Socks the Cat Rocks the Hill is a game that really deserves none of your attention, because it's about Bill Clinton's cat and it's not even that good.

📖 Background Link to heading

Socks the Cat Rocks the Hill is a game about Bill Clinton’s cat, of all things. It was being developed by Kaneko USA for a Fall 1993 release on Super Nintendo and Sega Genesis, but the game was ultimately canned. Maybe we should be thankful, because it had some spicy 90s politics references that I can’t imagine were any less cringe-worthy at the time. After cancellation, it was considered lost media for over twenty years. Then, in 2016, a collector by the name of Tom Curtin bought the only known demo from a collector and rereleased Socks through Kickstarter with the help of a company called Second Dimension.

The description on said Kickstarter page opens with the following quote:

“Socks the Cat is the most anticipated unreleased video game of all-time. Ever. For any platform. Don’t believe me? Grab some popcorn and “Google” it.”

If that doesn’t inspire confidence in you, I don’t know what will.

The rom available to the public comes from Second Dimension, who patched the rom to make the game “more playable”. Supposedly this involved fixing game-breaking bugs, so I can’t be too upset that the original is still in the hands of the collector selling this game.

🎮 Controls Link to heading

• Y: Attack
• X: Adjust HUD
• B: Jump
• A: Run
• L/R: Emote

🏁 Goal Link to heading

Get past evil rats, the paparazzi, and your political enemies to reach the end of the game, if you can!

Boss 1: Ross Perot Link to heading

I have no idea who this is. The strategy for this boss is to crouch-attack repeatedly because you can counter-hit his cane with the crouch attack.

Boss 2: Richard Nixon Link to heading

It’s not too hard to avoid his missiles, but it is a little slow.

I got to stage 5 with save states. I don’t expect players to get that far, but a player who figures out the bosses and is playing patiently might!

📝 Notes Link to heading

This game suffers from slippery controls and boring, generic level and enemy design. It’s incredibly easy to fall off platforms or into pits due to the awkward physics. Not only that, but there are lots of blind jumps, and the camera moves around wildly when you change facing.

The bad physics don’t stop at movement. If you hit an enemy at a wall, they will commonly rebound off the wall and damage you in retaliation. This can happen to you when swinging on ropes as well, if you hit your head on a ceiling.

The lives system is awful too. You have “nine lives” but they’re really hitpoints since you lose them instantly and you get i-frames after losing each life. The “continues” are really lives, or I suppose you could just consider the game as having one life and two continues.