What Aqua Kitty - Milk Mine Defender is
Aqua Kitty - Milk Mine Defender is a fast paced retro styled submarine arcade shooter. Cats around the world have run short on milk, so a team of milk mining kittens has gone under the ocean seabed to drill into reserves of naturally forming full-fat milk. Mechanical sea creatures keep turning up to disrupt the work, and your job is to blast through hordes of them in a kitty sub so the mining keeps going. The whole thing is built around hand drawn pixel art shown at a crisp 720p, with chiptune music drawing on the C64 and Amiga era.
Playing it together
The game has optional 2 player local Co-op, so two of you can take a sub each and split the incoming enemies between you. Remote Play Together is supported, which means one person can host and others join in over the internet. The campaign runs across a branching map of levels, and the sea depth changes from level to level, subtly shifting how things play out. There is a chain kill combo system, so a skilled pair can keep combos going to push the score up, and Steam online leaderboards let you compare results with other players alongside achievements to chase.
Modes and weapons
There are three main campaign modes. Normal Mode is the standard run through branching levels full of mechanical enemies with differing behaviours. Easy Mode is the same shape of game with more health and easier enemies if Normal proves too punishing. Arcade Mode is a survival mode where you collect gems to buy powerups. Alongside those sits Classic infinite mode, a milk-free level that never ends, aimed at players who want a hardcore challenge.
Your submarine fires from two barrels and carries a rechargeable secondary weapon that has to be managed carefully rather than spammed. That secondary upgrades through progress in Easy and Normal Modes, while in Arcade Mode you buy upgrades through a shop. A depth based power-up system gives you partial control over the type and location of power-ups that appear, so you can plan for a tactical advantage.
Before you start
Expect a difficult, bullet hell style shoot 'em up with dense enemy patterns, so the difficulty tags are there for a reason. Easy Mode is a legitimate starting point if the standard campaign feels too harsh. The game was made by a core team of two people, with audio by Electric Cafe and box art by David Hankin, and it was designed from the start as a modern-retro PC title in love with the 16bit era and late 80s arcade games. Leaderboards and achievements are tied to Steam.