Peppino <3
Peppino Spaghetti is the protagonist of the 2023 indie game Pizza Tower, developed and published by Tour de Pizza! After having his quiet pizzeria threatened to be blown to smithereenes by a floating face of pizza, he traverses through the titular Pizza Tower to conqeur it and save his livelihood from impending doom.
There is so so much I love about this little pizza man!! He doesn't utter a word throughout the game, but all of his animations are oozing with personality. Within a second he's jumping in fear from a door behing him closing, to running through enemies with an absolutely enraged expression on his face. I absolutely love the dedication he has to go through the whole tower despite how afraid he looks each time he enters a level. His poor pizzeria isn't even doing well! Outside of the tower, he's just kind of a tired, somewhat grumpy middle aged man which is just strangely endearing to me. Did I mention just how cute I think he is? His big ol' nose, moustache, tired eyes, small fat build... While some just don't get it, somehow all of this has captured the hearts of so many that have played this game! He's on the Sexypedia for god's sake.
Honestly, I don't think I can entirely put it into words how much I love him. It isn't just a bunch of traits I can list off, it's him as a whole!
Random things about him :3
- He doesn't handle spicy food well as evidence by the firemouth transformation. Cute...
- His status as a war vet has flip flopped around since the game came out, but The Noise update seemed to finally confirm it with the medals in his house. Kinda recontextualizes the whole WAR level...
- He can be seen swearing in some pieces of concept art which is just funny to me.
- For some reason during the final fight with Pizzahead he was gonna go full on rage mode and just lose all his clothes?? He even seems pretty confused about it himself in one of the concepts.
- Adding onto this, McPig has drawn Peppino naked an alarming amount of times. At least 7.
Some of my personal headcanons
- He's a dog person and would probably object at first to getting a cat, but he would come around like those memes where the dad doesn't want the pet but they become best friends.
- His favourite colour is purple! This is sorta supported by the purple boombox, rug, and light in his room. The best shade of purple might I add!
- Peppino has depression and GERD because I like projecting, and of course general anxiety. I also imagine he has PTSD from his time as a soldier (initially this was the whole reason why he's such an anxious mess).
- Tying into his PTSD, he HATES loud and sudden noises.
- Between him and Maurice, Peppino is the younger sibling.
- Peppino isn't exactly a glutton, but he has a habit of overindulging sometimes.