Content area
Full text
Video-game genres have their purist fans. I know gamers who play nothing but shooters, or role-playing adventures, or racing games.
But most players prefer a more varied diet, and developers have been eager to erase the boundaries.
Shooting games, for example, keep incorporating elements from other categories: "Ratchet & Clank" is a platform shooter, "Mass Effect" is a role-playing shooter, "Child of Eden" is a musical shooter.
All those combinations worked, but genre-bending can get weird. Take "Catherine" (Atlus, for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, $59.99), which mixes a sort of dating simulation and a puzzle game with a splash of survival horror.
It doesn't fully succeed, but it's completely original.
Let's start with the story. You control Vincent, a 31-year-old slacker who's muddling through a relationship with his longtime girlfriend, Katherine (with a K). She's beautiful, smart and ambitious, but she's getting a little impatient waiting for...