With some games, you can often tell from the very first minute if they’re works of art made from a place of passion, creativity and an admiration for the craft. Developer Fumi Games shows that with Mouse: P.I. For Hire, a rubberhose-style boomer shooter noir game set within a fictional world full of mice. By combining this melting pot of ingenious ideas and elements, Fumi Games have created one of the most unique shooters I’ve ever had the joy of playing, even if it’s not always hitting the mark.



Mouse: P.I. For Hire is set in the fictional New York-inspired metropolis city of Mouseburg in the 1930s. Players take on the role of police officer turned private investigator Jack Pepper (voiced by Troy Baker), a hard-as-nails mouse detective who delves deep into one of his investigations to uncover the truth behind a missing magician. The story unfolds mainly through Pepper’s narration and monologues as he pieces together clues to lead him to his next objectives.



As mentioned before, Mouse: P.I. For Hire’s world is populated by cartoon mice, lifting inspiration from Disney’s rubberhose animation style during the 1930s – beautifully animated 2D sprites contrasted with 3D environments, with a black-and-white filter layered over it to give the game its unique noir tone and mood. Obvious inspirations are also taken from classic movies like Fritz Lang’s M, Chinatown and the original Scarface which Fumi Games are evidently huge fans of.

Beautifully animated 2D sprites contrasted with 3D environments, with a black-and-white filter layered over it to give the game its unique noir tone and mood.

The story plays out like a traditional noir mystery, albeit with several creative liberties taken due to all the characters being animated mice. The game uses its grimy cartoon aesthetic to great effect, with plenty of tongue-in-cheek references and most of its humour surrounding cheese puns. It gives the game a lot of character, adding to its uniqueness and stylish narrative. The story, unfortunately, never reaches a point where it completely grabbed me. It has all of the twists and turns you’d expect from a detective noir tale, but it never throws memorable curveballs to really set the plot apart from the dozens of other noir films its inspired by. It feels like there were missed opportunities to do something cool narratively with its unique presentation but it never got there for me.



Fortunately, the rest of the game kicks a**. Mouse: P.I. For Hire’s gameplay mostly consists of first-person arena-style shooter segments, drawing comparisons to old-school Doom, Quake, and elements of BioShock. Waves of enemies have to be dealt with in areas before moving into the next room or enclosed space, rinse and repeat. It’s a satisfyingly addictive loop that, oddly enough, feels right at home with rubberhose animation, taken to surprisingly gory lengths when enemy’s heads explode or limbs are torn off in cartoonish fashion. Each and every weapon, from your standard pistol to shotgun, packs a punch, backed up by some incredible sound design to give the weapon audio its crunchiness. Zipping around environments to stock up on ammo while blasting enemies with a shotgun at point-blank is a loop that never got tired, even for the newer Doom games and it works wonderfully in Mouse: P.I. For Hire.

What impressed me the most is how well Fumi Games combines its 1930s cartoon aesthetic with the run-and-gun boomer shooter gameplay. I can’t say much more except that it’s absurdly fun and addictive, with so much attention and care put into the animation and art direction that I can’t help but sing its praises. Sure, it’s a style we’ve seen used before in games like Cuphead, but never for a first-person shooter and never to this degree before. It’s a truly inspired concept that makes the most out of its fun nostalgic presentation.



In-between the action, the game’s pacing slows a bit to make room for exposition dumps or dialogue interactions that could’ve been a little more tightly written – again tying into the story being a bit on the disappointing side. Instead of doing any actual detective work as the game’s title suggests, you instead collect clues and evidence to pin up on a board that leads you to your next objective (which you can travel to in a top-down sandbox driving section that’s pretty charming). Thankfully, these breaks aren’t long and you’re often thrown right back into the fray.

What impressed me the most is how well Fumi Games combines its 1930s cartoon aesthetic with the run-and-gun boomer shooter gameplay.

Weapons can be upgraded after collecting certain valuable resources, either boosting its power, rate of fire, or effectiveness against specific enemy types. A secondary mode of fire is also unlocked that gives each weapon an edge (or two edges) without wasting slots on your inventory wheel. Fumi Games borrows all the right elements from shooters of old to repurpose these ideas as an entirely refreshing experience, of course driven by its strong aesthetic. When you aren’t gathering mountains of mice corpses while making odd remarks about cheese, you’re piecing together the mystery by talking to Mouseburg’s inhabitants… who all make odd remarks about cheese.



On that note, the voice acting in Mouse: P.I. For Hire is noteworthy. Troy Baker puts on his best 1930s noir detective voice and delivers his lines with the confidence only a veteran voice actor such as himself could pull off. I never once got tired of his performance and it’s extremely convincing, to the point where it might actually overshadow his Indiana Jones (put down your pitchforks). The rest of the voice cast do an impeccable job at bringing these animated characters to life, walking a very fine line between quirky, hard-boiled and charismatic. The sound design is just as good as the visuals, especially the music which mixes jazz and swing to great effect.

As for performance, I played Mouse: P.I. For Hire on PC running a somewhat mid-range rig with a RTX 3060 and 16GB DDR4 RAM. Honestly, I ran into zero issues. It played buttery smooth from the get-go, requiring only minor tweaking for mouse sensitivity. Framerates were consistent, the visuals were sharp, and I appreciated that Fumi Games added so many graphical options to tweak the game’s visuals and audio, from cleaner visuals to a grimy CRT-esque filter to give it that authentic 1930s noir feeling.



Mouse: P.I. For Hire is an outrageous, quirky and addictively good time that harkens back to the days of the boomer shooter, with some of the strongest, most inspired art direction and presentation I’ve seen in a game all year. While the story and writing lacks oomph, the gameplay more than delivers a fast-paced, enjoyable ride from start to finish, helped by dedicated voice acting and a tremendous performance from Troy Baker as Jack Pepper. Purely for the aesthetics alone, it’s a strong recommend, but Fumi Games’ technical wizardry pushes it above and beyond.

PC Review code provided by Playside Studios | Mouse: P.I. For Hire releases physically at Nexus Hub on 17 July 2026, pre-orders available here