Okay, so I’m actually really late to the party on this one. Demon’s Tilt came out all the way back in 2018, and I only just recently found out about it. I’m a little disappointed that it took this long for it to get on my radar, but hey that just means I get to enjoy it now, right? Anyway, I was genuinely surprised by this one. I’ve always wanted a pinball game that could stand up to the real thing, but stuff like Pinball FX always fell short. They never felt like a real game. This one does though!

Now, graphically, Demon’s Tilt certainly doesn’t look like a real pinball game. Rather, it looks and sounds like an arcade game from the SNES era. Actually, if anything on the SNES had this kind of detail it’d probably have gone done in history as the best looking game on the system. So may PS1-era 2D graphics would be more apt. I’m not going to go too much into presentation here, other than to say it all looks very clean and all of the sounds, effects and music feel natural and have just the right amount of “punch” to them.

What’s important here is the gameplay, and Demon’s Tilt might just be the closest to ever come to accurately simulate a real, analog pinball game. It actually exceeds the real thing in some aspects too. Part of it is in how you interact with the ball. In all the past pinball game’s I’ve played, I haven’t really been able to consistently utilize standard pinball moves like cradling the ball, flipper passes and such. Either the physics are off, the field design doesn’t support it, or some combination of the two. In Demon’s Tilt though, I can use almost all of the same techniques I’d use on a physical table. So that aspect of the simulation is spot on!

The other part of what makes this work, I think, is that there’s some real depth to the game, especially in EX Mode. See, Demon’s Tilt works very much like a real pinball table from the early 90’s and onward. It’s not just about earning points, triggering multiballs and getting jackpots; there’s an actual endgame to work towards. In this one, that endgame is called “wizard mode,” and I have yet to see it. Getting to it requires completing all the missions on each of the table’s three zones and defeating the bosses on the upper and lower zones at least once (I think).

Each mission asks something different of the player, and completing them requires mastery over different kinds of shots on the table as well as the techniques necessary to set up those shots. It’s absolutely not easy, especially since the number of balls (tries) cannot be adjusted, and Demon’s Tilt doesn’t ever award extra balls like physical games do. It does do a lot to give the same ball back, and it does allow the player to use nudging (shoving the table) legally as part of their move set though.

So, it almost balances that out. Still this is a hard game that even experienced pinball fans will need time to learn. EX Mode takes it all farther by sometime transporting the player to bonus tables to do things like fight demons or go bowling. There’s a lot to do here, and it really sets the game apart from just about every other past pinball simulator.

If you’re a pinball fan, than picking up Demon’s Tilt should be a no brainer; this is more or less the game we’ve been waiting for, and it’s got an even better sequel (Xenotilt) in the works! For those who are either unfamiliar with pinball or only mildly interested, I honestly not sure if I should recommend it or not. It’s a great example of a high-quality pinball table, but the difficulty might be too much. Still, sometimes there’s no better way to learn than to jump right in an start swimming, right?

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Are you a pinball fan? Did you like stuff like Pinball FX? What about other games?

Image from the Demon’s Tilt steam page