9 Lives to Defend – PS5 Review

9 Lives to Defend is the latest auto-shooting rogue-lite to hit PSN following its release on Steam over a year ago and it comes to us by way of solo developer Goldarait Games (Felipe Cecato).

By now you’ll know the formula.  You’re put in an arena, of sorts, and tasked with defending yourself from a horde of enemies.  Defeating foes drops some sort of currency that is used to level you up and when you hit the top of the current level you’ll be offered a choice of perks before continuing.  If you’ve played Vampire Survivors or any of the countless games it has spawned, you’ll be right at home here.

However, what 9 Lives to Defend does to mix up the formula is to base the whole game around the internet’s favourite and most-memed animal, the not-so-humble house cat.  After a quick intro where your owner chuckles while telling you to defend the house, you’re thrown into the job of doing exactly that as various insects, vermin and other creatures warp onto the playfield and make a b-line right for you.

All you can do, by way of survival, is move with the left stick while the game aims and shoots for you.  Well, that’s not strictly everything.  The right stick can be used to override the auto-aim while X/R1 is used for a handy dodge and R2 is used to trigger your special ability which, in the case of the default playable class, is a souped-up but very temporary upgrade in firepower.

Some defeated foes drop ‘kibble’ which is the game’s chosen currency.  It levels you up in the game and can be spent on permanent upgrades outside of a run.  Levelling up gives you a choice of perks and secondary attacks.  It’s here where the game leans heavily into the whole cat thing with such items as cardboard boxes, laser pointers, food bowls, bouncy balls and food bowls acting as new abilities.  There’s quite a bit of fun to be had in seeing what items become available to Loki (even if it’s not always that clear what items are the most effective).

Your main objective is to last for 12 minutes (you can also choose a 24 minute run or an endless one) until the final boss shows up (although the game also drops in bosses every four minutes).  Defeat it and you’re done.  But even failure will let you keep any kibble you’ve earned, so death isn’t a total disaster and, actually, 12 minutes is a really good amount of time for a bit of pick up and play gameplay.

It’s all done in good fun and the basic game loop holds up quite well.  We’re big fans of this sort of game (when done correctly) and 9 Lives to Defend does a pretty good job but one thing you’ll notice early on is that you’re quite under-powered.  You’ll not be beating any runs with your basic cat and so after your first inevitable death, its time to delve into the permanent upgrades and its here where the game struggles a bit.

The sense of progression is slow.  Upgrades are expensive and pretty limited.  Sure you can upgrade your damage and attack rate but after that the remaining upgrades are pretty weak and, worse, they aren’t shared among the other playable classes meaning that you’ll be starting from scratch if you want to start playing as the Wizard, Soldier, Samurai and other cat types.  Even when you max out a character, the game never lives up to that over-used, and often under-delivered, tag of ‘bullet heaven.’

But progress does come and there are various classes, levels and items to unlock.  The latter either boosting or harming your chances by applying changes to the game both positive and negative.  It’s mildly diverting trying these out, and some of the unlockables require you to use certain items, so there’s a fair bit to do but 9 Lives to Defend stops short of being complicated which we appreciated after getting annoyed with Soulstone Survivors and all of its unrelenting faffiness.

The cheerful, cartoony art-style is charming enough.  It’s pretty simple which is typical of the genre but the game never pushes things in terms of enemy numbers so maybe they could have added a bit more in terms of detail.  Also, while the visual clarity wasn’t ever an issue when it came to playability, there is still a fair bit of clutter on the screen and that’s mostly down to the fact that you’ve got up to seven weapons throwing various graphics all over the place.

In the end we warmed to 9 Lives to Defend.  It certainly lacks in terms of impact (especially compared to Vampire Survivors and Brotato) but there’s still a degree of fun and addictiveness.  And while progress is slow, the game isn’t overloaded with content and so it stops short of feeling like too much of a grind.  It might not stick around as long as the best games in the genre but it’s certainly far from the worst.  And cat fans are sure to have a blast with it.