Back in 2021, when I reviewed the original TOEM, I admitted that I wasn’t much of a photographer. My wife enjoyed taking pictures whenever we hiked through Dutch or other European nature, while I was perfectly happy just being there and remembering the moment afterward. I called myself more of a memory collector than a photographer, which felt like a decent explanation at the time for why a game entirely built around taking pictures somehow worked so well for me. Five years later, TOEM 2 has made me reconsider that a little. And that’s not just because I suddenly understand aperture settings or because I’ve transformed into the kind of person who carries three lenses and spends twenty minutes waiting for exactly the right light whenever we go somewhere. My wife still has that department covered. What TOEM 2 made me realize is that photography itself was probably never what attracted me most to the original game; it always was curiosity. The camera just gave me a reason to look around properly, and wonder what was hiding somewhere just outside the obvious route. The sequel understands that exceptionally well. Let’s click in.
TOEM
The basic idea remains wonderfully simple. You travel from region to region by bus, get off somewhere new and start exploring with your camera, without the game constantly telling you where you need to go next. There are people to meet, creatures to photograph and plenty of strange little things happening along the way, so I rarely felt like walking straight towards my objective was the most interesting option. Most of the time, I just wanted to see what else was around.
I ended up liking the bus structure in TOEM 2 quite a lot. Every time you arrive somewhere new, you step off, look around for a bit and slowly figure out what kind of place you’ve ended up in. Then, whenever you feel like you’ve seen enough, you simply get back on the bus and move on. It fits a photography game surprisingly well because you’re never really trying to clear an area or finish a checklist before you’re allowed to leave. You’re just visiting these places for a while, taking pictures and getting involved in whatever weird situation happens to be going on there.
The regions also feel a bit more distinct this time around. One stop can look and feel completely different from the previous one, but it never felt like I was suddenly playing a different game. Returning characters help with that, as does the fact that you’re still carrying the same camera, journal and collection with you everywhere you go. By the time I reached a new stop, I was usually curious enough to ignore whatever objective I had for a while and just start walking in another direction. That probably says enough about why TOEM 2 worked so well for me.
Off the beaten path
I rarely followed the most direct route to whatever I was technically supposed to be doing, because something else almost always pulled my attention away. Maybe a path disappeared behind a building, maybe a creature moved somewhere in the distance, or perhaps an NPC looked just suspiciously specific enough that I knew a quest was probably hiding somewhere in the conversation. The sequel gives you a bit more freedom to wander around too. Being able to jump and climb might sound almost laughably basic when written down, but in TOEM it actually makes quite a difference. Suddenly you start looking at rooftops, ledges and weirdly placed objects and wondering whether you’re supposed to get up there somehow. And because the game often gives you something for checking, I eventually stopped thinking about it and just started exploring. I wasn’t looking around corners because I expected an achievement to pop up. I looked because there might actually be something there, the camera gives you permission to be nosy.
Photography is still what everything revolves around, and thankfully TOEM 2 doesn’t try to complicate that too much. You still photograph creatures, environments and strange things happening around you, while plenty of quests ask you to figure out what somebody wants before you go looking for the right subject. That already worked in the first game, so there wasn’t much reason to throw it away. The difference is that TOEM 2 gives you a little more to mess around with. New camera attachments expand what you can do, and some pictures require a bit more thought than simply finding the correct object and pointing the camera at it. Sometimes I was looking for the wrong thing entirely. Other times the subject was obvious, but I was standing in completely the wrong place. And then there were those moments where the answer had basically been sitting in front of me while I was inventing some ridiculous solution the game had never asked for. I usually ended those puzzles laughing at myself rather than feeling particularly clever, which of course, is what TOEM is all about.
Writing and discovering
That also shows in the way the quests are written, because the people living in these regions rarely feel like they’re just standing around waiting to give you something to do. Their problems are usually small, weird and sometimes incredibly specific. Nobody needs you to save reality from collapsing. Someone needs help because they’ve turned invisible, somehow a donkey ended up on top of a cliff, or a few creatures still haven’t been photographed yet, and because you’re walking around with a camera, you’re apparently the best person for the job.
I really liked how small most of these problems are. The game never tries to convince you that every little request is incredibly important. The characters are strange, but they don’t feel like they’re constantly trying to be funny either. Most of the time, I talked to people because I actually wanted to see what they had to say, not because there was an icon telling me I probably should.
The dangerous power of stamps
There is still a progression system beneath all this wandering, of course. Helping people and documenting discoveries earns you stamps, and once you’ve collected enough, you can move on to the next region. You don’t need to finish everything before leaving either, which is probably a good thing because otherwise I’d never get anywhere. The problem is that TOEM 2 is very good at making me think I’ve forgotten something.
I would reach the bus with enough stamps to continue and then remember that one person I hadn’t spoken to yet. Or the animal I still hadn’t managed to photograph. Or that weird little corner I walked past earlier and promised myself I’d check later. So instead of getting on the bus, I’d turn around and go looking again. The game never tells you that you have to do any of this, I just don’t like leaving when I know there might still be something hiding nearby. Apparently TOEM has figured out that being nosy is all the motivation I need.
This is probably where TOEM 2 improves the most on the game I reviewed back in 2021. I already liked the original TOEM a lot. Its black-and-white visual style, photography puzzles and relaxed pace made it a very easy game to enjoy, and I gave it an 8/10 back then. My biggest complaint was basically that I wanted more of it. Well, Something We Made gave me more, but thankfully that doesn’t just mean a bigger map and twice as many things to photograph. The regions are more interesting to explore, being able to jump and climb gives you more freedom to poke around, and the camera has a few more tricks to play with. The quests ask a little more from you too, without suddenly turning TOEM into a game where you need to sit there staring at the screen for twenty minutes because you’ve missed some ridiculously obscure clue. It still feels like TOEM, just with more opportunities to wander off and find something weird.
That’s probably the biggest difference I noticed compared to the first game. Back then, I already enjoyed taking pictures and seeing what was hidden around each area. In TOEM 2, I spent even more time walking in the wrong direction on purpose because there was usually something that made me curious. Sometimes that was a quest, sometimes an animal I hadn’t seen before, and sometimes it was just a path that looked suspicious enough to investigate.
I don’t really have some huge complaint waiting at the end of all this either. TOEM 2 knows exactly what kind of game it is, and I never felt like it needed combat, a timer or some enormous disaster to make things interesting. I was perfectly happy walking around, helping weird people and taking pictures of whatever caught my attention; sometimes that’s more than enough.
Conclusion
Five years ago, I ended my review of TOEM by saying I wanted to see more games like it, and TOEM 2 is pretty much the answer I was hoping for. I spent more time getting distracted, checking strange corners, and delaying the bus because I was convinced I’d missed something. That’s still the thing this series does best for me. I don’t care much about photography in real life, but TOEM keeps turning me into the kind of person who wants to stop and look around for a little longer. I called myself a memory collector back then, and after TOEM 2, that still feels about right.