Inspector Waffles

What a delightful game! I’ve played quite a few adventure games recently, and I think Inspector Waffles is the one I enjoyed the most from beginning to end. Granted, it’s not exactly hard to win me over with a game about anthropomorphic cats and dogs solving detective cases. That is more or less a honey trap designed specifically for me. But what makes this game special is not just the adorable concept, but how lovingly and precisely it is executed. It combines humor, mystery, a light noir atmosphere, charming characters, and cute puzzles in a really satisfying way. We play as Inspector Waffles, a tough, cynical cat who sleeps in his office because he suffers from nightmares whenever he goes home, following a tragic incident involving a gangster and his former partner, Pancakes. Very early on, you notice that everything in this world revolves around cats and dogs, and all the clichés, idioms, and associations connected to them come to life in the most charming ways. Waffles works in Cat City, has a painting of Meowgritte in his home, and the grim phrase “There’s more than one way to skin a cat” plays a central role in the plot. The cats, naturally, are often sly and slippery, or utterly shameless foodie gluttons, like Waffles’ boss, Patches. The game also has the most accurate feline computer geek I’ve ever seen, complete with technobabble and a deep reluctance to interact with anyone. The dogs, on the other hand, are loyal, good-hearted, and approach the professional sniffing of suspects with deadly seriousness, as if it were an indisputable forensic science. Waffles, being a cynical cat with unresolved trauma, remains skeptical. It all begins with the murder of Fluffy, a millionaire and the owner of a huge and popular company that specializes in... cardboard boxes. Yes, anyone who lives with cats will immediately understand why this would be a perfectly reasonable business empire in this world. At first, the investigation seems fairly straightforward, almost like a classic detective case with a wealthy victim, obvious suspects, and secrets starting to peek out from every corner. But quite quickly it branches out, gains more layers, and takes several surprising turns along the way. I managed to guess some of the revelations in advance, but there were also moments that genuinely surprised me. One of the things I loved most about Inspector Waffles is the feeling that the game doesn’t just love cats, dogs, and noir, but also truly loves adventure games. It is full of references to other games, genre in-jokes, and little winks that feel like a warm hug for longtime adventure game players. Pixel, for example, wears a shirt with the famous purple tentacle from Day of the Tentacle. But the coolest thing for me was the cameos from other contemporary adventure games. At one point, we meet Lord Winklebottom, an extremely refined giraffe detective, as well as the detectives from Chicken Police. All of them come from other games that belong to this wonderfully specific subgenre: anthropomorphic animals investigating crimes. I assume some of the roots of this phenomenon go back to Sam & Max, the classic series in which a dog and a somewhat psychotic rabbit solve cases in their own chaotic way. But I think there is something broader going on here too. In recent years, anthropomorphic animals are no longer confined to the Disney-like world of cute talking creatures. They appear in films like Zootopia, in series like BoJack Horseman, and in games that make use of the tension between animal cuteness and worlds of crime, trauma, cynicism, alienation, or social criticism. Inspector Waffles also has a sequel, which I haven’t played yet, focusing on Waffles’ early professional adventures in a style reminiscent of old Game Boy games. There is also another sequel on the way, which, from what I’ve seen, looks less like a classic adventure game and more arcade-like. I really like it when a franchise doesn’t stay locked into exactly the same formula, but instead explores how to tell more stories with the same characters and the same world through different kinds of gameplay language. In short, if you like adventure games, light noir, cat-and-dog humor, or just small indie games made with a lot of love, Inspector Waffles is absolutely one to put on your list.