Name: Ivy the Kiwi?
Item: Ivy the Kiwi?
Author: Retro Replay

Ivy the Kiwi?

Ivy the Kiwi? starts with a tiny hatchling on the move and immediately makes you responsible for every safe step. Since Ivy walks automatically, your job is to draw vines across the path, turning a simple side-view platformer into a quick, tactile exercise in route planning.

The hook is easy to understand, but the better moments come when vines do more than make bridges. You guide Ivy up and down, then use them to launch her through breakable walls. It is a sweet, focused game with enough friction in its demands to reward patient hands rather than casual scribbling.

Retro Replay Review

Gameplay

Ivy the Kiwi? gets moving right away: Ivy begins walking, and you are already deciding where her next foothold should be. You do not steer her directly. Instead, you draw vines for her to climb and descend, and that single constraint gives the game a pleasantly nervous rhythm. A line placed too late is not just a missed collectible or a slightly clumsy jump; it can leave a constantly marching little bird headed somewhere you did not intend.

The first stages make the idea feel wonderfully direct. Draw a vine, make a route, get Ivy to the exit. Then the game starts asking you to think beyond a simple walkway. Vines can send Ivy slingshotting through breakable walls, so your drawn lines become both terrain and tools for building momentum. That is where the concept clicks: you are not merely reacting to Ivy’s movement, but sketching the route she needs before she reaches the dangerous bit.

There is an inevitable tension between the game’s cute premise and its demand for precision. Because Ivy never waits for you, hesitation can be punishing, especially when a route needs to be placed cleanly under pressure. If you enjoy the hands-on problem solving of Kirby: Canvas Curse, this is an approachable cousin with a similarly unusual relationship between your input and the character on screen. If you want direct movement and lots of room to stop and reconsider, Ivy’s forward momentum may test your patience.

Graphics

The side-view stages keep Ivy and the vines in clear focus, which matters when you are drawing a route around her continuous movement. Quiet Forest and the tale of a newly hatched kiwi searching for her mother give the game a gentle, storybook-friendly frame rather than an aggressive action-game look.

Story

The story begins simply and effectively: an egg drops from the sky into the Quiet Forest, Ivy hatches, and her mother is nowhere to be found. It is an immediately understandable reason to keep traveling, especially because Ivy herself is so small and vulnerable in the setup.

That premise fits the action well. You are constantly making a path for a baby bird who cannot safely navigate the world alone, so the mechanical act of drawing vines has a natural connection to the journey. The game does not need a complicated setup to make you understand why reaching the next goal matters.

Anyone hoping for a dense narrative may find the setup slight, but it works as a warm emotional thread. Ivy’s search gives the platforming more heart than a generic march from start to finish, without getting in the way of the central challenge.

Overall Experience

Ivy the Kiwi? is built around one good idea and has the confidence to keep exploring it. Directing an auto-walking character with hand-drawn vines is immediately different from ordinary platforming, and the slingshot use of those vines gives the concept a useful second layer. You are always balancing quick reactions with the satisfaction of plotting a clever route.

The 7.2 score feels right: this is a charming, well-focused game rather than an all-purpose platforming crowd-pleaser. Its constant forward motion can turn small mistakes into frustration, and its central control scheme is something you will either enjoy mastering or wish you could bypass. Give it a chance if you like platformers that make you actively shape the path instead of simply running along it.

For the right gamer, the payoff is the feeling of rescuing a messy situation with one well-timed vine. Ivy keeps walking; you keep improvising. That modest pressure is the whole point, and it makes the journey through the Quiet Forest more memorable than its gentle opening suggests.