16% of Rise of the Ronin Players Hugged Every Cat

Sony has released a set of statistics showing how players engaged with Rise of the Ronin‘s various activities, and the game’s cat quest has proven surprisingly (or perhaps completely unsurprisingly) popular.

While Sony and Team Ninja’s open-world epic has a deep historical narrative to discover and plenty of the developer’s signature action to enjoy, it turns out that finding and cuddling every cat in the game is an important activity for a number of players.

According to Sony, 16% of Rise of the Ronin players collected every cat. That’s 100 cats in total, which is a lot of wandering around Edo-period Japan. I haven’t played this one yet, but I’ll definitely be adding to this statistic when I do.

Rise of the Ronin may have plenty of killing in it, but cats are more diverting.

The game’s cats have proven so popular that in the latest update, a feature was added whereby you can get reacquainted with cats you’ve already met near Usugumo Dayu, so you can while away your hours simply loving cats and refusing to engage with the story. What a rush!

If you’re not a cat lover, then there are plenty of other interesting statistics to pore over. Be aware that minor story spoilers for Rise of the Ronin follow, so if you’re looking to go in without knowing anything, avert your eyes.

When given the choice between sparing or killing Gonzo in the main story, 35% of players chose to kill him, while 65% chose to spare him. 62% of players sided with the shogunate and 38% with anti-shogunate forces, which surprises me.

51% of Rise of the Ronin players opted for Dusk, the game’s “normal” difficulty mode, while 36% played on the easier Dawn difficulty and 13% opted to challenge themselves by playing on the Twilight mode.

Give Team Ninja’s latest a try yourself with the Rise of the Ronin demo

These fascinating statistics aren’t all you’re getting by way of Rise of the Ronin goodies today.

If you’re yet to check out Rise of the Ronin, you’ll be pleased to know that a demo is now available via the PlayStation Store, so you can see whether this one is for you or not.

A screen showing the player choosing what to do with Gonzo, complete with text showing that 35% of players killed him and 65% spared him
Which option will you take?

The demo offers the chance to battle Gonzo, and when you’re done, you can transfer your save data over to the full game, so you don’t need to worry about losing progress if you decide to take the plunge.

Rise of the Ronin is available right now on PlayStation 5, and you can download the free demo right now as well. If you’re still making your mind up, you can check out our review right here.