Inspector Waffles | Nintendo Switch Review
Inspector Waffles is a point-and-click detective story developed by Goloso Games and published by Hitcents. It is currently available on Windows PC, PlayStation, XBox, and Nintendo Switch, and for the purpose of my review I was playing the Nintendo Switch version in handheld mode.
You take on the role of the title character Inspector Waffles who’s a cat detective. Inspector Waffles is feeling a little bit down and depressed after a case went painfully wrong. Alongside this, our sassy cat in question is getting more than a little bit sick and tired of their incompetent colleagues. The game opens up with you drowning your sorrows at a local bar with a nice cold glass of the finest… milk. Inspector Waffles is then interrupted when they are called to a murder scene, where we discover that Fluffy has been killed at his home and it's up to you to figure out who done it. As you progress, there are excellent narrative twists and turns leading you to new suspicions and questions as you unravel the mystery surrounding Fluffy's death.
Everything felt very traditional in terms of point-and-click games whilst making my way through Inspector Waffles; the inventory allows you to combine items required and also allows you to use these items to interact with other characters or objects that you find around the world. Alongside this, if you simply want to enjoy the story without too much thinking and effort you can turn on clues, meaning you can find out what's relevant to your case with little to no effort. I’d say that in general the puzzles are relatively easy to suss out and I never really struggled too much therefore in my opinion this is more of a fun experience rather than a real deep and intricate puzzler. If you do need the clues, they aren’t just given to you in the normal boring fashion; instead you have to call your mum. As well as getting a hint about what you're missing, she will also do the typical mother thing, making sure you're ok and demanding to know when your next visit will be. This seemingly small thing really gave the game even more character for me and I found myself simply calling mum for a chat because it amused me. Generally when I need to use a hint or an external walkthrough in a game it feels like my immersion breaks slightly as I breeze through the next area, however throughout Inspector Waffles it felt unique and funny and like its own event rather than the hint simply popping up on screen or an item becoming highlighted all of a sudden.
All through Inspector Waffles I found myself chuckling over and over again. Goloso Games have managed to pack so much humour and comedy into the writing all throughout and it never failed to give me a laugh. The characters are all very likeable and personable, really making me fall in love with the world given to us. As I’m sure you can expect, there was a seemingly endless script of cat puns; for example you can find a book called 'The Great Catsby’. I think, given how often I found myself chuckling away at Inspector Waffles, it’s clear to say that I enjoyed it, however I’d say that my main criticism is that the game itself is quite short. It didn’t take me terribly long to complete and aside from a side mission that revolves around collectables, there wasn’t much reason to go back and replay the game immediately.
I was a big fan of Inspector Waffles. The art style was easy on the eyes, the puns were flowing and the story line was fun to experience. Noir fans will maybe find Inspector Waffles a little bit too lighthearted. However despite its fluffy and cute exterior, the core concepts are still the same; a troubled detective feeling the weight of the job but having no choice but to keep going so that they can find the purr-petrator (I’m sorry… I had to get at least one cat pun in).
Lj’s Rating: 4 out of 5.
For more information on Inspector Waffles please use the following links...
Goloso Games - Developer | Twitter | Website
Hitcents - Publisher | Facebook | Twitter | Website
Many thanks to Team Critical Hit for the Review Key.
Inspector Waffles | Windows PC | PlayStation | XBox | Nintendo
#InspectorWaffles #GolosoGames #Hitcents #PointAndClick #IndieGame