Netflix’s dive into gaming has seen the release of their latest game, Cat Burglar — an interactive experience called where correct choices help move the story forward. The trivia title is from the creators of Bandersnatch and with this hybrid game-based storytelling on the way, Netflix thinks it could help push more of its users to think of the service as a place for games.
According to reports by The Verge, Andy Weil, VP of Netflix Comedy and Interactive said “You can only do this on Netflix”. “You can’t do this on any other platform because we’re a tech company, and that’s in the DNA of Netflix all along. The idea that you can interact with the content is something that we are exploring across all genres, all types of things.”
Created by Charlie Brooker and Annabel Jones, Cat Burglar is arguably Netflix’s biggest interactive title to date. The cartoon, has a similar feel to works from Looney Toons, with its stars being a museum-burgling cat named Rowdy and a security dog named Peanut. The show is intended for adults, though, with one round of trivia asking about the easiest things to do while drunk, for example.
Netflix in recent times has been delving deeper into interactive content with about a dozen different playable mobile games. It has also been experimenting with interactive programming but Cat Burglar is confirmation that Netflix is willing to take a more expansive view of what a game can look like.
“This is definitely more of like a fun experiment,” Weil says, according to the Verge, while adding that “we are going to do kind of more direct trivia stuff coming up.”