, sound and music for the game.

The backgrounds, he says, were the hardest part: he drew them pixel by pixel.
The sounds and music came naturally to Young, who has gained critical praise for several Tommy Ill albums and rowdy performances.

His girlfriend provided the voices of the cats, and friends were rewarded for their help and support with in-game characters.

Feedback has been great so far, Young says. Cat Puncher briefly made its way to the App Site games chart last weekend, and he hopes momentum will continue to escalate - just like those 2am scraps between neighbourhood cats.