“Here Kitty!” is an adorable way to pass the time while staying at home

If you’ve got kids with you through this stay-at-home stretch, there’s a good chance you’re running low on new ways to keep them entertained. All the coloring pages have been colored in; the freeze dances frozen; the stickers stuck.

Good news! Your iPhone is now a cat (congratulations!)

You need to help your new cat friend find somewhere to hide. Then everyone else in your house – like the toddler who somehow has an incredible amount of energy going into this 17th week of March – can try to find it, calling out “Here kitty!” and listening for a meow in response.

That’s the idea behind the aptly named “

Here Kitty!

”, the latest title from the team at Impending. You’ve probably seen some of Impending’s

other stuff, like the super popular party/waiting-in-line-at-Disneyland guessing game Heads Up!, or the minimalist todo app Clear. Their stuff is always deeply polished, and this one is no exception.

Once you’ve found a good spot, you “hide” the kitty by placing your phone face down. It’ll meow (or, occasionally, hiss – it is a cat, after all) when it hears you call out. Found kitty? Flip the phone back over to reveal how long it took, and you’ve won! It’s like a gadget-enabled mashup between hide-and-seek, hot/cold, and Marco Polo minus the need for a pool.

Want kitty’s meows to be a bit softer to make it a bit more challenging, or louder for a younger audience? Adjust the difficulty slider accordingly.

Impending says they’ll introduce a “new friend” to seek alongside the original kitty every Saturday.

I’ve been playing with an early build of Here Kitty! for a few weeks, and… well, it’s just adorable. Impending rates the game at ages 4 and up, but give it a spin even with younger ones; my kid is a few months shy of two years old but he totally (read: mostly) gets it. He doesn’t quite get how to call for the kitty on his own, but quickly figured out how to follow the sound and cackles like a mad man every time he finds the cat. (Pro tip, as learned the hard way: if you’re playing with a toddler, put a case on your phone.)

Impending CEO Phill Ryu

says

they initially prototyped the idea a few years ago as something that would require an Apple Watch; for the sake of everyone stuck at home right now, they returned to the concept, simplified it a bit, and got it shipped within just a few weeks.

Here Kitty! is out right

meow

now for iOS

(Sorry, Android users), and is free to play.