How do I play Neko Atsume?
If you don’t know any Japanese, don’t fret! This game is super easy to get through even without knowing the language.
When you start the game, a tutorial will start. Just tap on the arrows to move forward. The game won’t let you purchase items freely until you finish the tutorial, so just keep tapping the arrows.
To get cats to come visit you, you need to leave out food and some toys for them to play. Tap the bowl of food to refill, or if you want to exchange your food for something more high quality, then go to “goods” and pick the food you want to replace with the existing one. Food will run out eventually, so check every few hours to refill the food. (If you extend your house, be sure to put food in the other half of your house, too.) You will want to check the app occasionally anyway to you can catch some cats to log into their profiles. If you miss a cat, they’ll show up as a silhouette in their profile until you’re able to see them in action.
The same goes for the toys you leave for cats to play; just click on “goods” and pick some items to leave out. Some items are large and can only be placed in the middle. (With version 1.3, they’ve updated the items with “S” and “L” icons to indicate which items are small and large respectively.)
For reference, here is a screencap of an extended garden (with the default theme) to show you where food bowls and items are located. The location of food bowls and items WILL change if you change your theme.