The Battle Cats
is a free-to-play tower defense video game developed and published by Japanese developer PONOS Corporation for iOS and Android, originally released in Japan under the name Nyanko Great War. The Battle Cats debuted on the Japanese iOS App Store in November 2012 under the name Battle cats, with Android support following in December of that same year, and became popular in both Japan and Korea. It later was deleted from both the US Google Play stores and App Store, with an improved version released on 17 September 2014. A Microsoft Windows port was released in August 2017, and was available for download until late 2018, when PONOS Corporation ended support for it. It was ported to the Nintendo 3DS in 2016 and Nintendo Switch in Japan in 2018 and Southeast Asia in 2021.
Plot
The plot of The Battle Cats takes place across four main story sagas, three subchapter sagas in the Legends Stages, and various miscellaneous stages. Dialogue in the form of scrolling text before and after the completion of Chapters, unit and enemy descriptions, and battles during gameplay provide most of the game's lore and story.Story Chapters
In total, there are four sagas in the main story, which each contain three chapters, except for "The Aku Realms", which has only one chapter. There are ten chapters in total, but with the first three sagas, each chapter is essentially a harder version of the previous one. They contain the same levels, theme, and treasures across all three chapters, with the only difference being the amount, difficulty, and selection of enemies that appear in levels. Additionally, the opening and ending monologue to each saga is reused across them.Empire of Cats
The story begins in the first saga, Empire of Cats, where the Cat army travels the world to conquer its nations, with the Japanese version instead having them take over Japan. In EoC, there are three chapters of progressing difficulty, with identical stage design unlike the next sagas. Their inferred creator is the fictional deity, The Cat God, who can be unlocked early on as a power-up and as a usable unit upon further progression. Throughout the saga, the Cat army recruits special Legend units, who are similar to the mythical "The Heroes of Legend"; ancient warriors who wielded immense power. After conquering Earth, the Cats end resistance to their rule by conquering the Moon and obtaining a time machine.Into the Future
The second main story saga, Into the Future, begins after the Cats use the time machine they obtained at the end of Empire of Cats, transporting them to the year 29XX, where Aliens have conquered Earth. The cats reclaim earth; both in the international and Japanese version. However, some stages are replaced by fictional locations like the Floating Continent and Great Abyss, and battle new enemies to reconquer the world. After driving the aliens off the planet, the Cats arrive on the Moon, as they had during Empire of Cats. However, this time they face corrupted versions of the Legend units they recruited during Empire of Cats. After defeating them, the Legend units unlock their true forms, gaining more powers and abilities. The saga ends with the Cat army deciding to build a rocket to venture further into space and continue the fight against the aliens.Cats of the Cosmos
The third main saga, Cats of the Cosmos, begins with the Cats invading the cosmos, presumably using the rocket they built at the end of Into the Future. However, the Aliens out in space are unlike those on Earth, as their power is enhanced with stars and they can warp Cat units away and nullify damage with barriers. The Cats battle across the Solar System and venture further into the galaxy, eventually arriving at the "Big Bang", where they fight the Cat God. After defeating him, he reveals he was the narrator throughout the saga and that, despite being an ancient deity, he is actually around twenty years old. After the cat and Alien forces come to a pseudo-ceasefire, the Cat God declares the cats should move onward to the Realm of Legends. However, an entity of chaos and destruction known as Filibuster Obstructa arrives from outside the galaxy, serving as the Cat Army's final test in their conquest of the Cosmos.The Aku Realms
The last main saga, The Aku Realms, takes place some time after Cats of the Cosmos. Its story begins with a Cat leader, Empress Cat, conducting research on the mysterious Aku kind, who are connected to altars that weaken the Cat Army's power. With help from the Cat Aku Researcher, she manages to open a portal to the Aku Realms, but the Aku's power possesses her and she becomes the Possessed Empress. Upon entering the Aku Realms, the Cats find more altars that weaken them, which the dark priest Mamon built to prevent others from interfering with his plan. He seeks to unleash Jagando, the Lord of Ruin, by undoing the seals of power the heroes of legend placed on him. With their power limited, the Cats fight across the Aku Realms to destroy the altars and regain their strength.Upon reaching Norway and destroying half of the altars, the Cats arrive at "Mount Aku", where Dark Priest Mamon attacks them and they face him with half their strength. The Cats prevail and force Mamon to retreat, but he flees with the crystal of awakening; the last component needed to awaken Jagando. The Cats finish destroying the altars on Earth and travel to the Moon to destroy the last altar and confront High Priest Mamon. With Mamon's defeat, the last altar is seized and the Cats' power is almost fully restored. However, Mamon succeeds in reawakening Jagando, and with him holding the last of the Cats' power, they go back to Mount Aku to face him. They defeat and seal away Jagando once more and take his egg to raise as their own.
With the Cats' triumph, the Aku Altars are universally deactivated, allowing them to venture into areas they had been previously obstructed from. With his plans foiled and his army in shambles, Mamon loses motivation to continue his plans. However, this allows him to refocus his mind on his family, whom he reunites with for the first time in nearly a decade. He thanks the Battle Cats for giving him an opportunity to change his ways, but leaves them with a menacing message: "We'll surely meet again, Battle Cats. Just you wait..."
Legend Stages
Legend Stages are stages that supplement the main story of Battle Cats. It begins with the Cats using the time machine they obtained at the end of Empire of Cats to travel twenty years into the past, prior to the Cat God's birth/creation. These stages are split into two main groups: Event Stages and Sub-Chapter sagas. While all Sub-Chapter sagas are canon to the story of Battle Cats, some Event stages, such as collaboration stages, are not. While all Legend stages take place after the first chapter of Empire of Cats, where they fit within the greater story and timeline is ambiguous.Stories of Legend
Stories of Legend, is the first of the Sub-Chapter sagas and has 49 sub-chapters, with 1-8 stages in each one. They fight new and old enemies as they aim to collect Cat Food and recruit Legend units to join their army, who resemble the Heroes of Legend. After the Cats accomplish their goals, they travel back to the present; however, upon emerging from the time machine, they find themselves in an unfamiliar place.Uncanny Legends
Uncanny Legends is the second of the Sub-Chapter Sagas and takes place after Stories of Legend and Cats of the Cosmos. After defeating and recruiting Mecha-Bun, the final boss of Stories of Legend, the Cats' time machine brings them to an ancient world, where Relic enemies, who have the ability to Curse their opponents, have not yet gone extinct. The Cats soon realize that some of the Legend units recruited during Stories of Legend are descendants of the true Heroes of Legend. Like before, the Cat Army defeats and recruits these ancient Legend units into their army. During their journey, the Cats also find "a dark guild researching forbidden knowledge" and "the REAL ultimate superweapon". The former likely refers to the Aku, but it is unknown what the latter refers to. Near the end of the saga, the Cats begin a project to "Catify" all of humanity and come across the ancient Sacred Tree, whose guardian is Zero Luza, the ancestor of humanity. After defeating him, a God emerges from the tree and tells the Cats to find a sage in another world while drawing a can of Cat Food in the sky. The Cats, with a new journey ahead of them, venture into a new world.Zero Legends
Zero Legends is the third and final Sub-Chapter saga and features bosses previously exclusive to Advent Stages. After travelling through a spacetime distortion to the "other world", the Cats find themselves in an alternate universe at its Big Bang and face Metafilibuster, a corrupted and altered version of Filibuster Obstructa. After emerging victorious, the Cats soon find that the laws of this universe are drastically different from their own, with natural phenomena such as snow in volcanoes and forests filled with poisonous gas. As well, enemies that are individuals in their world are commonplace here, and a new type of enemies, the mysterious Sage enemies, appear. After a few sub-chapters, 9 to be precise, the cats face the first Zero Legends boss, Sage of Mind Soractes.The current newest sub-chapters for Zero Legends are:
- BCEN: Booklet Islands
- BCJP: Bukku Rettō, Booklet Islands
Gameplay
In battle, each Cat and enemy unit has different stats and abilities, which gives units different roles on the battlefield, for example meat shield, crowd controller, or backliner. Along with base stats, a unit can also have abilities, which can improve their performance against a specific type of enemy or gives them a unique ability that can aid them in battle. For example, the Cat "Axe Cat" is strong against the "Red" enemy type, meaning it deals more and takes less damage against "Red" enemies.
The Cats are the protagonists that the player deploys throughout the game. Many Cats do not resemble typical cats, and are sometimes equipped with external objects such as weapons or machines, or are characters earned through collaboration events. A player can spend XP and "Catseyes", resources obtained by completing levels, to upgrade a Cat, as well as NP to obtain and upgrade Talents, which give additional abilities. Version 12.1 added Ultra Talents, allowing certain Uber Rare Cats to unlock one to three additional Talents and equip a second Talent Orb after reaching level 60. Cats have level caps, or maximum levels, which differ across Cat units, ranging from as high as 60 to as low as 20. Some Cats can evolve into a True Form after being leveled up to their evolved form, which requires Catfruit or Catfruit Seeds; these are obtained from special stages or from merging Seeds into Fruit. Some Cats require Behemoth Stones or Behemoth Gems to reach their True Form, which are obtained from Behemoth Culling stages. The 13.0 update adds the ability for some Uber Rare Cats to evolve into Ultra Forms after reaching level 60, after spending Behemoth Stones or Gems, Catfruit, and XP. Duplicates obtained in the game's Gacha systems can be used to add additional "plus-levels" to a Cat unit. The Cats are divided into six rarities, which are in increasing rarity: Normal, Special, Rare, Super Rare, Uber Super Rare, and Legend Rare.
The Battle Cats contains three main stories: Empire of Cats, Into the Future, and Cats of the Cosmos, with each story containing three chapters, and an extra story, the Aku Realms. In addition, there are the Legend Stages, which are extra and less linear stages that supplement the main sagas. There are also two additional areas known as the Catclaw Dojo and the Underground Labyrinth, which are bonus areas designed to challenge the player in unique ways.
The Legend Stages are further divided into three main categories: Stories of Legend, Uncanny Legends, and Zero Legends, with each being unlocked after completing the previous. There is also an additional category for event and Collaboration stages.
The Catclaw Dojo contains a stage to test how many enemies the player can defeat within a given period of time. This challenge is amplified by the money being scarce, as the enemies don't drop money when killed, forcing the player to send out units strategically and save their money. The Dojo house two types of stages, those being ranked stages and the Catclaw Championships. Ranked stages are typically levels in which the player competes against other players to defeat the most enemies as quickly as possible. At the end of the event, a reward is given out to each participant based on their performance compared to other players. These stages can be event or collaboration stages that refresh regularly, allowing rewards to be fought for again. The Catclaw Championship acts as a pseudo tutorial for the game, where players are shown how aspects such as traits and abilities function. These stages often start with levels that require the use of set cats to help teach aspect of the game, and end with tough levels designed to test players technical abilities. Upon completing a set of stages a player is given a rank. These ranks range from rank 1 up to rank 12, and are shown on the players' Officers' Club ID. It is recommended a player complete these stages when possible as these levels contain some of the best rewards in the game, including multiple Platinum tickets, special gacha capsules that have a guaranteed chance of giving the player an Uber Rare Cat.
The Underground Labyrinth is a collection of 100 stages with an unknown schedule that reward the player with rare items like Dark Catseyes. Despite the early stages being relatively easy, the challenge comes from the restrictions placed on the unit selection. In the Labyrinth, if a unit is used, it cannot be removed from the Equip menu. The only way to remove a unit from the player's lineup is for the unit to become "trapped". After defeating or losing a level, units can become trapped and are unusable, but the player can be given the choice to "rescue" a unit from being trapped, allowing them to still be usable. However, the traps are unpredictable, since they vary in how many units they trap and sometimes do not allow the player to rescue units. The Labyrinth forces players to ration their units carefully and use different units, adding a unique challenge seen nowhere else in the game.
While there is no reason to assume not, it is inconclusive whether or not the events that take place in the Catclaw Dojo and the Underground Labyrinth are canon to the story of The Battle Cats.