The game key for this review was provided by the publisher.
MOUSE: P.I. For Hire, created by Polish studio Fumi Games, strips away the neon and grit of modern shooters in favor of a 1930s noir filter. It plays out as a single-player narrative experience where cartoon physics are applied to first-person gunplay, using a high-contrast black-and-white palette and big-band music to build atmosphere. Behind the novelty of its hand-drawn sprites lies a traditional first-person shooter loop: fast movement, secret hunting, and an arsenal used to dismantle corruption in Mouseville.
Gameplay
The game offers standard difficulty options.
Protagonist Jack Pepper, P.I., goes through a range of locations, from dark alleyways to a zeppelin owned by a corrupt politician. His cases play out in an old-school first-person shooter style, built around fast movement, dashing from cover to cover, and close-range gun and melee combat.The game world is structured into areas, with Jack’s office acting as a central hub where he returns between levels. From there, he manages cases through a Crime Wall system, where collected clues are stored and organized. As more clues are gathered, new leads unlock and guide progression to the next objective. Between missions, Jack can prepare by stocking up on ammo, weapons, and other supplies. The Crime Wall ultimately feels like little more than a dressed-up way of unlocking the next level, without serving a meaningful gameplay purpose. It lacks any real deduction or interaction, especially when compared to adventure games like Sherlock Holmes or Broken Sword, where collecting and connecting clues is central to progression.
Jack uses his car to go to the next area, which is done through an overworld.
I found the overworld to be very unnecessary. It adds little to the experience and feels out of place in a boomer shooter. The car controls are also clumsy, and the system would have been better served by simply selecting destinations from a menu rather than driving between locations.Combat is straightforward, with Jack able to jump and dash until his stamina runs out, alongside a fairly large arsenal of weapons. As the game progresses, encounters become more hectic, with a wider mix of enemy types forcing faster movement and more aggressive use of his tools.
One of the key movement tools is Jack’s tail, which allows him to glide and gain upward momentum near fans. It can also be used to swing from hooks in a manner similar to Indiana Jones. Additional upgrades expand his mobility further, including double-jump boots, a suction-based wallrun upgrade, and Monkey Arms that allow him to vault up to otherwise unreachable areas.
There is also a minigame called Baseball Cards, found in a bar near Jack’s office. It’s a turn-based card game built around baseball rules. Winning matches grants tokens, with 20 required to obtain the minigame’s only real reward: a zapper weapon from a nearby slot machine.
Unfortunately, the mode feels more like a distraction added simply because the devs wanted a card minigame rather than because it meaningfully adds to the experience. While the mechanics are functional enough, matches quickly become repetitive and the rewards do little to justify the time or currency invested into them. Considering the weapon is weaker than the default gun and relies on limited, expensive ammunition, the payoff hardly justifies the amount of time spent playing Baseball Cards.
An ongoing match of Baseball Cards
Equipment
Lockpicks can open certain doors and safes through a minigame. In its basic form, Jack must manipulate a flexible lockpick to reach each pin without blocking his own path. More difficult variants restrict available moves and also introduce spikes that will immediately end the attempt if touched. Failure seals the target lock permanently.In my opinion, it’s a complete waste of time and interrupts the flow of the game. One minute you are hectically running and dashing around an arena killing enemies, and then you need to lockpick doors, which kills the pacing, especially in chase scenes where every second should count. It would make more sense for Jack just to kick the door in or blow it up.
The weapons that are available throughout the game.
Jack also has access to a wide variety of firearms. He starts with a Micer (a pistol resembling a Mauser) and acquires additional weapons over time which can be upgraded. Unfortunately, some weapons feel underpowered, and visual effects can sometimes obscure hit feedback, making it hard to tell whether shots are landing and encouraging more blind firing than precision. I ended up relying mostly on the Micer, James Gun, and Portable Freezer, as they were effective enough to handle most encounters.Sound and Visuals
When first booting up the game, you’re presented with various noir-inspired options for film grain and diffusion. The sound degradation settings are a nice touch, ranging from a clean, modern mix to filters like Vinyl and Cellulose Disc that add a warm, crackling texture. More extreme options, such as the Cylinder settings, introduce a heavily distorted, lo-fi quality that makes the soundtrack feel like a century-old recording.
Speaking of the aesthetic, the environments are rendered in 3D, while key items and interactable objects are presented in a more cartoonish, hand-drawn style. This contrast works well, with stylized elements standing out clearly against the more grounded surroundings. The game’s black-and-white presentation reinforces its noir optics, and the environments themselves are varied, ranging from dark alleyways and police stations to airships, film sets, swamps, and secret laboratories.
Enemies
Combat encounters are visually engaging because enemy variety is tied closely to the game’s faction design rather than relying solely on mechanical differences. Cultists, mobsters, and crooked cops all have distinct visual styles that help encounters feel grounded within the world itself. Even when enemy archetypes overlap mechanically, the different faction aesthetics help fights maintain a strong sense of identity and make combat easier to read during chaotic moments.However, while the game introduces melee attackers, shielded enemies, ranged units, and flying threats, many encounters eventually begin to feel repetitive over time. Several enemy types share similar behaviors despite belonging to different factions, which limits how much combat evolves throughout the campaign. Overall, the faction design succeeds in making the world feel cohesive and visually memorable, even if the underlying enemy variety is not always deep enough to keep every encounter feeling fresh. The occasional bosses do little to spice things up, as each rely on one gimmick and as soon as you figure it out, the fight becomes repetitive and trivial. Still, I have to say that they have nice introductions and arenas.
