Climb! AMiYP Review

Walking around with a mountain in your pocket is not as uncomfortable as it sounds. Although the feeling of a prickly peak rubbing against your leg is a little irritating, being able to pull a mountain right out of your trousers is pretty impressive. Jokes aside, Climb! A Mountain in Your Pocket is a small, indie game where your lone goal is to skillfully climb up a mountain wall without falling off. A variety of rock climbing strategies must be mastered and executed in order to do well in this strategic mobile title.

At first glance, Climb! appears to be entirely skill-based. In the tutorial, you’re required to initiate a few different moves up a wall, all of which require timing and accuracy. Although being precise is an important part of this game, strategy is another key component. Once you get a shot at climbing the main event, you’ll quickly discover that certain routes up the mountain require more work than others. It’s your job to determine the most efficient path through trial and error. Doing so will allow you to gradually advance farther over time.

Climbing itself involves either reaching for or jumping at pegs. An actual mountain wouldn’t have a thousand pegs on its side, but that’s beside the point. Reaching is the safer option, as it doesn’t risk missing the target and falling. However, you’ll be forced to jump when the peg is out of reaching radius or if you see a more desirable option. See, your climber swings side to side and can only grab onto anything directly in his path. Otherwise, you’ll have to make a jump and hope for the best. Luckily, a little target marker helps you time jumps and visualize the maximum distance.

One aspect of the game that I believe should be scrapped is the death timer. You’re only given a certain amount of time to scale the entire mountain, which decreases based on how inaccurate you are in the given playthrough. This “energy” limit will typically run out on me after 70 meters. When beating the game requires a whopping 400+ meters of distance, it makes winning practically impossible. I understand that reaching the summit isn’t supposed to be easy, but 90% of the time I would die from the timer running out rather than missing my target on a leap. If not fully removed, this time limit should be less harsh on the player.

Scaling the mountain in Climb! is actually peaceful thanks to ambient music and calm colors. Although many mobile games of this sort are rage-inducing, Climb! doesn’t feel too punishing when you inevitably lose your grip and fall. It’s more of a learning experience, but doesn’t really have a fun factor either. Determination and free time are the only two things that keep you playing, which might turn some people away. Nevertheless, Climb! was made from the heart, which means more than anything else in a time where most mobile games exist for the sole purpose of making money and keeping players hooked.