Bounce your way to victory in Stilt! Developed by Rekt Games and published by VRKiwi you must use your trusty stilts to hop, bounce, and pray you don’t jump straight off the edge of the map…
Can neither confirm nor deny I did this, but with a whole world filled to explore, this is a platformer like no other. Are you ready to arm your stilts for a huge adventure? Can you retrieve what was taken from you whilst taking on those who are there to stop you from reaching your goal, this is the new VR platformer Stilt!
Buddy, If You’re Gonna Pounce, You’ve Got To Have Some Bounce!
Story
Stilt has a very unique story that honestly never saw coming, as a cat or furball hopping about on your ship.
You are just minding your own business when you are suddenly attacked by a huge pink alien creature that steals your spaceship, you must jump through different levels and worlds to reach the top of the mountain and regain what was stolen from you.
The creature has placed obstacles and foes in your way that you must defeat to pass through, whilst exploring and collecting your cargo that had fallen from your spaceship and reaching your target!
Some Bouncing, Huh?
Gameplay
Stilt is a classic platformer with controls that I have never experienced before, it took a good hour or so to get used to. You must thrust down using your controls to bounce on your stilts, this can be tricky and sometimes you have no idea where you are going to land.
I had a few mini-panic moments, thrusting my arms and waving them about trying to stop myself from falling. You are able to walk on these stilts but when it comes to this game where you need to jump to great heights to reach your target this becomes near impossible, especially if it’s a moving platform, enemies are blocking your way, or it’s icy surface.
One part that was frustrating for me was the time limit, 35 seconds in some of these parts is way too difficult, especially on parts where platforms disappear, this is the same with some of the puzzles where you have a time limit of 20 seconds, of course, the game is supposed to be challenging and tests your skills, so it depends entirely with how good you are on the stilts.
A feature I really enjoyed was the power-ups you could find to help you progress more easily or further, reaching parts that had collectibles on that were too far to jump to, some of these power-ups also helped defeat enemies such as the missile launcher that helped annihilate those flying enemies that attacked you and made exploring even more difficult as the damage would rid you of your power-ups or take away one of your hearts.
The blue fan was 100% my top favourite as it helped me reach the tricky parts or skip through certain platforms! There are a lot of different stilt power-ups to use, and each one has a unique power that will assist in helping you complete the level and continue on your journey.
I would recommend if you were going to try to get the time limits top score then I would explore it first and come back later to speed run through it. You cannot do both in one sit-in as there are a lot of collectibles on each level and the presents you must find doing puzzles or exploring.
You will also come across stamps which you can use to save yourself from restarting from the very start of the level and instead sending you to a checkpoint with or without a power-up. To defeat enemies, you need to bounce and bump them on the head, you need to be careful as any damage they do will also rid one of your power-ups on your stilts.
If you thought bouncing about was fun, then you can do it with your buddies! Yes, you are able to jump into multiple modes and take on your friends in a bouncy competitive match! Becoming the best stilt player out there!
Or, if you want to just race each other on the adventure playground HUB for multiplayer where you can test a few power-ups out and reach the top of the castle.
Stilt is Mario in virtual reality except you use stilts, with tons of levels and worlds to explore full of different obstacles and enemies to face. You are also able to change the colour of your furball using a colour wheel so you can choose any furball colour you want.
I Almost Bounced Clear Out Of The World!
Graphics and Audio
Stilt has a huge variety of worlds to see, that makes every level different, explore a grass biome, ice biome, and so many more! Graphically the game looks amazing, with very colourful worlds to explore and a cartoonish art style.
Stilt is also a smooth ride, with no issues or glitches. Character models for the protagonist and the antagonist are well done, enemies have a few different models as well.
Music in Stilt varies depending on the environment you are in. A few sound effects from enemies and your furball meowing but there is no voice acting whatsoever plus the effects on the stilts, power-ups, and breaking of the crates.
Well, I Gotta Go Now! I Got A Lot Of Bouncing To Do! Hoo-Hoo-Hoo-Hoo!
Comfort
When it comes to Stilt you have to have a high tolerance when it comes to motion sickness as you will be bouncing all over the place, there are no options for teleporting as you are unable to teleport on the stilts.
I don’t know if this is something the developers might work on in a future update but when it comes to a game about bouncing on stilts, I highly doubt it. There are a few options that can make it a bit easier for those who suffer from motion sickness.
UPDATE:
Hey Gamers, so after speaking with someone behind the game, I had some information regarding the motion sickness aspects and actually I was very much astounded with the steps and planning that was done to give this game the smooth ride it deserved.
One of their main solutions was to optimize the game for higher frames per second. This helped reduce motion sickness by a huge amount and helped with the comfort of bouncing around!
Due to some games using a lower FPS this can cause stuttering which the developer didn’t want as this caused sever issues with players with motion sickness and higher FPS will give it a more smooth experience.
PSVR2 uses 120 FPS
PC is merely depending on the set up the player owns, the higher the set up – the better the experience and chance of 120 FPS!
Lastly Meta Quest hits at 90 HZ.
Mechanics included in Stilt to help with motion sickness was the fact that when you jumped your body still moved in game, this tricks your brain into thinking you’re moving when in fact if it used the analogues and you moved, the effect would affect your brain causing sever motion sickness to player. I really respect the developers for doing this, and the fact they informed me of this new information.
Final Thoughts
Stilt was a fun experience, with the option and being able to bounce off the walls had me giggling a bit, but this game was a very challenging experience I think could be too difficult for some people but that’s the best part, having that challenge!
Other than that, the worlds were really well designed, the concept was clever, and I can truly see the developers put a lot of hard work into Stilt and can’t wait to jump back in and complete the time limits I missed! If you are a VR fan who loves games like Mario, Spyro, or even Crash then this is one you don’t want to miss out on!
Stilt is AVAILABLE NOW on PSVR2, Steam VR and Meta
GAMERHUB RATING: FOUR (Out of FIVE) JOYSTICKS
(Thank you to Lauri at VRKiwi and the team at Rekt Games for providing the code for this review)
