The Princess, the Stray Cat, and Matters of the Heart similar games & best alternatives

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The Princess, the Stray Cat, and Matters of the Heart

PlayStation 4, PC (Microsoft Windows), PlayStation Vita, Nintendo Switch • 2019

Should you play it?

Once upon a time, after his mother passed away, a boy called Nora felt all alone in the world. He spent every day with his unique and kind hearted friends until one fateful day, he had a chance encounter with a princess from the Netherworld.

What works
  • Strong, engaging story with emotional depth
  • High-quality voice acting and soundtrack
  • Charming and distinct characters
  • Multiple story routes and endings
  • Beautiful anime-style artwork
Things to keep in mind
  • Adult content heavily censored or removed
  • Limited gameplay interaction beyond reading and choices
  • Some pacing issues and overused comedic elements
  • Certain story routes feel rushed or incomplete
  • No multiplayer or social features

What to play next

Top picks

Games that feel the closest overall

  • Sakura Santa

  • Select Oblige

  • Wolf Tails

  • taking my Dark Knight Girlfriend to the corner store

  • Sakura Nova

  • Amairo Chocolate 2

  • Clover Day's Plus

  • Tayutama 2-you're the only one-

  • Fantasy Tavern Sextet -Vol.1 New World Days-
Hidden Gems

Less popular games with surprisingly high similarity

  • Select Oblige

  • taking my Dark Knight Girlfriend to the corner store

  • Sakura Nova
If you liked…

Recommendations by what you enjoyed most

Similarity map

Explore nearby similar games and see why they’re close.

How to use the graph
Similarity map

Each dot is a game. They are arranged from the same motivation profile as in the “Why this game works” section below. Closer dots usually mean more similar reasons to play (exploration, competition, relaxation, etc.)—not that one game is “better” than another.

  • Purple star: this page’s game — everything on the map is relative to it.
  • Coloured chips: click to highlight games that mainly differ on that motivation; click again to reset.
  • Dotted line: link between this page’s game and the one selected for comparison.
  • Hover a dot for a screenshot preview, score, and top score gaps; click to compare in the panel on the right.
  • Scroll or double-click the chart to zoom out and see more games.

Why don’t the axes read like a score? This view uses t-SNE: it only keeps who is close to whom. The scales are not “good to bad” or hours played—they separate groups on the map. Read distance between dots, not the axis numbers (hidden on purpose).

The Princess, the Stray Cat, and Matters of the Heart: A very typical example of its motivational profile. Motivations that often define this kind of title include Strategy, Experimenting, Competence, Survival. Here, the score leans higher than usual among comparable games on Intimacy, Fantasy, Story.

Why this game works

A motivational profile of the game, with the closest similar game for each player motivation.

  • Autonomy

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  • Competence

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  • Continuation

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  • Escapism

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  • Expectation

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  • Experimenting

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    "Some exploration of different narrative paths and endings, but largely follows established visual novel conventions."

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  • Exploration

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  • Expression

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  • Fantasy

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  • Growth

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  • Health

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  • Idle

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  • Intimacy

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  • Leadership

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  • Progression

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  • Relaxation

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  • Sensation

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  • Status

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  • Story

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  • Strategy

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  • Thrill

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  • Value

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  • Violence

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  • Survival

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Last update: 12/07/2026