Mouse P.I. review

In a world full of games overflowing with new ideas, complex systems and dozens of hours of content, a game like Mouse P.I. For Hire could easily be dismissed. Some reviews already have, calling it too simple and forgettable. That would be a big mistake for anyone looking for some fun in their gaming life.

You’ll know within the first hour whether this game is for you. Either you’ll appreciate the developers’ dedication to 1930s, Steamboat Willie-inspired hand-drawn animation, gumshoe detective humor, voice acting and fast, fluid, classic shoot-’em-up action. Or you’ll write it off as simple and repetitive and miss out on something special. I played it for 14 hours on Normal, on Xbox, and I loved it.

A 1930s detective story, played for laughs

If you’ve ever watched an old detective movie, or a satire of one, this will feel instantly familiar. You play Jack Pepper, a tired, grumpy mouse detective trying to help the citizens of Mouseburg. Around him are politicians, chatty bartenders, a reporter always chasing the scoop, a friendly mechanic who upgrades your weapons, Hollywood starlets, gangsters and plenty more.

What starts as a missing-person case for a magician spirals into a hilarious conspiracy involving gangster mice, mad scientists, corrupt politicians, World War II-style fascists and even a talking brain.

Voice acting that’s in on the joke

Some reviewers find the voices stereotypical and the one-liners cheesy. I think they missed the point. It’s the perfect mix for this kind of wild action game. Troy Baker, fresh off his Indiana Jones work, brings just the right amount of grit, inner monologue and humor to Jack, and every voice in the supporting cast does a great job.

It’s also more than a few quips. As you work through cases you get full conversations with characters, sometimes minutes of dialogue at a time.

Art, animation and music

The attention to the art and animation is impressive for a hand-drawn game. Enemies lose their heads, fill with bullet holes or turn into a pile of ash with blinking eyes. Background objects are animated, and so are your own hands and the guns you hold. I don’t think I’ll ever look at the hands in a first-person shooter the same way again.

The soundtrack is bluesy, lounge-style 1930s music that feels plucked from a classic film. The special effects are nothing special on their own, but they add a whimsical cartoon layer to every explosion.

Gameplay: fast, frantic and addictive

My first reaction to the gameplay was a smirk, and it turned into a grin that never left my face. After a few group fights I realized I had to change how I was playing.

It’s fast and smooth like an old-school shooter, think Quake. Individual enemies aren’t hard, but they come in large groups, from every angle, with different tactics. You’re constantly moving, shooting, hunting for ammo and health, and switching weapons mid-fight. Some enemies drop with a single shot. Giant brutes charge you and can take a quarter of your shield. Shielded enemies have to be kicked to stun them before you can shoot them. Early on, before I had many weapons, I was sometimes down to kicking and punching with no ammo, laughing out loud in panic.

We’re so used to cover systems, leveling and complex enemy AI that this threw me at first. But unlike the old shooters it’s inspired by, Mouse P.I. has very refined, smooth controls, so it’s fun rather than frustrating. Once you get the pace down, you can take out dozens of enemies while constantly moving.

It’s not easy, though. I died often in the later game, and the final boss is as exciting and long as it is exhausting. I never felt it was the game’s fault. It was usually me getting sloppy or too fancy. I’d reload my last save and go again. It’s addictive.

Levels and weapons

The variety keeps things moving. One level had me shooting through boatyards, the next through a burning opera house, then a New Orleans-style swamp, and even jumping between airplanes mid-flight.

As you progress you unlock a large weapon set: handguns, shotguns and machine guns, plus fun options like a cannon, a paint-thinner gun, dynamite and even a chainsaw. A double jump and grappling hooks keep the movement fresh, even as enemies start to become reskins of the same core types.

Completionist tip: I finished with every weapon but one. The last one is unlocked with tokens from the card minigame, which I only played once because I was so into the main game. Spend some time winning that minigame to unlock every weapon and its achievement.

Difficulty and replay

There are three difficulties. You can change them at any time without reloading, and there are no difficulty-based achievements, so you could play the whole game on Easy and still get 100%.

My one real complaint is that there’s no New Game Plus and no way to replay case levels, even after the credits. With 34 achievements and a game that pushes collecting, anything you miss means replaying the whole 10-plus-hour game. That limits replay value for me. Adding multiplayer, a level replay or some DLC could turn this into a sleeper hit with a real community, and I’d love to see a second game.

Verdict: don’t sleep on this fun shooter

I had no glitches, no bad saves and no real issues beyond a few tough boss fights and jumping sections. It’s an indie game, but it puts a lot of big-budget AAA games to shame in how tightly the art, animation, audio and gameplay fit together.

Is it game-of-the-year material? No. But the characters and story are well worth a game priced at half of what most big releases cost, and it cuts through a lot of the indie and AAA slop we live with now. Don’t listen to a big-site reviewer who gets every game for free. Try it yourself, and support developers like these. The only fault I found after 14 hours was that it ended and I still wanted more.