The first set of screenshots for the English version of Catherine has been released, and thankfully the screen capturers had the foresight to enable subtitles so our interest in this intriguing title could be piqued further still.

Catherine is a highly unusual game coming to PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 on July 26th in North America. It’s different in the sense that it tells an adult, thoughtful story yet features some very weird platform-puzzler, block-pulling gameplay to give players something to do in-between all the storytelling.

That said, the narrative thread in Catherine isn’t set in stone, and you’ll be presented with some tough choices along the way which will determine how the story plays out and which one of the multiple endings you arrive at.

From my perspective, the intriguing plot of Catherine and the lush anime visuals are the biggest incentives to play this title. You are thrust into the role of Vincent - a lonely man in his thirties who is at the centre of a love triangle between his long-time, commitment-hungry girlfriend Katherine and a high-spirited, pretty woman who he meets in a bar one day. The latter lass - Catherine - is ten years his junior and is an alluring subject for Vincent’s wandering eye.

The story will no doubt touch on such themes as fidelity, commitment, lust and the weighty decisions adults are sometimes faced with - all topics which are rarely broached in videogames.

Let’s hope that an English demo is released in the next few weeks, and that a European publisher can be found for this philosophical entry into the videogame annals.

In the meantime, you can read El33tonline’s preview of Catherine, and then take a look at these screenshots and try to guess the context in which they occur. It’s fun, I promise:

Source: Siliconera