Climb the Tower in Tomb Towers Coming to Steam’s Early Access May 10^th, 2018

By:GeekyGamerGirl87

Tomb Towers, which is developed and published by Mosaique Games is a puzzle platformer that is getting ready to release onto Steam Early Access.

I have been following the game for awhile now, as I have played the demo for this game, and when I was giving a copy of the Early Access version of the game to review from the developers, for free; I was excited and very thankful.

One of the biggest differences I notice between the demo and the actual game is that the storyline was filled in a little more. Although, there is no subtitled telling you much of the story; you do get to see still pictures of what has occurred and aren’t introduced to the story until you enter the first tower.

From what I have gathered, you take on the role of a nameless knight; who is entering a tower after a necromancer has released monsters across the land. You must climb each tower to reach the necromancer. There are three towers in total for this game and within each tower you must collect keys to advance through the tower. That sounds very simple but let me tell you it’s not as simple as you would think. There are also coins that you must collect as well, and sometimes to obtain those coins you will have to think outside of the box, and maybe even revisit a room to obtain them. This means if you go through a room you can go back to the former room to collect things you may have left behind.

One of the things I enjoyed about this game was the ability to turn up the speed of the game. The game can at times be a little frustrating, but it’s not a bad frustration. It really is a good frustration and every time I lose a life in the game I find myself laughing, because I like a game that offers a friendly challenge, and this does just that.

At times I found myself using the speed switching feature a lot. There are times that I wanted to go fast, not that I am a speed runner, just I have the tendency to want to play fast. The game pretty much made me see that going fast may not be the right option and it’s better to play at a slower pace sometimes. I also like that the music speeds up and slows down when you use the speed feature.

In addition to there being three different towers you play through. You do also get the ability to select from five different costumes –once you have opened them– for the nameless knight (who I am personally naming Roger, because I name all video game characters that I play with.)  There’s the regular “Roger” and a skeleton “Roger” just to name a few of the costumes you can choose from.

There  is a nightmare mode that you can select as well; once you have completed all the rooms in each tower.  You cannot select nightmare mode until you have completed the core game. Nightmare mode  is exactly what it suggests, an even harder version of each tower. So, if you are looking for an additional challenge, then nightmare mode would be ideal for you.

I really do like the retro look of the game and the difficulty of the core game brings a smile to my face. Again, I mention earlier that the game can be frustrating at times, but it’s the frustration that draws me into the game more and more.  It reminds me of early MS-DOS games that would make you determined that you were going to complete the game no matter what. Also, another feature I love is that if you perish in the tower; you must start at the beginning of the tower. Just to make it a little clearer; the game is generous, and you start off with ten lives to begin with.  However, once all ten lives are gone then you start at the beginning of the tower with a reduced amount of lives. Therefore, you really need to think carefully when playing this.

When it comes to the controls of the game you can use both controller and keyboard. Both sets of controls work marvelously. In the demo, I only used keyboard as that is what was shown to play the game. In the full game version, it loads up in steam’s big screen mode and you can play with the controller, and it does walk you through the controls for the controller. I am not sure if it walks you through the controls for keyboard if you don’t have a controller plugged in, like some of the other games do. So, one thing I would like to see added to the game is the layout for both controller and keyboard and the option of selecting between the two, as I already knew the keyboard controls from playing the demo I didn’t have to go back to see what the controls were.

If you enjoy collecting achievements, Tomb Towers does have fifteen achievements that you can collect. On the other side, it does not have the trading cards feature yet. I say “yet” because the game is in early access and could very well add that feature later to the game.  However, I think the game would make you want to replay it time and time again, just because of the difficulty of the game. This isn’t just a game you’re going to be able to breeze through, and I like that the looks of it can be a tad bit deceiving when it comes to someone saying, “Oh I can probably beat that pretty quickly.” I am serious when I say the game will show you that looks can be deceiving.

In the future, I can see Tomb Towers being ran as a speed ran game and would be interested in seeing people speed run it. To me, it has the feel that once people play it, it won’t take long for someone to want to speed run it, and it does have the look and feel to be a speed ran game. Which another feature Tomb Tower should add is a speed run clock to the game and maybe even a global board to show everyone who has the fastest time. I think that would make the game even better because besides the achievements, it would give the game a little more longevity.

Overall, I would highly recommend Tomb Towers for those who are looking for a great challenging game to play. Tomb Towers is a fun game and will leave you coming back and wanting more and more of the game. I can honestly say this is a puzzle platformer done right. Tomb Towers will be releasing onto Steam’s early access on May 10^th, 2018 at the price of $3.99 USD. I would say the game is worth buying even in the early access phase because it is that good.