Tilt It! Golf Review (PC)

The Xbox ROG Ally X has been a great way to play a lot of recent games. From behemoths like Resident Evil Requiem to Hades II, I’ve loved using the device to play on the go. But it’s also a great way to play some smaller indie titles, such as todays subject, Tilt It! Golf.

Gameplay is about as straightforward as it gets; in the vein of Super Monkey Ball. We don’t directly control the ball, rather we tilt the level to roll the ball to the goal at the end. There are various obstacles in the way, from barriers to bridges, springy trees and open edges. Playing just requires movement of the analogue stick, and we simply tilt around until the ball hits the hole.

Simple and easy to grasp. Each stage features five levels to clear, and doing so within a set time limit rewards up to 3 stars. If you’ve ever played a mobile game of any sort you’ll know they deal. Thankfully there is no other mobile game nonsense going on – no lives, play limits, or retries that run out or can be purchased – so it is just us and our skill and patience.

I have found the going to be fairly easy though, a little too much so. To get the full three stars we obviously need to beat the fastest time, but across all of the levels I’ve played there has only been one time where I’ve failed to hit it. The rest of the time I’ve not only beaten the par time, but almost halved it.

Even in the levels themselves the obstacles don’t present too much of a challenge. The bouncy trees I mentioned act like springs, knocking the ball off course when touched, but this is to such a small degree that it’s easy enough to just bounce off and carry on with little issue.

It does feel like Tilt It! Golf is aiming for simply being something to pass the time with, and it is enjoyable enough in small doses. It’ll certainly remain on the handheld for when I have five minutes to spare to knock another level or two out, but it’s not something that provides enough challenge or incentive to keep playing for more than 15 minutes at a time.

Especially when the main point of issue for me has been that when played on a bigger screen I found the flipping and flopping of the level gave me a bit of a headache at times, which is very rare in my case. On the handheld this was not really a problem (though it did rear its head at points), but playing on my PC monitor I had to stop after a a while. Of course, that is just a personal problem, but maybe being able to zoom the camera out a little might help with this.

Conclusion

Tilt It! Golf is simple to pick up and play, and in short bursts is a fun little game to dabble in. The timers and levels are far too easy to blitz through though, and as such it can get a bit too repetitive after even a short session. One for those times where you have five minutes and need something quick and easy to fill the time.

This game was tested and reviewed on PC (via Steam). All of the opinions and insights here are subject to that version. Game provided by the publisher.