If there’s something strange in your neighborhood. If it’s something weird, and it don’t look good. Who are you gonna call? Not Huey Lewis for plagiarism, but the Mousebusters! OK, yeah, I’m pretty sure I’m not the first one to make this connection but that’s probably the best way I can describe this latest indie game. I don’t mean the comparison as a negative, let me be clear there. This is, quite possibly, one of the most charming little games to come out this year and one with an engaging premise and story that kept me hooked all throughout the game.
“No Job Is Too Big, No Fee Is Too Big”
The basic gist of the game is that, after moving into your new apartment, you wake up the next day to find you have transformed into a mouse. Unlike the metamorphosis that Gregor Samsa experienced, this transformation is very beneficial to you and not just because you’re now a cute, adorable mouse with a hankering for cheese. But because you can now see the spectral ghosts haunting this apartment building and making the lives of those who live there miserable. Now, working alongside another mouse who calls themself ‘Chief’, you must rid the apartment of these ghosts, make the folks happy once again, and return to being human, all the while uncovering a bit of sordid history with the apartment’s beginnings that I daren’t spoil. Usually, a game takes just a bit to get me invested in the story but this one hooked me right from the get-go. While it is a basic idea, there is a surprising amount of depth and heart throughout that it kept me engaged in what was going on. You genuinely start to feel for the tenants in the building while you work to bust the ghosts living there as you learn about their lives and hobbies. One tenant is a straight-up workaholic who never had a real interaction with a female while another is this sweet little old lady who lives alone with her cat (more on that in a bit) who longs to just have some friends. I think the only sorta weak character is, surprisingly, the main one you control. There really isn’t much in the way of character to them, outside of the little animations he does while as a mouse and the dialogue choices (which really doesn’t seem to affect anything). But, who knows? Maybe they’re supposed to represent the player. But, don’t think the game is over once you bust all the ghosts. Oh, no, the game has a small trick up its sleeve and it’s one that caught me by surprise as I thought the game was going one direction with its story but ended up going a completely different direction. I won’t spoil what exactly happens but there is more here to everything, including the Chief, then meets the eye.
“I ain’t afraid of no ghosts!”
But how’s the gameplay of Mousebusters? Well, it’s also fairly basic but it’s also pretty fun. So, the game is broken up into two types of gameplay: Exploration and Combat. During the Exploration sections, you’re tasked with exploring a room, finding clues that can help you out, interacting with items, and finding the ghost living there. The clues are usually simple stuff like what food someone is eating or what hobbies said person likes to do. These clues also help with the various minigames and challenges that are in each apartment. For example, the old lady I mentioned? The challenge there is to distract the cat so you can get close to the ghost. Sounds easy, right? Just find a cat toy and distract them. Well, you have to remember something about cats: They may be cute but they’re also smart (or evil, depending on who you ask). I won’t spoil exactly how to solve this challenge, but I’ll just say this: One of the items I used led to one of the most funniest scenes I’ve ever seen in a game this year, if not in a long while, and one that gave me the best laugh I’ve had all year. In fact, I don’t think I laughed this hard since some of the cutscenes in Brutal Legend from 2009. There was also one minigame involving making ramen and this one was surprisingly educational as it taught me what works best in ramen and what doesn’t. While I haven’t had ramen myself for some time (I think a year because I kinda got bored by it), I honestly may end up trying some of the flavor combinations shown in this game whenever I do have ramen again, especially the pineapple one (Which, by the way? Pineapple does taste good on pizza).
Then, there’s the combat sections when you finally find a ghost and here is where I’m split with my thoughts. To begin with, it’s fairly simple to get a handle on: Just point your targeting reticle on the ghost’s eyes and fire away, while also dealing with any mini-ghosts that come out to distract you. Very easy to figure out and I do like how the gun you use looks like a classic laser tag toy. However, I don’t like how you only get three shots for your gun. Yes, the gun is quite powerful but the fact you can’t upgrade the blaster in any way (the training stages in the main HQ kinda tease you with a charge up ability) does mean you’ll be tapping the fire button a lot. There’s also the fact that the combat is very easy, even on Standard difficulty. As long as you don’t bump fire your gun (i.e constantly tap the fire button) and pay attention to the mini-ghosts, you can survive EVERY encounter without taking a single bit of damage. I understand this is an Indie title so I wasn’t expecting the difficulty of most challenging games on the market, but just a wee bit of challenge would’ve been nice.
That’s not to say there isn’t any challenge as there is a bit here and there. I’d say the only real challenging portions are a few of the minigames and, oddly, controlling your character. If you’re using the D-pad on the Xbox (which is what I played), then movement feels fine and responsive. But, when I moved them with the control stick, it felt just a bit on the slippery side. Not to the point where it felt like I was walking on ice, but just enough to where I could feel the looseness. Combat controls worked fine, thankfully, it was just the movement that felt slightly off and is really only my main complaint. As for the minigames you’ll find, I’d say the only real challenging one is the Guitar Hero-like game as you have to time your button presses right but that’s pretty much it. I will say the music for that minigame had no reason to be that awesome to where I came close to headbanging. In fact, that’s something else I’d like to praise: The music overall is really good! It has this nice, cozy feel to it that gets tense when the action calls for it. It can also lead to some hilarious moments, including the aforementioned cat sequence which uses two certain famous orchestrated songs that not only fit, but made the sequence even more funny. This goes double for the artstyle and animations. Yes, it’s a pixel art style and I know these types of games are everywhere, it seems, but I really enjoyed the look here. The rooms are nicely detailed and I like how every character has unique looks and animations to them to make them stand out. I was equally impressed with the mice, when both zoomed out and zoomed in for sections of the game. In fact, I think they’d make great plushies as they are just that cute. Even the ghosts are nicely designed, each one having a surprisingly creepy look to them and almost reminding me of symbiotes in a way but not quite as creepy. One last thing I want to mention and it is a bit of a minor thing: The game has a working mirror! I don’t know why many games nowadays struggle with mirrors but this game has one and it pulls it off amazingly well!
“We came, we saw, we kicked its tail!”
All and all? I was pleasantly surprised by Mousebusters. I went in expecting just, admittedly, an average, run of the mill, pixel art indie game with the usual cliches you see in these types of games. However, what I got instead was a cute little game where you control mice saving people from ghosts in an apartment and helping them come out of their shells, while also dealing with a longstanding mystery of the place. I never once felt the urge to roll my eyes or go “Ugh I hate this trope!” at all during my playtime and I have to give the game props for that. Yes, it is a relatively short game and you can beat it in one day. But that short session gave way to a deep story with loveable characters, fun gameplay, and, of course, two loveable mice that I think would make for some great plushies. I personally think that last part is the mark of a great game with cute animal characters if it makes me want a plush of them.
