lilt line (demo)

The "lilt" in lilt line refers to music—specifically dubstep, a genre with which I was not previously familiar. The "line" refers to the geometric figure you guide through a narrowing and widening path using the Wiimote tilt control. Occasionally, there is a fence (played in this game by a vertical swath of mismatched color) corresponding to a musical beat which must be cleared by a button press or you will lose points. Running into the side of the path or pressing a button outside of a fence region will also cost points and when you lose all your points the game ends. That's pretty much the entire specification document for the game.

Prior interest: none

The WiiWare demo program has reached the point where new games are released simultaneously with demos, which allows games to be tried out at the same moment they are being promoted. Clearly, Nintendo and WiiWare publishers have found the demo program to be a success. Gaijin games, the creator of the Bit.Trip series and publisher of lilt line, certainly have. Considering the type of game and the publisher, I probably would have looked twice at this particular game, but it sure helps to have the demo to try out since as with Bit.Trip: Beat, "a screenshot just doesn't do it justice."

Odds of purchase: low

Lilt line hits its notes just right: minimalistic graphics match the minimalistic gameplay which is offset by a rich soundtrack. The controls work well as long as you are able to find a button on the Wiimote that you can press without altering its orientation. Hitting a sidewall produces a jarring sound and causes the line to bounce back into the path in a similarly jarring manner. Missing a button press or adding an extra one causes the music to die down as if it were on the radio and you've just driven through a tunnel. Alternatively, hitting the beat causes a sudden flash of color in the background like the visual representation of a hi-hat hit as imagined by Walt Disney¹. Scoring amounts to nothing more than losing points for each mistake and ending the game when you run out of the alloted points for a stage. Passing a stage sets the high score, which may be bested later, and opens up the next stage.

However, the minimalism extends a bit far to overcome the barrier of breaking out a credit card and buying the game. Compared to the Bit.Trip series or even ThruSpace, there just does not seem to be enough content to justify the full purchase price. Worse, this seems to be title for which a good demo will also be enough of a taste for many consumers as was the Bit.Trip: Beat demo. While the demo does end in the beginning of a stage, it didn't leave me wanting more². It's also hard to shake the feeling that while the music was given plenty of love, the graphics and gameplay are minimal not for artistic reasons, but because they weren't seen as a particular priority. As an example, when the music shifts to a more expansive easy-going mode, the path ought to open up and become more forgiving and when the music becomes tighter and more aggressive, the path ought to get narrow and twisty. But the path never seems locked to the music and contains long stretches where nothing much happens. Not that lilt line doesn't show potential. Rather it fails to fulfill it's promise.

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1 - See Fantasia.

2 - Except to replay the Bit.Trip: Beat demo.