TOEM was such a great game. We loved how warm that black-and-white world could feel, with all the lovable characters, memorable locations and tiny details that made us stop and look around. We spent so much time playing it on our Steam Deck, taking turns with our nephews and competing over who could take the best photographs or collect the most stamps. So when TOEM 2 was announced, it came as a complete surprise, and we were beyond excited when the publishers granted us a review code.
The sequel doesn’t mess around with the formula that made the original so enjoyable. We are once again grabbing our camera and heading out into a series of cozy little worlds, meeting strange and adorable people, photographing whatever catches our eye and helping everyone with their increasingly unusual problems. There is more to see, more to collect and more ways to interact with the environments, with that same relaxed feeling that makes you chant a long, vibrating ooooomph.
A beautiful world in shades of gray
The world now looks much more beautiful and crisper, but it hasn’t lost its charm. All those shades of gray work wonderfully with the cartoony art style, creating a place that feels cozy, friendly and completely safe. There is no looming danger waiting around the corner and no reason to rush from one objective to another. We can just go with the flow and see what we can find.
Exploration is a big part of the fun. Using a controller is probably the best way to experience the game because moving around and rotating the world feels very fluid. We can look behind buildings, check out things in the distance and discover all kinds of little surprises and presents. There are also hats. Lots of hats and costumes. We couldn’t get enough of those.
The camera can zoom in and out much further than before too, which makes exploring a little easier when we’re trying to spot something in the distance. Traversal has been expanded as well, so we can jump around and climb ladders while moving through the different areas. It all feels natural, and there is plenty to hear while we’re doing it. Birds are chirping, the wind is blowing, machinery is humming quietly and cheerful music is spinning in our cassette player. There is always something small going on around us.
Our camera has a few new tricks
Taking pictures is still one of the main gameplay pillars, and our dear old camera is always ready to immortalize whatever happens to be in front of us. We take photographs for quests, fill our journal, catalogue critters and collect pictures that can be used to decorate the world with some of our favourite characters. We can even take selfies now thanks to the hovering camera, which naturally led to us taking far more pictures of ourselves than was probably necessary.
The camera has also become a much more useful tool for interacting with the world. Zooming in on certain objects and focusing on them can trigger all kinds of reactions. A newspaper can turn into a flying paper plane, while a cloud can be shaped into something recognizable. You start pointing the camera at everything because you never know what might react to it.
There are also additional tools for some more memorable moments. Scissors cut certain things, while a hammer can be used to bonk objects and our screwdriver comes in handy when something needs to be twisted or untwisted. These little additions give the puzzles activities a nice creative twist but in no way do they change the basic idea behind the game.
For us, TOEM 2 is the best sedative. Its animations are adorable, the characters react in wonderfully silly ways and even the smallest interaction can make us smile, including those moments when we don’t particularly feel like smiling. It’s a game that doesn’t ask anything difficult from us and is perfectly happy to let us take things at our own pace.
The people are the best part
For us, meeting people was another great highlight of the whole experience. Talking with them and trying to help them along the way by doing all kinds of quests was such a memorable part of TOEM 2. The game starts slowly, with something as simple as taking a photograph of a critter for a kind old lady, but before you know it you’ll have so many quests on your hands that you’ll be dangerously close to choice paralysis.
Luckily, most of them have a funny way of solving themselves while we’re exploring. Someone needs a jam? We’ll probably find an apple or three while walking around. Somebody is looking for gnomes? There’s a good chance we’ll stumble across them while doing something completely different. Muddy piglets, strange creatures and all sorts of other little things are scattered around the environments, so paying attention usually pays off.
There can be a lot to keep track of, though. At one point we had so many things in our journal that we weren’t sure what we should be doing first. It sounds overwhelming on paper, but it becomes much easier when we stop worrying about completing everything in a particular order and just start walking around. One discovery leads to another, a photograph completes a quest, a quest gives us a stamp and suddenly our journal is getting fuller without us even realizing how much we’ve done.
The stamps, just like the first game, help us unlock the next region, while the journal gradually becomes a record of everything we’ve seen and done. There is also a critter compendium to fill, so make sure you always have dat camera at the ready.
Most quests are relatively short, while each region has one larger quest that sticks around and gives the whole area a bit of narrative glue. It works nicely primarily because we always have something bigger to work towards.
There are so many quests, critters and little things to discover that we occasionally found ourselves searching the same places over and over, wondering what on earth we’d missed. Sometimes we had to put the game down, walk away and come back later with a fresh pair of eyes. More often than not, we’d spot the thing almost immediately.
We’re still looking for the giant chicken, though. So if anyone’s seen it, please, for the love of God, let us know down in the comments.
No pressure, just enjoy yourself
TOEM 2 is a safe haven. Its cozy vibes are designed to make you slow down, forget about whatever happened during the day and spend some time doing wonderfully simple things. There are no time limits and no tricky requirements for full completion. The game doesn’t care if we spend ten minutes photographing the same silly creature or sit on a bench listening to music.
We can almost smell the flowers, admire the scenery, take pictures of things nobody asked us to photograph and wander off because something in the distance caught our attention. There is no penalty for getting distracted, which is particularly important in a game where getting distracted is half the fun.
This is also why we can easily imagine playing it with our nephews again. There is enough to discover and collect to keep us interested, with zero stress and demand. We can take turns with the camera, argue about who took the better picture and laugh when somebody finds something the other person completely missed.
A cozy little adventure worth taking
TOEM 2 takes what worked in the original and serves up on a silver platter more ways to interact with its expansive, highly adorable world and more strange little people who need our help. The jumping, climbing, camera attachments, collecting, quests and the critter compendium make wandering around such a joyful experience. We loved TOEM, and we’re very happy that TOEM 2 managed to give us that same warm feeling again. It’s a lovely little world full of lovely little people, and we’re more than happy to spend a few more hours wandering around it.
Now, about that giant chicken…
Our Score: 10/10
Game: TOEM 2
Developer: Something We Made
Publisher: Something We Made / popagenda
Genre: Adventure, Casual, Indie
Release Date: September 29, 2026
Platforms: PC, macOS, SteamOS + Linux
Players: Single-player
Playtime: Approximately 6–10 hours, depending on how much you explore and complete
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