Thanks for reporting this! The issue wasn’t caused by the couches or other props. The empty-hand poke hitbox was slightly offset to one side when aiming vertically, so standing directly below the NPC could make the hitbox only touch the edge of the NPC’s interaction area. I centered the poke hitbox, so vertical pokes should now work without needing to move left or right first.
We’ll include this fix in an update after the Game Jam ends. Thank you so much for your feedback—it helped us notice and identify this issue!