The Annapurna cat game (yes, we at The Loadout are calling it that and you should too) Stray is rich in lore and worldbuilding. In fact, the game has a fantastic story that really gets you involved in its science-fiction world of a dystopian, robot-inhabited city. But, after you’ve played through the adventure, you might want the somewhat abrupt Stray ending explained.
Stray presents many questions as you play through the game, but because you’re a cat and can’t talk in human (only meows), it’s hard for any exposition to be delivered, especially towards the end of the game. And when that end finally does come, it leaves a lot on the table unanswered. So, our Stray ending explained guide below details everything that happens and all of the events we can infer from the final cutscene. There are major story spoilers ahead, so turn back now if you haven’t finished the game.
Stray ending explained
Once you reach the control room in Stray and activate the computers, you finally open the doors to the outside world again, but not before your drone companion B-12 dies helping you open the escape route. This means the only thing that could talk to us directly is gone.
In the game’s final cutscene, after we walk out of the open subway door, we see our stray cat protagonist walk through the door into a bright light surrounded by vegetation, before glancing back at the camera.
We can take this to mean that the stray cat we’ve been controlling the whole time has found its way outside again and will hopefully meet up with the cat pals it lost contact with at the start of the game.
This is backed up by the fact that Momo in the Slums puts you on the track of a group called The Outsiders, who are three robots who want to escape the confines of the walled city and go back into the outside world.
So, despite having an abrupt ending that doesn’t give much information to the player, we can assume the cat completed its missions of escaping outside and made it safe and sound back to its friends.
Who knows, maybe we’ll find out more in a Stray sequel?