Thank you Wayward Thoughts Interactive for providing us with a review code!

Super Sketch Bob is a cute hand-drawn platformer that’s short and sweet. While the game can be completed in less than three hours, there’s some replayability in finding all of the collectibles and beating your previous times. The game begins with Bob and his girlfriend Liz witnessing a giant pencil falling from the sky. Bob manages to extract the pencil from the ground and Liz takes an interest in it. After fighting over the writing utensil, Bob is left with the sharpened end of the pencil and Liz runs off with the eraser end. She then travels to six different areas and erases parts of them. Bob chases after her to restore the chaos she created and their relationship.

Each level has enemies to avoid or pounce on as well as deadly obstacles like spiked surfaces. Bob has three health bars and when they’re depleted he’ll have to restart the level or from the checkpoint if he made it to one. Every level has a hidden costume chest that changes Bob’s appearance, a section to draw in whatever Liz erased (Un-Lizzing), and three coins to collect which can be used to purchase more costumes for Bob. Scattered throughout the levels are differently colored crayon tips that Bob can collect to unlock even more costumes.

The costumes that Bob wears are super cute with many unique animations and pop culture references. I like how the astronaut costume has Bob placing a flag in the ground if you leave him idle for a few seconds. I also enjoyed the Back to the Future, Matrix, and Tron inspired looks as well.

Aside from the cool outfits, what sets Super Sketch Bob apart from other platformers is that Bob can place planks, bouncy mushrooms/flowers, and ladders to aid him in completing the levels. There are two game modes: Challenge and Free Sketch mode. In Free Sketch mode you are not limited by the number of objects you can place. In Challenge mode there’s a hard limit that you cannot exceed. In either mode if you use less than the recommended amount your score will be boosted.

I played the game in the Free Sketch mode and the highest score I received on a level is a B. You can get dinged for dying, not finding all of the coins/costumes, or failing to undo Liz’s erasing. The time it takes you to complete a level is recorded and you can always go back and try to beat your best time.

The world and enemies have a neat hand-drawn art style which I found aesthetically pleasing. I especially enjoyed the rougher looking paper and pencil drawn levels. I like how the Steam achievements poke fun at the art with descriptions like “Outrun The Poorly Drawn Sandworm”.

The background music is a bit of a mixed bag. I recognized some of the tunes and others went over my head. I appreciated the Tetris theme song while jumping over and around tetrominoes. However, some of the other song covers are a little rough around the edges.

Super Sketch Bob ran well on my gaming desktop and is playable on the Steam Deck. While playing on the Steam Deck I did run into two game glitches where I had to forcefully exit the game and re-launch it. These glitches both happened in areas where I had to undo Liz’s erasing.

Morally Super Sketch Bob is pretty clean with cartoon violence. Animals will attack Bob and there are spiked surfaces that he needs to avoid if he wants to keep all of his health bars.

In the end Super Sketch Bob is a super cute and fun platformer game. The price is reasonable but probably best to wait for a sale since the game is pretty short. There is a demo available if you’re undecided. I was pleasantly surprised by Super Sketch Bob and I look forward to checking out other games from Wayward Thoughts Interactive.