Magic Cat Academy

Magic Cat Academy is a series of short browser games created as Google Doodles for Halloween which were released every four years. The first game, Magic Cat Academy, also known as Doodle Halloween 2016, was released on October 30, 2016. The second, Magic Cat Academy 2, also known as Doodle Halloween 2020, was released on October 30, 2020. The third, Magic Cat Academy 3, also known as Doodle Halloween 2024, was released on October 30, 2024.

The main gameplay element present in the games is casting spells by clicking and swiping the mouse in certain directions. The game uses technology to identify the shapes that the player draws on their screen as one of the available spells. Ghosts, the antagonists of the game, slowly approach Momo, the protagonist in the center of the screen, and when they touch her, one of five lives is lost. Ghosts are defeated by making these spells, pertaining to the series of symbols atop the ghosts' heads.^[1]

The common spells have swiping directions that include a horizontal line, a vertical line, a "v" shape, and a "ʌ" shape. These spells cause the respective foremost spells atop the ghosts' heads to be deleted. A ghost vanishes when all of its spells have been done in order.

There are certain special spells that can only be used when a ghost appears with the spell above them.^[2] The swiping directions of these spells look like the following:

• A lightning bolt - This causes every ghost on screen to lose one spell by the means of lightning.
• A heart - This appears at certain times after Momo is damaged. Making this spell causes the player to regain a life.
• A circle - This creates a shield around Momo, and therefore the next time a ghost touches her, a life will not be lost.
• A spiral - This is similar to the lightning bolt's function, and additionally causes all ghosts to flow further away from Momo.
• An hourglass - This slows down all enemies, giving the player more time to defeat them.^[3]

Players control Momo, a sorcerer cat who goes to a magic academy. The academy is infiltrated and ruined by a group of ghosts and Momo's anthropomorphic friends are taken away. Momo consequently fights ghosts and bosses throughout five levels^[4], taking place in the school's library, a kitchen/cafeteria, a laboratory/classroom and a gymnasium. Finally, Momo defeats the final boss, the leader of the ghosts named Marshmallow^[3], on the tower/sky and her friends come to congratulate her.

It is revealed that Marshmallow has plunged down into the ocean. His band of ghosts are summoned into the ocean with him and they proceed to possess various marine animals. The objective and the development of the game are exactly the same as the first, only that the action takes place under the ocean.^[5] Momo fights in five stages, each at a deeper level, against ghosts and possessed animals such as an immortal jellyfish, a school of bogues, a vampire squid and an anglerfish. Momo also meets a new aquatic sailor cat friend named Captain Sugar^[5] and reaches the final stage, which begins at an underwater fissure haunted by Marshmallow. The second phase takes place in an underwater volcano. After defeating Marshmallow yet again, who is launched into space by the volcanic eruption, Momo and Sugar have a celebration with all their friends.

Marshmallow, after being launched to space, finds a purple star and eats it. This causes him to be more powerful, and the ghosts spread into the atmosphere. The objective and the development of the game are exactly the same as previous games, only that the action takes place across the layers of the atmosphere.^[3] Momo fights the ghosts in five stages which takes place in the Earth's tropo-, strato-, meso-, thermo-, and exospheres. In the process, Momo experiences various natural phenomena that take place in the atmosphere being possessed by the ghosts such as a giant golden-crowned flying fox, polar stratospheric clouds, red sprites and constellations. Before the final stage, Momo confronts Marshmallow and makes him spit out the purple star, which proceeds to enter the sun and turn it into an evil threat. Momo and Marshmallow team up to defeat the sun, and Marshmallow allows Momo to make the "hourglass" spell, which causes the sun's projectiles to slow down.

After the sun is defeated, both Momo and Marshmallow rejoice and the purple star is ejected from the Sun to consequently explode into Halloween candy that falls into the Earth. All of Momo's friends, along with Marshmallow's ghost minions, congratulate Momo and Marshmallow on their feat and celebrate. It is later implied that Marshmallow and his ghost minions attend and graduate from the Magic Academy, alongside Momo and her friends.

The creation of the game was coordinated amongst four different design groups, relating to art design, engineering, production, and music.^[6] The original concept for the game involved Momo making soup that resurrects dead spirits.^[7] The game's development involved multiple rejected concepts including elaborate symbols to draw and additional boss enemies.^[8]

The characters of Momo and Sugar were based on real-life cats belonging to the game's art designer Juliana Chen.^[8] Momo also appears in the animated Google Doodle film for Halloween 2017 and in Google's Doodle Champion Island Games (2021).

• Magic Cat Academy official website
• Magic Cat Academy 2 official website
• Magic Cat Academy 3 official website