History Main / ItsAllUpstairsFromHere

** ''VideoGame/XenobladeChronicles2 features the WorldTree, TheVeryDefiniteFinalDungeon, which has you climbing all the way up [[spoiler:to space as the entire structure is a SpaceElevator covered in centuries of vegetation.]] Luckily there's a number of elevators to help the climb up.

* One part of ''VideoGame/{{Blood}} 2'' involves climbing the [=CabalCo=] tower, but you get to ride an elevator most of the way.

*** Played straight in the UpdatedReRelease ''Persona 5 Royal'', where the VeryDefiniteFinalDungeon ([[spoiler:Dr. Maruki]]'s Palace) takes the form of a massive glass-and-golden tower. The final boss is met at the highest point of the structure.

** ''VideoGame/ProfessorLaytonVsAceAttorney'' has the great archives, and more importantly, the Storyteller's tower. And if that wasn't enough, there are smaller towers at the top of the main tower.

* ''VideoGame/MirrorsEdge'' has many towers: given the fact that there's a lot of LeParkour going on, you have to be on top of very tall buildings in order for failure to have the appropriate road pizza end. There's an inversion and a subversion, however: [[spoiler: in the second last chapter, you're trying to run ''down'' a spiral staircase to get to the street as quickly as possible, and the last chapter requires you to get to the top of the highest building in the city...but there's ''elevators!'' Yay!]]

* ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfHeroesTrailsOfColdSteel II'' has the Infernal Castle where the heroes must climb to reach the top to rescue the crown prince and settle things with [[TheRival Crow]].

* ''LightNovel/{{Slayers}}'' has the heroes climbing ''down'' into the sub-sub-sub-(whatever) basement of Rezo the red priest. Lina got increasingly irritated as each door they opened lead to yet another set of stairs. They'd later do the reverse in ''Slayers NEXT''. Subverted near the end of the first story arc where, when faced with a giant spiral staircase, they just flew up.

* Thanks to the fairy tale book he read at the beginning, WesternAnimation/{{Shrek}} realizes that the tallest tower is where his [[DamselInDistress objective]] most likely is. Fortunately for him, the dragon guarding said tower [[FastballSpecial saves him the effort of having to climb the stairs]].

* Non-RPG example: ''VideoGame/DevilMayCry3DantesAwakening'' revolves around ascending [[spoiler:then descending then ''reascending'']] the Temen-ni-gru; a giant demon tower.

** ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaTheMinishCap'' has the highest ([[FanWorks/TheLegendOfZelda official]]) climb to date: from Hyrule's humble surface, to high above even the high-flying Palace Of Winds for the battle with the Gyorg Pair. One has to wonder if said battle took place near the mesopause.

** The [[VideoGame/PokemonRedAndBlue Kanto series games]] has two that can (and (and [[{{Railroading}} must]]) be climbed, both of which were taken over by Team Rocket. The first of which is the [[BigBoosHaunt Pokémon Tower in Lavender Town]], where you need to calm the ghost of the mother Marowak and obtain the PokéFlute from Mr. Fuji. The second is the Silph Co. Building in Saffron City, where Giovanni planned to get his hands on the Master Ball to catch Mewtwo, and defeating him clears out the Team Rocket grunts in the city.

** The [[VideoGame/PokemonRedAndBlue Kanto series games]] has two to count, both of which were taken over by Team Rocket. The first of which is the [[BigBoosHaunt Pokémon Tower in Lavender Town]], where you need to calm the ghost of the mother Marowak and obtain the PokéFlute from Mr. Fuji. The second is the Silph Building in Saffron City, where Giovanni planned to get his hands on the Master Ball to catch Mewtwo, and defeating him clears out the Team Rocket grunts in the city.

** Silph Co. in Saffron City. It can (and [[{{Railroading}} must]]) only be climbed in [[VideoGame/PokemonRedAndBlue the Kanto games]].

** The [[VideoGame/PokemonRedAndBlue Kanto series games]] has two to count, both of which were taken over by Team Rocket. The first of which is the Pokémon Tower in Lavender Town, where you need to calm the ghost of the mother Marowak and obtain the PokéFlute from Mr. Fuji. The second is the Silph Building in Saffron City, where Giovanni planned to get his hands on the Master Ball to catch Mewtwo, and defeating him clears out the Team Rocket grunts in the city.

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* ''WesternAnimation/KungFuPanda'' makes a RunningGag of Po being too overweight to climb the stairs to the Jade Palace without getting winded. Even after all his training, the only improvement he gets in stair climbing is that he gets ''less'' winded, and is at least able to stand up after getting to the top. The gag is extended in the sequel, where he regarnds the stairs to Lord Shen's throne room as "my old enemy". In this case, he has to get carried half of the way up.

* Thanks to the fairy tale book he read at the beginning, WesternAnimation/{{Shrek}} realizes that the tallest tower is where his [[DamselInDistress objective]] most likely is. Fortunately for him, the dragon guarding said tower [[FastballSpecial saves him the effort of having to climb the stairs]].

** The [[VideoGame/PokemonRedAndBlue Kanto series games]] has two to count, both of which were taken over by Team Rocket and accomplishing the objective is always at the top floor. The first of which is the Pokémon Tower in Lavender Town, where you need to calm the ghost of the mother Marowak and obtain the PokéFlute from Mr. Fuji. The second is the Silph Building in Saffron City, where Giovanni planned to get his hands on the Master Ball to catch Mewtwo, and defeating him clears out the Team Rocket grunts in the city.

** The [[VideoGame/PokemonRedAndBlue Kanto series games]] has the Silph Building, an 11-floor dungeon located in Saffron City that was taken over by Team Rocket so Giovanni could get his hands on the Master Ball to catch Mewtwo. Giovanni awaits you on the top floor and defeating him clears out the Team Rocket grunts in the city.

** The [[VideoGame/PokemonRedAndBlue Kanto series games]] has the Silph Building, an 11-floor dungeon located in Saffron City where Giovanni of Team Rocket awaits you on the top floor, and defeating him clears out the Team Rocket grunts in the city.

** [[VideoGame/PokemonRedAndBlue The]] [[VideoGame/PokemonFireRedAndLeafGreen Kanto]] [[PokemonLetsGoPikachuAndLetsGoEevee games]] has the Silph Building, an 11-floor dungeon located in Saffron City where Giovanni of Team Rocket awaits you on the top floor, and defeating him clears out the Team Rocket grunts in the city.

** [[VideoGame/PokemonRedAndBlue The]] [[VideoGame/PokemonFireRedAndLeafGreen Kanto]] [[PokemonLetsGoPikachuAndEevee games]] has the Silph Building, an 11-floor dungeon located in Saffron City where Giovanni of Team Rocket awaits you on the top floor, and defeating him clears out the Team Rocket grunts in the city.

** [[VideoGame/PokemonGoldAndSilver The Johto games]] have Olivine's lighthouse, Goldenrod's radio tower, the Tin/Bell Tower in Ecruteak City (atop of which is Ho-oh), and a tower in Violet City that was supposedly a giant Bellsprout at one point.

* ''VideoGame/ShadowHearts: Covenant'' has the Man Festival, which consists of multiple tiers of combat that Joachim engages in. He climbs the tower by ''jumping''. Though there are a hundred floors, you skip from the twenty-sixth to the mid-eighties... at which points Anastasia [[LampshadeHanging immediately asks where the other floors went]].

* The ''VideoGame/ProfessorLayton'' games love this trope:

** ''VideoGame/ProfessorLaytonAndTheDiabolicalBox'' has a big castle in the forest.
** ''VideoGame/ProfessorLaytonAndTheUnwoundFuture'' features the towering pagoda and [[spoiler: a giant mecha]].
** ''VideoGame/ProfessorLaytonAndTheLastSpecter'' has a mansion on a hill.
** ''Anime/ProfessorLaytonAndTheEternalDiva'' has a castle on a mountain [[spoiler: complete with a huge digging machine that can go on a rampage]].
** ''VideoGame/ProfessorLaytonAndTheMiracleMask'' has a big hotel with a very high auditorium.
** ''VideoGame/ProfessorLaytonAndTheAzranLegacy'' has a skyscraper right in the middle of a city that acts as the base of the BigBad.

* ''VideoGame/DungeonCrawl'''s primary branches are 27+5 levels, which you then climb back up once you have what you came for.
** Starting from 0.5, Stone Soup also has ''Ziggurats''. Pay to enter, 27 levels, traversed from top to bottom. You can leave them any time you make it to the exit of a level, but going back a level - or reentering a Ziggurat you've exited - is impossible. Each individual level is a small room, filled with a bunch of monsters that guard a pile of treasure and the exit. Room sizes, numbers of monsters per level, average monster nastiness and amount of loot per level go up as you delve deeper into the Ziggurat. Monster generation follows themes; each time you enter a new level the game randomly selects a theme, which determines what monsters get generated. Some themes are notably much more nasty than others, leading to a large variance in difficulty. On average Ziggurats are probably the most dangerous crawl branch, beating out such nice places as the Hells (finite demon-filled wastes) and Pandemonium (infinite demon-filled wastes). They are an effective source of both loot and experience - but in general, if you can reliably survive them, you don't really need any more of either.

** ''VideoGame/BaldursGate II'' avoids this even more. It gets all metaphysical. The last battle takes place in a place that's half [[BattleInTheCenterOfTheMind inside your mind]] and half in hell. It's awesome.

** In ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid3'', there's an incredibly long ladder which the player is required to climb. The ladder is so long, in fact, that there's enough time to play a sizable chunk of the game's theme song. However, the bottom of the ladder is in a jungle, while the top is on a mountain. If it ''wasn't'' ridiculously long, some of the realism would've worn off. Then you start to wonder why they didn't just have an elevator, or simply FadeToBlack and then skip to the top, or ''something''. The bottom line is that justified or not, it's a rare game that would make the player climb a ladder for several minutes to proceed, but MGS does it proudly.

** ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXII'' had the ''100-story'' Pharos. You skip maybe 27 stories by teleporting, but the rest have to be climbed. It also has three basement floors, solely for BonusBoss sidequests. However, it should be noted that the definition of "story" is stretched to its limit. Most of those stories are better defined as "landings between sets of stairs".

* Pork City in ''VideoGame/TheWorldEndsWithYou''. During Another Day, you must make your way to the top by using only one of the game's 13 brands of pins on each level if you want to fight the game's [[BonusBoss toughest enemy]] on the highest floor.

* In two ''VideoGame/EtrianOdyssey'' games (''Heroes of Lagaard'' and ''Beyond the Myth'', respectively the second and fifth), the Yggdrasil Labyrinth is explored this way, as the explorers have to climb it steadily upward to conquer it. By constrast, the first and third games (the latter subtitled ''The Drowned City'') have you making your way down, while the fourth and sixth (''Legends of the Titan'' and ''Nexus'') revolve around simply going ''towards'' them.