Annapurna Interactive’s Stray has taken the world by storm over the course of the past week and a half. Many have finished the relatively short game already though, so have been figuring out homemade ways to potentially improve upon it. Most of those improvements take the form of mods, and someone is working on one right now that allows you to play everyone’s favorite cat game in local multiplayer.
KangieDanie is the mod’s creator (thanks, Eurogamer) and you can actually download and play it right now through Nexus Mods if you play Stray on PC. However, KangieDanie makes sure to point out their mod has a fair few creases that need to be ironed out before it is anywhere near perfect. It is still in the very early stages of development, which means you will likely encounter a few bugs and may even find one of your cats getting stuck between level transitions. Poor kitty.
If you do download and apply the mod, all you need to do to add another player, and another cat, is press F9. The implication seems to be that if you press F9 again after that, another cat will be added, and then another if you press it again, and so on. KangieDanie recommends not doing that as not only are they not sure what would happen if you were to add more than one additional cat, but there’s also no way to remove a player/cat once they have been added.
You can see KangieDanie’s Stray multiplayer mod in action above. Both of the cats are identical, but that can potentially be changed by applying one of the other mods people have already created for Stray. One turns the game’s leading feline into Garfield, and another will see them transform into CJ from San Andreas. Probably not worth adding more mods to the game until the multiplayer one is figured out and free from bugs, though.
As for whether you will be able to connect with other like-minded cats and play Stray with people online, that’s a no from KangieDanie. They did add that they know of someone who is working on an online multiplayer mod for Stray, though. The ability to play with others, whether locally or online, will likely be a popular one. Stray smashed Annapurna’s concurrent player record on Steam on its launch day, and it’s currently the highest rated game on the platform in 2022.