Customers enter the cafe with a preferred type of cat they wish to spend time with -- friendly, playful, shy, etc. Once you match them with a cat, they wander around spending quality time together. Minigames frequently appear, in which you prepare drinks for customers, give otherwise unoccupied cats a pat, or clean up kitty pawprints. These minigames earn you tokens. The games aren't timed and you can't "get it wrong", so they don't feel stressful. Occasionally cats will give you random tokens as well. These tokens can be used to buy furniture and other decorations for your cafe.
Periodically, baskets arrive, which contain currency and treats. There are 2 guaranteed daily baskets, and timed baskets, arriving in increments between 20 minutes and 12 hours. The treats in these baskets can be used to upgrade the cats (called "nurture" in the game). Higher level cats can spend more time with customers, enabling you to serve them more drinks and earn more tokens. As you level up, you get access to more cats and decorations, and your cafe gets bigger.
Aside from the minigames, it's just fun to watch the cats and the customers playing and spending time together. According to Runaway Games, all of the cats are modelled after real-life cats belonging to staff and friends, and there's a description of each one's personality on the cat screen. This makes them so much more charming in my opinion.
The developers have certainly gone to a lot of effort to make the behaviours of the cats lifelike. Cats will play with different toys, be cuddled, or petted, and sleep in different positions. Sometimes they sleep with one paw stretched out in front of them, just like my cat! They also knead the cushions, or rub up against the customers' legs. They make various different noises, from meows to purring to chirps. If you find the sound of cats purring relaxing, I definitely recommend having the sound on.
The decor of the cafe has a natural feel with many wooden items and plants to choose from. Similarly, the cats and customers are cute with large eyes, but aren't too far from reality, with realistic colours and features. This is unlike many games which are much more colourful and over-the-top. While I don't mind that kind of aesthetic, this is much more calming and appeals to my Mori Girl side. The mellow jazz soundtrack matches this feel. The sound effects -- including the cats purring when you pet them! -- aren't too obtrusive. While playing most games, I have the sound turned off as it can become annoying, but the sound effects in Furistas aren't overwhelming.
It's relatively quick and easy to level up when playing Furistas Cat Cafe. In the beginning, I was issued with a fairly generous amount of tokens, treats and kittykash. I started with one cat (Bon-Chan) and have collected another one at most levels so far. This is what my cafe looked like after only playing for about 2 hours (and I still had tokens left over!):
Many casual games these days have a plethora of advertisements, often playing involuntarily in between rounds. Furistas has no involuntary advertising. When a daily basket arrives (which occurs twice a day), you can optionally play an ad to double the amount of goodies in the basket. This is the only advertising in the game. The developers have chosen to prioritise the gameplay experience over getting revenue from advertising, and I really have to applaud this. When I come across games like this, I always enjoy the game more. I feel more positively towards the game developers, and open to purchasing upgrade packs or other things on offer. It also increases my feelings of loyalty -- I will often play the game for longer, and come back to it after a break.
Pluses
+ It's cats! And adorable ones, too! What more can I say?
+ The fact that they are based on real-life cats adds an extra dimension to the kitty goodness.
+ Made for cat lovers with realistic behaviour and sounds.
+ Generous supply of currency for upgrading cats and decorating cafe. Guaranteed daily baskets make you feel less pressured to return to the game and add to the relaxing feel.
+ Diverse customers (both in appearance and in names).
+ Natural and calming aesthetic appeals to me.
+ Minimal advertising makes for a really enjoyable gaming experience.
Minuses
- There are 4 different types of currency (5 when there is an event on). Even though tapping on a currency brings up an explanation of how to earn it and what it's for, it was still quite confusing at first. Now that I've been playing for a while, it seems to make sense though.
It was too hard weeding out the screenshots I took of the game, so I'll leave you with some photospam of the adorable kitties:
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