MOUTHOLE Review

MOUTHOLE is strange. Really strange. On Xbox, it demands you live two lives: the mundanity of your psychospherical house and the chaos of your own mouth. It’s part surreal puzzle game, part horror-tinged dreamscape, part existential art piece. If you’re up for something that tests your nerves more than your reflexes, this one’s for you.

Premise & Core Loop

You’re given a simple, terrifying ultimatum: your mouth will rot away unless you “clean it up” over six days. Starting in your house, you make everyday decisions—keeping fit, surfing the web, investing, interacting with people—and choosing when (and if) to dream. Dreaming means entering ten surreal worlds inside your mouth, exploring hidden paths, solving weird puzzles, and unraveling mysteries.

Time is short; choices matter. Actions in the house affect what you can access in your mouth. Doors unlock only when specific conditions are met. Every day is a tension point: do you spend time outside or dive into the bizarre?

There are 11 endings, and not all are easy to reach. Some you’ll stumble into by accident; others demand rigid, often hidden triggers. Replayability comes from exploring these divergent endings, revisiting worlds, and experimenting with paths you missed.

Exploration & Puzzle Design

Exploration is at the heart of MOUTHOLE. The way worlds are stitched together — your house, your mouth, the dream realms — rewards curiosity. Hidden triggers, obscure items, and branching doors give a feeling of discovery. But with discovery comes confusion. The game doesn’t guide you much. Usually, you’ll have to find clues on your own, re-visit areas, try combinations.

Puzzles are often cryptic. Some are environmental: a lever here, an object there. Others depend on you noticing tiny details, or picking up on ambient clues. On Xbox, many players say patience is needed. Some doors won’t open until you’ve done something elsewhere. Others end you abruptly if you miss steps.

The obtuseness is intentional — part of what makes it unsettling. But it also means a steep mental curve. If you don’t like feeling lost, you may get frustrated.

Atmosphere, Visuals & Audio

Here’s where MOUTHOLE really shines (for better or worse). Visually, it leans into retro distortion: low-poly, warped geometry, shadow-heavy lighting, surreal designs. Textures shift, geometry sometimes feels “off,” but that’s part of the charm. You’ll see scenes that are uncomfortable, dreamlike, but visually compelling.

Audio complements this beautifully. Ambient noise, echoes, dissonant sounds, faint voices, strange music — they build tension. The game opens with a dentist look-inside, which sets tone: claustrophobic, uncanny, discomfiting. Music isn’t always melodic; sometimes it’s analogous to static or distortion — unsettling, yes, but it worms its way into your mind.

All this is underpinned by simple but effective UI, minimal latency, and responsive performance on Xbox. The game is optimised for Series X|S, and it generally holds together technically — though some scenes are so visually busy it’s hard to see what’s interactable.

Pacing, Length & Replayability

MOUTHOLE is not a marathon. One full playthrough (main paths, some quests) can be completed without exploring too many secrets, perhaps in just a few hours. But that’s not the point. The replay value is high if you want to see more endings, explore undiscovered paths, or push to unlock obscure content.

Because of how endings are gated, many players will need multiple saves from different times to explore fully. Some endings require very precise conditions or discoveries that aren’t obvious. That can feel rewarding, but also tedious if you’re chasing completion.

Pacing is uneven. Early moments are slow — setup, exploration of the house, establishing tone. But once you start venturing into the more bizarre dream realms, it becomes more intense, more dream-logic amplified, which is where the game finds its rhythm.

Verdict

MOUTHOLE on Xbox is not safe. It’s daring, at times disturbing, and intensely weird. It’s not designed to entertain in the way most games do — it wants to unsettle you, confuse you, and reward you for daring to tread its more obscure paths.

If you like games that twist perception, that treat atmosphere as a primary mechanic, and that offer divergent endings and hidden content, this is a gem. But if you want something linear, clean, or clearly explained — you may find MOUTHOLE strains patience.

Still, for what it sets out to do, it achieves a lot. It’s memorable. It challenges the boundaries of what a puzzle/adventure game can be on Xbox.