A note about The Cuddlywumps Chronicles

This blog is written and maintained by Miss Cuddlywumps, a fluffy-tailed calico cat who is both classically educated and familiar with mysteries. She receives creative input from the Real Cats and clerical assistance from She of Little Talent (old SoLT, a.k.a. Roby Sweet). Comments or complaints should be addressed to Miss C rather than to old SoLt (Ms. Sweet). Ms. Sweet accepts no responsibility for Miss C's opinions.

Monday, December 4, 2017

Cat App Review: Cat Bomb

You know how sometimes you get all excited about a new app because it looks like so much fun, but when you start using it, it’s so annoying it makes you want to hiss? That sums up our experience with Cat Bomb. 

The basics

Cat Bomb is an app that lets you “photobomb with cats for IG, FB, Snapchat.” In other words, it adds cats to your photos. This is a noble goal, we think, because what photo wouldn’t benefit from the addition of a cat or two? You can even replace people’s heads with cats’ heads for that “cat in a business suit” or “cat in overalls” effect. At least, supposedly you can.

When you open the app on your iPhone, you have the option of opening an existing photo on your device or taking a new one. Then you click the plus sign to go to the menu of available cats. All well and good, and you select a cat from the 15 that are available in the free pack. You select, say, the handsome tuxedo cat in the bottom row. But oh no ... you then find out that you can’t have that one—not until you give the app a five-star review! An app you haven’t even used yet, and it wants a five-star review already!

Everyone say it with me, “Hiss!”

Real Cat Paisley being photobombed by cats from Cat Bomb
Here, Real Cat Paisley is photobombed by the paltry three
cats that are actually free in Cat Bomb.
Turns out the only cats you can use without doing a review are the first three. The others in the “free” pack require a review—of five stars. Just to clarify, if you are required to give something in exchange for something else, technically it isn’t free.

Beyond the “free” cats, the app also includes six packs of cat photos, available for 99 cents each. There’s a Fat Pack (fat cats), a Kittens Pack, and a Cat Heads Pack (which has those neat heads you can add to people’s bodies or whatever). We didn’t try any of these because we were so annoyed by the free pack, but in principle we don’t object to paying for extras in an app or for the full version of a “lite” app we enjoy. We do understand that app developers have to pay their rent and stock their fridges like the rest of us. And I will say that the actual cat photos available are really cute, so we can see having a lot of fun with them.

Our verdict

We love the concept of Cat Bomb—it sounds like a lot of fun, and the cat photos are cute. However, we really think the developers (Visual Playground Apps) should rethink their restriction on the “free” pack. At the very least, they should make it clear when you open the pack that only the first three cats are free. Currently, you don’t find that out until you click on one of the non-free cats. This, wethinks, is deceptive. And asking for a five-star review right off the bat is just too much. We don’t give five-star reviews on apps that demand them. What we do with those apps is delete them and give them

Half a Paw Up--An Okay App

  

For the record, Cat Bomb is available for iOS devices. We played on an iPhone 7.

A note on the "Paws Up" system: Miss C gives either one or two paws up. One paw is for a good app; two paws is for a great app. She never gives three or four paws because that would require her to lie on her back...and Miss C does not do that!

5 comments:

  1. Hmm, we always want anything to do with cats to work 100%, so it's so disappointing that this app is too weird. Thanks for the review!

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  2. Thank you for the honest review. It sure sounds like a cute app, too bad there are downsides :(

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  3. It sounded good in theory, but I would be annoyed by the deception too. Sometimes I think that those that create some of this stuff are out of touch with what consumers really want.

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  4. It would be improved if you were one of the cats :)

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  5. Hmph ... we think the Cat Bomb people should use Paisley's picture! These other kitties don't hold a candle to her gorgeous tortie-ness!

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