Fashion Police Squad Review (Switch eShop)

Feel like you’ve played one too many dull Doom clones in your time to really be bothered trying another? Well, may we suggest you get your glad rags on and give Mopeful Games’ Fashion Police Squad a whirl, it’s absolutely fabulous, darling!

Sashaying onto Switch in a very silly burst of colour and humour, this is a quirky delight of an indie first-person shooter that starts off feeling a little too basic but gradually adds enough components to its core gameplay to make it well worth getting stuck into.

In Fashion Police Squad, you assume the role of Sargent Des, whose very important duty is to clear the streets of heinous clothing crimes. If Des sees you coming his way in a pair of socks with sandals, an ill-fitting suit or some other utterly drab get-up, well, you’re getting both barrels of his fashion gun, sunshine, as he blasts your sartorial sins right off your body, replacing them with swanky new threads. Soon you’ll look absolutely divine, darling, with truly stunning stitchwork on a cute power suit.

Starting out on the not-so-stylish streets of the city, Des is equipped only with that gun that blasts drab-suited stiffs into something much more trendy, much to their delight and amazement, and it’s in these early moments that the game feels at its weakest, with not much to do other than simply mow throw a bunch of suitcase-slinging foes and enjoy the silly quips and humour. However, things pick up when you get your hands on a better variety of tools with which to dish out designer justice.

You’ll get your hands on a sewing machine gun that fixes ill-fitting suits, a neon lasso that injects colour into drab officewear, and even a Belt of Justice and a great big slappy glove thing that can be charged up and used to knock badly-dressed bozos into a temporary state of calamitously-clothed confusion. Honestly, comedy slapping people — it just never fails to feel great.

Once you’ve got your full set of toys to play with and the game introduces specific enemy types that can only be dealt with using a certain weapon, things get nice and hectic, with you needing to constantly juggle your guns whilst dodging all incoming hostile projectiles. It’s more than enough to keep you on your toes. Speaking of toes, you simply must tell us where you got those shoes — they are the absolute bee’s knees! Hmm, is ‘bee’s knees’ actual fashion world lingo? We have no idea, we’re currently sitting writing this review in a very old pair of shorts, which may or may not have a tear in their backside. Don’t tell Des.

Is the gameplay in Fashion Police Squad going to set the world on fire? Nope. However, for the bargain asking price, there’s plenty of very silly, cheerful fun to get stuck into for four or five hours here, and it’s pretty much impossible not to grin from ear to ear as Des gets busy busting the baggy pants off his inelegant enemies. There’s a decent enough crack at a campaign story, too, with plenty of funny characters to meet, a handful of very silly boss confrontations to pit your wits against and the whole thing looks and plays slick and smooth as you like in both handheld and docked modes.

Oh, and there are weaponized sock gnomes, mate — have we not mentioned the weaponized sock gnomes? With tight shooting mechanics, some surprisingly fun swinging action, plenty of secrets to scour the simple environments for, and an entire city to save from cringeworthy clothing chaos, this one’s well worth getting all dolled up for.

Now…where did we put our Sellotape? You can use Sellotape to fix a hole in a pair of shorts, yeah?

Conclusion

Fashion Police Squad is a fun indie romp that does some clever, colourful things with the often rather samey DOOM clone genre. It’s bright and breezy stuff, chock-full of very silly humour and, bonus points, you get to slap people in their faces with a Belt of Justice whilst shooting actual fashion onto their badly-dressed bodies. If you’re looking for a few hours of knockabout retro FPS fun with its own unique style and take on the usual shooter mechanics, you could do a lot worse than bagging this stylish bargain. It’s simply fabulous, darling!