About this game
Hot Barrel Cats is a tower defense game where the towers are cats, and every shot they fire makes them hotter. A fungus horde called the Mildews is marching along the road toward your gate, and only the cats on the wall can stop them. When a cat's burn timer runs out, it jams and stays silent until it cools off. The trick is to drag overheated cats back to the spawn zone and bring fresh ones up to take their place.
The merge system is the heart of the game. Drop two matching cats on each other and they combine into a stronger tier, and the new cat starts completely cool. That makes every merge both an upgrade and a rescue, so you will often merge just to save a struggling cat.
There are 16 hand-tuned levels, each rated from one to three stars, with three boss fights on levels 8, 12 and 16: Big Puffball, Shelf Cap and Spore Mother. These bosses go after your cats' heat instead of your gate's health, which changes how you plan every battle. Between levels, spend coins in the cafe on perks, grab your daily reward and work through the achievements.
How to play
On desktop, drag cats with the mouse, or click a cat and then click the target. On mobile, drag with your finger or tap a cat and then tap the target. Wall cats shoot automatically, so drag the hot ones down to cool them. Press Esc to pause and M to mute.