Cat Quest 3 Overview + Steam Deck Efficiency

Cat Quest 3 was offered by Kepler Interactive for evaluate. Thanks!

This evaluate used an LCD Steam Deck. OLED particulars can be coming later.

I’ve seen the Cat Quest video games round for the previous few years, however by no means really took the time to play one. Effectively, with Cat Quest 3, I lastly received my probability. And I’ve to say, what a pleasant little Journey/RPG this recreation is.

Cat Quest 3 is technically an motion RPG, however it sort of feels like an motion RPG lite. It is very easygoing, with level-ups merely rising your stats mechanically and sometimes unlocking a brand new tools slot. There aren’t as many gadgets or talents as you would possibly count on. As a substitute, the sport opts for a system the place getting a reproduction merchandise raises the extent of the merchandise, making it extra highly effective.

Whereas this simplicity and a smaller focus of things may be perceived as damaging in some video games, I really feel like it really works to its profit. It condenses the sensation of an RPG right into a small and pleasant bundle. The map is smaller than most RPGs you may play, there are fewer gadgets, and you will not be sitting there making an attempt to determine if you happen to ought to put your factors into power or dexterity.

Regardless of this, the sport nonetheless feels deep. You might have restricted tools slots for gear, magic, and ship upgrades, that means that although there are only some of every, you continue to must determine which of them you wish to use. Each bit of substances additionally typically offers a stat enhance, so you may “spec” into well being, protection, assault power, or magical capability, so there are some changes you may make to fit your playstyle.

As I beforehand stated, the sport world is not overly massive. I am unfamiliar with the earlier 2 Cat Quest video games to understand how huge their worlds are, however in Cat Quest 3, you may sail your ship from one finish of the archipelago to the opposite in round a minute.

Cat Quest 3 is a pirate recreation, not like the earlier 2 video games, which had a extra typical fantasy RPG setting. You will get out and in of your ship at any time, and your gameplay can be a reasonably balanced mixture of utilizing your ship to journey and battle different ships and strolling round on the various islands within the recreation.

Whereas a lot of the combating is finished in paw-to-paw fight, you get a ranged weapon, which might be good as an preliminary strike as they are typically high-damage. Often, you can see it is best to make use of your ship to bombard a powerful enemy from vary or take care of a pesky ship that is inflicting you issues.

It is not all in regards to the fight, although; littered throughout the archipelago are its residents, lots of whom are in search of assist to finish their quests. The sport is known as Cat Quest 3, in any case! These quests might be easy, comparable to carrying an merchandise from Level A to Level B, or it might be to defeat a sure enemy or discover a hidden treasure someplace. The quests are almost all the time on the shorter facet, and even the “fetch” quests within the recreation aren’t too troublesome as a consequence of that reality.

Most of the islands within the recreation are additionally house to puzzles and caves. The puzzles usually contain magical rocks, and it’s a must to work out what they need from you every time. Some require you to hit them so as, some require you to hit them in fast succession, and so forth.

Caves are Cat Quest 3’s model of dungeons. They usually comprise enemies and/or obstacles so that you can work by means of, and on the finish, you’ll doubtless encounter some treasure, both within the type of loads of gold and XP or a bit of kit you need to use. Very like the remainder of the sport, they’re shorter and may often be accomplished in 5 minutes or much less.

There aren’t many damaging issues I can say about Cat Quest 3. It units out to be a simplified, cozy, enjoyable Motion RPG, and it does simply that. If I have been to pick a difficulty I discovered with the sport, it is principally a bit directionless. Totally different islands within the archipelago have enemies of various ranges, and it may be troublesome to find out the following island you must go to. I usually discovered myself visiting 2 or 3 high-level islands and virtually dying earlier than discovering an island I may deal with at my present stage. That being stated, the sport is mostly simpler if you happen to keep on with the proper islands.

The story additionally feels just a little flat. Data is clearly stored from the participant from the outset, however that is one space the place I really feel just like the simplified strategy did not assist. Issues simply aren’t actually defined all that a lot. The protagonist’s being totally silent additionally would not assist issues right here, both.

These are pretty small complaints; nonetheless, Cat Quest 3 is all about how the sport feels and performs, and you’ll inform that not a lot emphasis is on the story.

Cat Quest III – Steam Deck Efficiency

Cat Quest 3 is about so simple as you want when setting it up on the Steam Deck. It defaults to the Steam Deck’s native 1280×800 decision, and the controls work completely. The sport performs greatest on a gamepad.

Due to this, I solely have one preset.

Beneficial Settings – 60 FPS

In your SteamOS settings, set an FPS Restrict of 60 FPS / 60Hz after which we’ll decrease the TDP Restrict all the way down to 5W.

There are few graphical settings for Cat Quest 3, simply Decision and Draw Distance. On this case, the Decision ought to already be set to 1280×800, however the Draw Distance was set to about half for me. So bump that as much as the best stage as effectively.

Utilizing these settings, the sport virtually all the time ran at a locked 60 FPS for me. There are occasional stutters, however nothing egregious. There’s not a lot else to say, actually!

The Steam Deck LCD’s energy draw stays fairly low, hovering round 8-10W typically, however you may see will increase to 11W in “intensive” areas, comparable to when fog seems. So count on the Steam Deck LCD to get a very good 4 hours of battery life and the Steam Deck OLED to get round 5 hours.

Temperatures principally caught to about 60C, often creeping near 65C however by no means exceeding it.

If you happen to actually wish to save battery life, you may play the sport at 30 FPS with a 3W TDP Restrict. Nevertheless, the ability draw nonetheless stays at about 8W, so that you would possibly get an additional 30-40 minutes of battery life, which is not actually price it to drop from 60 FPS to 30 FPS.

Accessibility:

Sadly, Cat Quest 3’s lack of choices extends to accessibility choices. Apart from rebindable controls, there are actually no accessibility choices. All dialogue is subtitled, although. The sport additionally has an “Simple” mode.

Conclusion:

Cat Quest 3 is an appropriately fuzzy-feeling expertise. Motion-RPG-Lite looks like the right label for this recreation. It is accessible, enjoyable, and about as carefree as you may make a recreation like this. Youngsters and adults should not have any hassle having fun with this recreation, and it might be ideally suited for a guardian and baby to play collectively.

The sport is not too lengthy, doubtless following the earlier two video games, with round 10-12 hours of content material right here. However for the great instances you may have and the cheap price ticket ($19.99 on the time of writing), Cat Quest 3 is certainly a recreation I can advocate.

It runs nice on the Steam Deck, too. It has an ideal management scheme and really low energy draw, that means you may simply get in lengthy play classes or hook it as much as an exterior show to play at the next decision for some native co-op. Cat Quest 3 deserves our “Finest on Deck” score.

Our evaluate relies on the PC model of this recreation.

If you happen to loved this evaluate, be sure you try the remainder of the content material on SteamDeckHQ! We now have all kinds of recreation opinions and information which can be positive to assist your gaming expertise. Whether or not you are in search of information, suggestions and tutorials, recreation settings and opinions, or simply wish to keep up-to-date on the most recent traits, we have your again.