Rats!

Platform	Game Boy Color
Genre	Stage-based Platformer
Release Year	1998
Rating	⭐⭐⚝⚝⚝
Added	2025-Jun-06

"Rats!" is very much a product of the late-90s edgy attitude era. You're a rat in dark sunglasses that carries a gun, and you go forth and shoot enemies and collect stuff.

Each stage is about 3x3 screens and smoothly scrolls as you run around picking up ice cream and burgers and fighting enemies. Once you have all the junk food, the door opens. There's about 80 stages divided up into five worlds with a boss after each world. Each boss is just a large normal enemy that needs a lot of shots to take down.

The game's inoffensive on a play/handling level, except for the dev's compulsion to litter the world with platforms that are exactly one pixel too high or too far to make, so you're constantly misjudging your jumps. The music is kind of questionable too.

You get a password every single level, so no lost progress by dying. I took it down in three hours. Kind of ho-hum but charming in a jank edgy way.