RumbleKitten turns Fruit Ninja into a kitty-combat game on iOS

Gaia's newest iOS game RumbleKitten takes place in the Victorian era, as you tickle-fight cats and dress them up in themed clothing. If that doesn't already have your attention, I'm not sure what will. Now available to download for free on iPhone, RumbleKitten takes place in the dangerous world of Fursbury. Your feline friends have been captured and thrown into the pound by the evil Daddy Cat, and only by diving into the underground world of cat tickle fights can you hope to rescue them.

The game comes with a unique style of animation that Gaia is known for, as the game's feline characters are personified with human emotions and clothing. As you head into the game, you'll be able to name your cat and will immediately dive into the world of tickle fighting, which plays a lot like Fruit Ninja. Each battle sees stars appearing in groups as they're flung from the bottom to the top of the screen, and you'll need to swipe your finger across them to destroy them, thus causing damage to your opponent. Bombs also appear on the screen, and these must be avoided so that you don't take damage yourself.

As a free-to-play experience, each match requires energy to complete, and the enemies themselves become more difficult to defeat as you go along. If you ever feel the need to train before progressing to a harder enemy, you can go back and have rematches with previously defeated foes. Thankfully, you can earn multiple achievements via each character that you battle, so there's more incentive to go back and fight before moving on.

Earning gold allows you to unlock new pieces of clothing for your cat, which then translates to "Swagger" points. Swagger is required to unlock some enemies, and it's a system that works well as a break from the same Fruit Ninja-style gameplay that each battle offers. While the core gameplay of RumbleKitten is so similar to Halfbrick's classic, it comes with that unique Gaia flair, fun characters and a storyline that make it a much lengthier process than you might be expecting.

The game is still simple to play due to its familiarity, but there's enough originality and content here (including 12 cats to bail out of the pound by spending gold) to definitely make it worth the free download. If you're not convinced, check out the trailer above for more.

Download RumbleKitten for free on iOS >

Have you tried RumbleKitten? What do you think of this unique, yet familiar battle kitten-filled battle game on iPhone? Sound off in the comments!