Pizza Tower, an independently-developed platformer game inspired by the Wario Land series, released in January 2023 to critical acclaim, and now, a free Halloween update is available on Steam.
The game gained popularity thanks to its fast-paced platforming action and unique 90’s cartoon-inspired art style. After a few vague teasers regarding more content for the game from its development team, Tour de Pizza’s recent update according to patch notes includes new secret levels, a new type of collectible item in every stage, bug fixes and more. Additionally, standard Steam items such as emotes and trading cards have been added for the game.
After beating Pizza Tower, or upon loading a previously cleared save file, the game’s hub area will take on a new Halloween flavor with numerous decorations. Here, the Wario-esque protagonist Peppino can encounter other characters, like his fellow chef Gustavo or his Dominos-parodying rival The Noise, dressed in Halloween costumes. However, the real meat of the update will take some effort to get into: on a cleared save file, all 20 regular levels in the game will have a collectible pumpkin item added to them.
After doing the legwork and collecting the 20 pumpkins, a new Halloween-flavored level called “Tricky Treat” will open up behind a pumpkin-shaped door in the main lobby. The new level makes use of many of the game’s over-the-top transformations while a deadly, Spelunky-like ghost pursues the player. It’s reminiscent of the highly challenging final courses found in Mario platformers that became such a series staple, starting with Super Mario Galaxy 2‘s Grandmaster Galaxy, serving as something of a “final review.” As such, returning players may want to refresh themselves on Peppino’s unique set of skills before diving back into the world of Pizza Tower for this update.
Unrelated to Halloween, the Pizza Tower update includes an additional level called “Secrets of the World” — a gauntlet comprised of the 55 secret areas from the base game. In this level, the secret areas are queued up in a random order, providing a challenge even for experienced speedrunners of the game. This new challenge level can only be accessed from a sound test area unlocked by finding and completing the secret areas in their original locations, so less thorough players may have some work ahead of them if they wish to try this new content.
Pizza Tower is available for purchase on Steam.
Source: Steam
