Whiskerwood Preview by Matthew O’Toole
My time with the demo of Whiskerwood, developed by Minakata Dynamics and published by Hooded Horse, was a charming and highly addicting romp through colonial-era British Empire times, but with mice workers and cat overlords. Taking place in the 17th century, Whiskerwood puts you in charge of a new colony of mice as they explore, build, and rake in the resources of their new island home. Along the way, you will have to pay taxes to your cat overlords, avoid bombardments by pirates, and ensure the happiness of your settlers.
I found myself highly addicted to Whiskerwood. What started as thirty minutes quickly turned into a three- or four-hour session. In my time spent playing, I both refused and gave into piratical demands, overpaid and underpaid my taxes, was chided for a lack of housing and hygienic mice, created various chains of production on my island, and watched four brave mice settlers pass away due to illness from a brutal winter. The constant stream of events and ability to build new types of resource-gathering buildings and pleasantries made me want to keep playing.
I am not a seasoned veteran of city builder games, so it took me some time to get used to the mechanics, and new players may find themselves asking for more explanations at times. Part of this I will chalk up to the demo version itself, however, as it does not allow you to research or build every last type of building or resource that you may need. This is rightfully so, however, as I believe they would give away too much, too quickly, and as can probably be told by my time spent in the game, I was heavily addicted and enjoyed myself anyway.
I highly recommend checking out Whiskerwood if you are into the genre or even new to it, such as myself. It has a charm to it all its own and plenty of addicting gameplay facets to make you wonder where all your time went!
Whiskerwood launches for PC via Steam on November 6, 2025. You can wishlist the game as well as play the demo right now.
Related: Reviews by Matt O’Toole
Your local neighborhood nutjob, gamer, and teacher! I'm an avid fan of many genres such as platformers, shooters, horror, etc. I am also an avid tabletop gamer - hugely into the worlds of Warhammer and all of their spinoffs. I'm a big believer in being objective - even if something is not my cup of tea, I want to talk about it on the objective level - is it well made, crafted with love, and with care for the fans? If so, that's a good game in my book for someone and well worth their hard earned dollarydoos!
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