With a 10 out of 10 on Steam, it’s clear that strayed has made many fans. Created by the indie-French game company BlueTwelve Studio, the story explores a cyberpunk world through the eyes of an orange tabby cat. The game is loved not only for its adorable feline protagonist, but also for its beautiful world, interesting robots, and sobering apocalyptic lore.
In fact, one of the biggest parts of the game was the location. The walled city that players can explore is full of life in its skyscrapers, neon signs, small apartments and alleys. It is the perfect playground for a cat. However, there is more to the city than meets the eye. It was actually inspired by a place that existed in real life. This place used to be the Kowloon Walled City in China, a place that was torn down in the 90’s due to its poor quality of life and hygienic conditions.
How Kowloon Inspired Stray
According to a reverse interview with producer Swann Martin-Raget, the walled city of Kowloon was the source of fascination that inspired its early development. Kowloon was known for its incredibly high population density. In fact, Kowloon was the most populous place on Earth in its time. The alleys were narrow, only three to six feet wide with poor drainage and little room for light. Because the apartments in the city were so small, many of people’s lives moved to the rooftops and balconies in cages with clotheslines, garbage and TVs. Most of the buildings were 10 to 14 stories high.
Kowloon made the perfect blueprint for strayed, when the developers realized that the architecture made itself a fantastic cat playground. Cats can sneak through alleys, jump from balcony to balcony and have tons of trash to play with. Looking at the picture of Kowloon and then of strayed, the cities practically mirror each other. However, Kowloon’s backstory is very different from the post-apocalyptic walled city strayed.
Kowloon’s Story
Originally a Chinese military fortress, Kowloon became an urban settlement in the 1940s in the aftermath of World War II. The city underwent massive construction, reaching its maximum size in the late 1970s. By the 1990s, Kowloon had squeezed between 30 and 50 thousand residents into just 6.4 acres of land. For much of its existence, the city became notorious for its crime and poor conditions. A single fire could destroy the lives of thousands and sunlight rarely even reached the ground on the lower levels of the city. The city was also home to many unlicensed doctors and dentists who had no fear of repercussions.
Due to its unique circumstances, the city had its own unique culture. The difficult living conditions made the community active in helping each other, especially when it came to childcare. Roofs were often used as a meeting place to play or work. Due to crime and isolation, many of the communities were self-governing and reflective of anarchic urbanism. Unsurprisingly, the city did not last long due to the poor conditions, and the thousands of civilians were compensated by the government and expelled from Kowloon. What was once Kowloon is now a city park. The skyscrapers were demolished and replaced by plants, statues and paths. Little remains of what was there when the city stood.
Since its destruction, Kowloon has been romanticized by dystopian fiction. strayed is far from the first medium to use Kowloon as a source of inspiration. Movies like Brothers from the Walled City, Long Arm of the Law, Baraka, Re-cycle, Batman Begins, Crime Storyand blood sport they all have scenes or are set entirely in the city of Kowloon or a city/neighborhood based on the design.
Other video games inspired by Kowloon include: Shenmue 2, Stranglehold, Shadowrun: Hong Kong, Call of Duty: Black Ops, and fear effect. With the popularity of strayed, it’s possible that there are even more visions of Kowloon in the game world in the future. It shows how much one place can inspire others, even the places that no longer exist.
strayed is available on PC, PS4 and PS5.
Source: Inverse
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