Quick Review: The WereCleaner

If not friend, why friend-shaped?

Cleaning ink spills, sure. I do wonder who had
the strength to destroy the printer this bad, though.

Developed by Howlin’ Hugs, published by USC Games and released on May 7th, 2024, this free game is the story of Kyle, who works as a janitor at a big company. Just the usual: Clean up the messes around the office, wash the graffitied walls, suck up the remnants of last week’s birthday party… However, the CEO throws a wrench in Kyle’s life by forcing a week’s worth of mandatory night shifts on everyone, with no extra compensation. The issue: Kyle is a lycanthrope.

"Mental breakdown"? I call that action-painting.

At night, he becomes a(n adorable) deadly werewolf. He controls himself enough to talk, or to remember he needs to work, but if he’s seen… instincts take over and that witness is dead. Thus, it is in a state of extreme danger to his own colleagues that Kyle puts his janitor uniform over his furred body and gets to work anyway, because rent won’t pay itself. Oh, and Daryl the security guard is having a hunch about an animal in the office…

Whoops, killed the secretary.

You heard that right: A stealth game in which YOU are the danger, and it’s out of care for everybody else that you choose to be sneaky and not be seen. Ooooooorrrrrrr play evil and don’t give a damn if you’re spotted, Kyle’s just gonna have one more mess to clean, like that makes a difference. Your coworkers will also panic if they see a bloody mess you’ve left behind. Can’t leave any witnesses, either.

You move Kyle with WASD and direct him with the mouse. You press the left-click button to powerwash liquid messes or vacuum solid items, and switch between both modes with Q. You can interact with stuff by pressing E. Later in the week, you gain the ability to toss paper balls (using the right-click button) to distract other workers away from you. There's also the option, by pressing Space, to shove a trash bag onto an enemy (as the place has vermin infestations) or onto a distracted coworker (so you can sneak by; it only works if you haven’t been spotted first).

"Hey, who turned off the light?"

Call it a hunch, but I think the employees aren't fans
of those unpaid overtime night shifts...

Only seven levels, one per night, but there’s some replayability here. For starters, you can look for collectibles scattered around the office. Second, you get a special sticker on each night for not killing anybody. Third, you can aim for the 5-star score by beating each level as quickly as possible – meaning going in, cleaning every mess, and leaving in record time. Finally, you can hunt for achievements with very specific requirements (e.g. Kill everyone on the busiest night).

Ooh, someone's gonna die. Bad dog! Bad!

Dripping with black comedy, featuring very family-unfriendly deaths presented in the cutest artstyle possible, The WereCleaner is one of my favorite discoveries this year. Its story is basic, and it’s not particularly subtle in its themes – but the lack of subtlety makes the whole thing even funnier. It plays very well and presents interesting ideas and challenges. It is very short; you can beat it in 30 to 40 minutes, and take 2-3 hours for 100% completion. But then again, when a game is free, you can let something like length slide if quality is present everywhere else.

I'll tell my kids that this was PowerWash Simulator.

USC Games is the game design program of the University of Southern California, and several video games created by its students were published to Steam for free, giving them a first experience in both making and releasing a game. Through titles like The WereCleaner, we may be seeing the start of many promising game developers’ careers. So why not take a stroll down their collection of free games, and see what the creators of tomorrow have to offer?