Anthropo
There are various appeals to anthropomorphisizing feral animals in stories. We can think about how being an animal influences the way the characters interact with the world and how they perceive the bizarre behavior of humans.
These stories are often geared towards youthful readers, but some take the opportunity to show violent extremes—and others have some sort of middleground. Well, I suppose that's the case with all sorts of fiction. But, you know, animals have some pretty good built-in weapons with their claws and fangs and hooves and antlers. Why not show off conflict through physical altercations?
At least for me, some appeal comes from the simplicity. It feels like worldbuilding for a small, isolated clan (or clans) of felines is easier than dealing with humans. But, then again, we know what it's like to be human. It takes knowledge of the animal in order to write something convincingly, and I always fear getting some detail wrong. Like, oh, let me describe in detail the vibrant color of these berries. Oh wait, this POV animal is color blind. At least I know I'm not colorblind.
Then again, I've gotten in arguments about colors with Z. But he's probably the one who's colorblind.