Mewgenics

Mewgenics is a tactical role-playing game divided into two stages: combat and cat breeding. At the beginning of the game, the player is assigned a team of four cats, which feature character classes, such as hunter, mage, tank, and fighter. The cats have varying statistics, as well as access to mana reserves, which influence their roles and performance. The cats may be additionally enhanced by equipping clothing and other paraphernalia.

The combat portion of the game takes place, principally, on a procedurally-generated grid with a two-dimensional isometric perspective, where the team must eliminate all the enemies before advancing. The combatants may take a move action, use an active ability, and get benefit from passive abilities. The combat is heavily influenced by the environment, including weather and foliage, the latter of which can work for and against the cats. If a cat loses all its hit points, it will be incapacitated yet remain in the battle, though it will suffer long-term consequences in the form of injuries, such as a broken paw, which applies negative stat penalties.

Mewgenics is set in Boon County, a mostly-dilapidated area in the United States. The game's story is "pretty light", having the player "do the bidding of an incompetent scientist".

The player character is a cat lady who is defibrillated at the start of the game, by a cat-obsessed scientist named Dr. Thomas A. Beanies. Beanies gives the player two cats before sending them off to their house, with no instructions beyond acquiring as many cats as possible and performing eugenics on them to make them stronger.

Following the release of the critically and commercially successful video game Super Meat Boy co-created by programmer Tommy Refenes and artist Edmund McMillen of Team Meat, McMillen collaborated with programmer Florian Himsl on the Flash video game The Binding of Isaac as a three-month exploration of the roguelike genre. After the game's release in 2011, McMillen worked with Refenes to develop Mew-Genics, taking into consideration lessons learned from the development of The Binding of Isaac. Announced in October 2012, the game was described by McMillen as being randomly generated, involving cats and the "strangest project [he had] ever worked on". The cats engaged bosses in a manner styled, principally, after Pokémon combat system, where opponents become progressively more difficult with every fight.

Outside combat, cats could participate in various activities, such as beauty pageants and sewer races – as well as be cryogenically frozen for longevity. The game was intended to be a multi-platform title, with iOS being the first announced platform, followed by Steam and Android. The game's soundtrack was composed by the two-member band Ridiculon, McMillen's repeat collaborators.

Mewgenics was first previewed by journalist Russ Frushtick of Polygon on Halloween 2022, detailing his playthrough, as well as McMillen and Glaiel's account of the game's development history. He complimented it for being "one of the most ambitious and bizarre strategy games [he had] ever played." IGN journalist Tom Marks was given an extended preview of Mewgenics in May 2025 and praised the game for being one of the most exciting and nuanced roguelikes he had played in years. Tyler Wilde of PC Gamer, attending the early preview in July 2025, agreed with McMillen's assessment of Mewgenics as the best title of his career. Jean-Luc Seipke from GameSpot praised the video preview of Mewgenics posted in December 2025, describing it as "[his] next obsession".

The game received highly positive reviews from critics. After reaching a Top Critic Average of 89 with 94% of critics recommending the title on OpenCritic, Mewgenics became the first game of 2026 to secure "Must-Play" status. In response to the critical reception, Polygon's Giovanni Colantonio declared that Mewgenics was the first legitimate Game of the Year contender for 2026. Ali Jones' review for GamesRadar+ felt that the game's randomness was sometimes unfair, although this increased the satisfaction of finding ways to tip the odds in the player's favor and overall considered it "an excellent addition to its creator's already enviable canon".