Squirrel With a Gun Review (PC)

Having seen the absolute carnage that has occurred since the likes of Goat Simulator came to town, I am gradually beginning to come to terms with the fact that weird concepts are more commonplace than ever. Take Squirrel With a Gun, for example—a game that quite literally depicts, well, a squirrel with a gun, and with it, a suburban playground that might as well be the slaughtering grounds for the rabid rodents that accommodate it. Like I said, weird games do exist, and it’s because of that, that I rarely feel surprised by them these days. But there’s a silver lining here: Squirrel With a Gun isn’t just a niche product; on the contrary, it’s a game that actually brings a little more to the table than mere kooky vibes and oddball fodder.  Well, sort of.

As the title implies, Squirrel With a Gun is more or less about one thing: a fur ball with a natural tendency to cause pandemonium in just about any situation. Like DEEER Simulator, the game invites you to run rampant in a suburban neighborhood in a traditional sandbox-like manner, and shovel through a series of hilarious puzzles and rodent-centric shenanigans in a bid to flesh out your squirrel and unlock additional weapons, cosmetics, and general upgrades. Now, if that sounds like your idea of a good time, then you might want to stick around for a while as we unpack its contents, piece by piece, bullet by bullet. Squirrel, meet gun. Gun, meet squirrel. Let’s jump right in.

“I’m a Rodent With a Shotgun”

It goes like this: Agents have descended into the seemingly picturesque quarters of a generic town, and surprise surprise, they’re fighting to restore peace and stability to the social fabric of the neighborhood. But there’s one small issue: a squirrel—a rodent that has ironically waltzed into the inner sanctum of an armory and gained access to its contents—has recently begun waging war against the world and its innocent people and general bystanders. And that’s where you come in — shackled to the trigger of one of many weapons, and lumbered with a ludicrously large series of tasks that either involve having to wreak havoc on the Agents’ desperate attempts to foil your plans, or turning the quaint crags and crevices of the town into pockets of bullet-sweltering Armageddon and mindless terror. Sounds easy enough, right? Well, it pretty much is. Go figure.

Squirrel With a Gun really only runs as deep as you want it to, meaning, if you did happen to roll into it with the hopes of finding a one-sided concept with little to no meat on the bones, then chances are that’s exactly what you’d get. Naturally, the best thing you could possibly get out of this, I don’t know, unruly gem, is a short stint of a good time—a period that, while not quite as timeless as a lot of rampageous sandbox simulation games out there, has all of the same quick-fire hooks and tongue-in-cheek tomfoolery as the vast majority of its adversaries. It doesn’t do a massive amount to change the category, nor does it exactly hold a candle to its peers’ success, either. But, for the sake of simplicity, I will say this: Squirrel With a Gun is a stupidly entertaining game.

Bullets & Rodents

If you’ve played one animal-centric sandbox sim with a destructible environment in it, then chances are, you might have already played Squirrel With a Gun — or at least some version of it, anyway. Why? Well, as it turns out, the bulk of the game is pretty much set out to capture just about every aspect and thematic node that we’ve seen dozens of times before—rubbery foes, sandpaper landmarks, and oddly placed quests that have no real impact on the overarching storyline. It’s all here in the seams of Squirrel With a Gun — and then some. Is there a plot? Eh — there isn’t not a plot. But that’s sort of irrelevant, given the fact that the game quite literally discards any form of structure right from the get-go, and instead opts to just, I don’t know, throw caution to the wind and roll with it.

For the most part, your journey in Squirrel With a Gun sees you taking to the streets of a relatively quaint town—a world in which you are given the ability to unlock better weapons and abilities, and use said weapons and abilities to either reach new areas on the map, or complete textbook environmental puzzles in order to acquire more resources for your furry friend. All in all, there are about six or seven hours of content here, most of which can’t really be replayed due to the one-note structure that the game fosters. It’s a good time, if only in short bursts, but longevity certainly isn’t its strong suit, I’ll say that much. Even still, squirrels, guns — there’s a great amount of fun to be found there, doubly so if you’re easily pleased with floaty mechanics and unorthodox design choices.

With Good Comes Bad

While Squirrel With a Gun is surprisingly fun to romp through, that isn’t to say that it’s completely without its flaws. For starters, the camera angles — they’re a little too erratic, and not to mention incredibly intoxicating, to say the least. Secondly, the autosave feature, or lack thereof. And thirdly, the sheer lack of replay value. Suffice it to say, Squirrel With a Gun does have its quality features—its graphics, being one of its standout features, for sure—but that doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s a picture-perfect game. And yet, for as little as $20, I’m struggling to find the means to slate a lot of its inner components. Is it a fun game? Absolutely. Is it a good game? Eh — it isn’t a bad game, though I wouldn’t go as far as to say that it’s award-winning material, either.

I’m on the fence with this one, to be honest. On one hand, Squirrel With a Gun does have its interesting nodes—a quality map size, and a decent collection of weapons, upgrades and puzzles, to list just a few of its classier workings. But on the other, I can’t help but call it for what it is: a rodent-centric rehash of a game that, quite frankly, we’ve already seen dozens of times before. It isn’t the end of the world, but to be perfectly clear, Squirrel With a Gun is, more or less, Goat Simulator with a lick of different paint lathered over the top. If that’s what turns your gears, then hey, you’ll probably love just about everything that makes up the whole thing. Well, probably.

Verdict

Well, I can’t say that I wasn’t impressed by the sheer volume of rodents with firearms that Squirrel With a Gun brought to the table. To that end, the developers had achieved what they set out to create: a playground with a few bullets and high-flying tails in it. Sure enough, the game has that by the motherlode, and so I can’t really bring myself to slate their efforts to set the scene. Plus, seeing as there’s literally nothing else I can compare it against, it isn’t as if I have the momentum to catapult it in favor of another work of art. It’s an original concept, for sure, and one that, while certainly not everyone’s cup of tea, has the potential to tickle a few funny bones and provide some genuinely comical moments. It isn’t exactly a contender for Game of the Year — but that comes expected.

I’m just going to come out and say it. Yes, you should give Squirrel With a Gun your undivided attention, if only to whet the whistle before delving into other, slightly more bonkers iterations that hail from the sandbox genre. Say, Baby Steps, for example. If you’re planning on picking that oddball up, then chances are you’ll get a kick out of Squirrel With a Gun. If, however, you’re one to quickly discard anything that lacks a basic sense of purpose, then boy, take it from me: Squirrel With a Gun will never be the glue that cements the gaps between your drive and your hunger for quality storytelling. This isn’t that — like, at all. Still, if you’re on the hunt for a belly laugh or two, then shoot, you might find it somewhere between the chamber and the devilish grin of a rodent, weirdly enough.