Micetopia review for PS4, Xbox One, Switch

As I played through Micetopia, I couldn?t help but feel like I?d played something awfully similar very recently. It?s published by Ratalaika, and it?s a fairly easy platformer that can clearly be classified as a Metroidvania, albeit one with far fewer branching paths than the typical game from that subgenre.

In other words, it?s Prehistoric Dude all over again, only with mice instead of cavemen. Admittedly, that comparison doesn?t totally work, since where I enjoyed Prehistoric Dude, my feelings towards Micetopia fell somewhere between ?tolerated” and ?resigned myself to it.”

Nonetheless, it?s remarkable how similar they are, once you get beyond the mouse vs. caveman thing. Micetopia, too, is a Metroidvania that you can finish in an hour or two, a platformer that requires you to search every inch of its small map. It?s seldom very demanding, and you?ll be able to add its Platinum trophy to your collection without breaking much of a sweat.

The difference, however, is that Micetopia isn?t all that fun. There are only two levels to it, basically, and you?ll spend far more time in the first area than the second one. Moreover, there are only a couple of enemy types in the whole game, and none of them are very aggressive or require much in the way of skill to beat. In fact, one of them, a crab-like creature, basically just sits there and waits for you to stumble across it and kill it; the only time it moves is to go a single step in either direction, which is often the only way you can tell it apart from the background.

Mind you, it?s probably a good thing none of the enemies are very challenging, because the combat here is awful. Your mouse is equipped only with a short, useless sword and an ever-so-slightly-less-useless bow and arrow, and neither of them cause much damage. The game is also very stingy with its upgrades, so for the most part, you?re better off simply running and jumping past every enemy until you discover the gems/free the mouse hostages/reach the bosses (though, obviously, you?ll need to fight the bosses — you shouldn?t be surprised to learn they?re not very difficult).

To be fair, I don?t want to give the impression that Micetopia is a terrible game or anything, because it?s not. It doesn?t try or claim to be anything more than a basic Metroidvania-style platformer, and it delivers that. It?s just..it?s so basic, and so forgettable, it?s hard to feel very enthusiastic about anything here. If you want a game you can play for 2 hours, see everything it has to offer, and then never think about it again, Micetopia will deliver that, but it?s hard not to think that you should want a little more out of what you?re playing.

Ratalaika Games provided us with a Micetopia PS4 code for review purposes.