good little game thank you again

Don't want to read much:
Pro:
+ Platformer
+ Looks nice
+ Cheap (when on sale)

♥♥♥:
- Bad Controls (imprecise)
- Button colors/labels ingame do not match with xbox controller (the one tobe seems to hold)
- Flow interrupting "cutscene" in every level
- No two controller coop, just controller/keyboard (title supports only local coop)
- Tiny resolution
- Unable to exit the game with the controller


I usually enjoy platformer, especially short and independet ones with great music.

I don't really care for the graphics, although I have to say Tobe's looked pretty appealing to me on the screenshots.

However nice graphics cannot make up for broken control mechanics, which are in my opinion the most important part of any platformer.

Tobe's Vertical Adventure is a retro platformer built around modern ideas. As the titular Tobe and his would-be girlfriend Nana, you embark on a quest to loot every island you come across and making off with as much gold as you can carry. A simple plot for a simple game, it sets up Tobe's most interesting feature.

Each level is structured like that of a cave, starting you off at the top and forcing you to make your way down to the treasure somewhere at the bottom. When you finally get your prize, the cave begins to collapse opening new paths and sending you scrambling for the surface before time runs out and you are trapped under the rubble. It's a cool mechanic that I haven't seen other games do, and works well given the somewhat nonlinear level design that lets you choose from several different paths going both downwards and upwards. Being able to run off one side of the screen and pop out the other also allows for more creative traversal, which is the game's strongest asset.

But aside from this much of the game is rather clumsy, especially in terms of controls and movement. Essentially you move as a mix of Sonic 2's underwater levels with the original Prince of Persia's acrobatic hijinks. Tobe can run up walls, slide under gaps, and dangle from hanging branches, whereas Nana swaps the wall climb for a double jump. This sounds great on paper would work fantastically with the open level designs, if only the characters controlled with any consistency. Button presses register only part of the time, your jump is terribly weak which makes scaling walls frustratingly unpredictable, and movement as a whole feels like Sonic plodding through a muddy swamp.

The second problem is the game is alarmingly short. I completed all 16 levels in just over an hour, which for the price feels quite insufficient. Theoretically you could double this time if you plan to play through with both characters, but they play so similarly I don't believe it to be worth doing so.

All the while I was playing I couldn't help but think how much Tobe's Vertical Adventure feels like a flash game awkwardly dressed up as a full game and put up on Steam as if players wouldn't notice. If it wasn't for the terrible controls I could still recommend it at sale prices, but unfortunately they ruined my enjoyment of the game and I wouldn't feel right advising others to purchase it. I'm quite disappointed to have to say it too because the level designs, art and music are not half bad, but a platformer with bad controls is like a sandwich without bread. It just doesn't work.

Tobe's Vertical Adventure is one of those games that makes me long for a ~Meh~ option for steam reviews.


Right, right, so what've we got here? Well, Tobe's Vertical Adventure is a Side-Scrolling... Er, Up-n'-Down-Scrolling(?) platformer where the idea is to get from the top of a cave to the bottom and then make your escape back to the entrance, all while collecting gems and animals as you descend/ascend. It offers two different playable characters for singleplayer and multiplayer story modes across four different worlds, each with four levels. So lets get started shall we?


First of all I'd like to mention the presentation. The majority of the game is represented in the form of sprites, with some art slides that are used as cutscenes and such. The style of the art is nice; it's a simplistic style where everything is gratuitously round for some reason or another. I'm being told it's cute, but something about the hips of both characters being twice the size of their heads puts me off... Anyway, it works, but it's nothing I can say is spectacular. The in-game sprites also look okay and have decent animation to them, but I noticed that a fair few of them were blurry or lacked sharpness, specifically the character sprites. Overall, it's a quaint artstyle, but it's nothing to write home about.


Audio is also just okay. Not a lot of music to listen to; There's the menu music, one track for each world, and then some cutscene music. Once again, none of it is /really/ good, just kinda okay. I suppose I liked the 1st and 3rd world's music the best, seeing as I remember them the most, but it's still all... Whatever y'know? Sound effects as well, which really wouldn't even be noted in this review if it wasn't for the fact that many sound effects occuring at the same time will cause the sound to increase in volume exponentially. Collecting gems becomes a little less fun when you start hearing "ding, Ding, DING, DDDIIIINNNGGG" as you pick them up in groups.


Put hey, as long as the gameplay if fun, right?... Er, well, it's okay. That's the word of the day folks. As previously mentioned, you start at the top of the level and must make your way down to a chest at the bottom. You'll encounter stage-specific traps and collect power-ups such as balloons and ropes... Which is to say those are the only items you collect. Balloons allow you to float down for a short period of time and ropes can be thrown to the ceiling where they'll hang down and you can climb them. In all honesty though, I never really /needed/ these items. Aside from using balloons to break my fall simply so I could go down a vertical shaft a little more quickly for my own convenience, everything can be done almost, if not just as easily without these items. They /can/ occasionally be used to make speedruns easier, but speedrunning, while encouraged, is not the main focus of the game.


The worlds don't have a whole lot of diference in them either. The first one is just a cave; there are some enemies that walk back and forth, nothing really special. The second world is an ice world that introduces horizontally positioned ropes, and has invisible blocks as one of it's level gimmicks. There's also a trap that's, like, an impossible-to-see fake wall that'll drop on you from the background, but it only appears twice and it's where you'll be running so fast that you'll pass them without a second thought. Third world is the lava world, so there's lava and stuff. This world has these bubbles that'll pop and bounce you up when you land on them, which make the platforming a little more interesting. Thing is, these bubbles reform waaayy too fast, so you'll encounter vertical shafts with unavoidable bubbles in them so that you can quickly ascend, but on the way down will only bounce you up and reform before you fall beyond them. Lastly there's the pyramid island. There's some shooty traps, there are some annoying spike traps, and some crushers. Nothing entirely notable really.


What IS kinda cool about this game is the escape bit of the levels. Once you get to the bottom, you have to unlock a chest which causes the cave to crumble while you make your escape. You have a limited amount of time, which can be extended by 10 or 15 seconds depending on how well you do on the chest unlocking QTE. At this point in time, the level changes, destroying certain walls and platforms to allow for certain shortcuts and various hazards. It can also make getting the collectibles easier, but you also have a time limit, so you kinda have a risk/reward thing goin' on there. You can even see what blocks will be destroyed when the cave crumbles, so you can semi-plan your escape route on your way down!


Finally, lets talk about the characters. There's not a whole lot to say about them; both can grab ledges, wall-jump, and roll. Tobe, the yellow one, is faster and can do a short wall-run. The controls for the wall-run are fairly clunky and imprecise though, so I'd always screw it up at vital points in time. Nana, the pink one, on the other hand is slower, has less health, but has a double jump. This double jump allows her to make ascend quickly, break a long fall, take short cuts, and basically wall-climb. She is by far the easier character of the two, as reflected by the stricter speedrun times in the achievement sections. The game was short enough as it is, but even after clearing the game 100%, Nana got me through it in a little under a half hour.


And that's kinda the whole problem with the game. It's pretty short, and what little there is of it has a lack of substance. Playing through the game as both characters was probably an hour's work, and that's with doing the previously mentioned 100% completion. And that's not even mentioning the various glitches I've come across, including but not limited to being clipped inside of a wall consistantly after being hit on a particular level, or stuttering scrolling during co-op play. Match that with head-scratching desgin choices like unnoticable but sparsley placed wall traps, or quickly respawning bubbles, and this game is a short, unpolished, substance-lacking "meh" of a game.


The one place where this game shines to it's fullest though is it's co-op, which is still flawed in a way thanks to the lack of duo-controller support and the fact that it's local-only. Still, in co-op, there are some extra moves you can pull off such as head bouncing or pulling the other player up a ledge, which made for some interesting multiplayer-specific shortcuts. Two players also collect gems and animals more quickly and efficiently, making the experience a touch more streamlined. Good luck finding someone who'll play it with you though, even if it would only be a half-hour.


But hey, that's all just my opinion. Cross reference mine with others and determine if this is a game for you. Though personally, there's juuuust enough wrong with the game to lean it towards the negative side of meh, and I really wouldn't pick it up unless it was on sale or something.

A good riddance from the ultra realistic modern 2021 games . Or maybe its my personal opinion that most games towards the better side should be like 16-bit only. It certainly took me back to the era of Nintendo when I frankly used to enjoy gaming the most. The look and feel of Tobe's quite resonates with good old konami games, Contra, adventure island, Super Mario, Circus Charlie, Dangerous Dave. And speaking of this, at first glance it sounds cute. Tobe And Nana sets out on adventure. And the game would be best enjoyed in co-op mode. With 4 worlds and 4 stages each world. This is a 2 way game where in you need to traverse each stage 2 times, down the level and once you open a big treasure chest, travel back up where you started but for the second time while going back up, you will have the time limit before the entire level comes crashing down on you. I think that's what best sums up Tobe's vertical adventure. However, be prepared for a challenge as this is perhaps one of the most difficult games I played after Super Meat Boy and terraria. Surviving with limited lives would be a challenge as you proceed the levels and might gonna leave you banging your head and will still force you to glue to the game for as long as I don't get to verdict of this most adorable Brother-Sister Duo Tobe and Nana. Buy it for sure.

Bought this ages ago, thinking it would make a fun co-op game. Wife gave up after a few minutes. I tried it again just now, to see if it would be worth finishing solo... A lot of these other negative reviews are right, the character movement and controls just don't feel right. Everything is slow and awkward.

Game doesn't work for me - crashes on load with a "Some issue with Steam API. Highscores downloaded: True" error followed by a fatal exception window. Messing with settings didn't seem to do anything, and there's no other reports of this error for this old game.

So yeah, not a "real" review, but also not recommended since it doesn't function.

This is probably on the very tame side of negative, but negative it is nonetheless.

My main problem with this game comes down to the controls; they're very stiff and clunky and even 100%'ing the game I'm still not quite sure how everything works. Wall jumping in particular is a pain but really there's just a lot of weirdness here.

The neat thing about this game is the way levels start you off going down, then hurry you back upwards with more paths unlocked. It's actually generally pretty clever level design and only a few levels really spoil this by forcing you to wait for an obstacle to be out of the way.

That being said it's also fairly glitchy and clipping through walls/platforms is not an uncommon occurence. Not a huge hindrance but it's there.

The music and graphics are fairly standard 16-bit type stuff, nothing really special.

The control scheme is also quite awkward and if I ever thought directly about which button to press I'd always end up pressing the wrong one. It's just strange.

This probably isn't a "bad" game but it's not one I particularly enjoyed, it's a very "meh" game more than anything. It's also really short, 16 levels that can be completed in a few minutes each. Probably not really worth it for the price, that's also a part of my rating here. Honestly it's possible to have some fun with this game but it's not a high-quality experience even still.

Shoddily coded platformer that's not particularly amazing. If you have a copy, here are some tips:

- Play as Nana if you're not co-op, double-jump is great.
- The game does not save your settings. Period. So god help you if you want it windowed/lower volume/custom keys, you're changing it every time.
- If you play windowed/alt-tab away, the game will continue tracking your key inputs when it's not in focus! Have fun responding to an IM and then it quits the game on you.
- 4-3 is a ♥♥♥♥♥♥ up stage. Worst level in the game.

I'm platformer-friendly but damn this thing is repetitive without any real positives.

I really tried to like this game but the controls are just horrible. Everything about controlling Tobe feels clunky and awkward which makes traversing each level frustrating rather than fun. Considering that the latter half of every level is against the clock such imprecise controls just result in an unpleasent and unsatisfying gaming experience.

Navigating the confusing menus and UI is equally frustrating and, even though you can redefine the game controls, you still have to use the hard-coded defaults to operate the UI. This means that even when dismissing in-game dialogs while you are playing (i.e. when you read a sign) you still have to use the J and K keys.

While the art is quite cute and Cave Story-esque I can't see much else to recommend here.