noah rosenfield - Tilt: Quill's Quandary

Release: Dec. '15
Platform: App Store
Role/Responsibilities: Creator / Game Design, Level Design, Sound Design, Creative Direction, Development
Accolades: App Store Feature (Best New Games), 80 Metacritic Rating

Game Description

Tilt: Quill's Quandary is a mobile physics puzzler that challenges players to guide our hero, a pirate hedgehog named Captain Quill, through 100 levels of increasingly difficult "moving mazes" by tilting their device.

Tilting the device a little will move Capt. Quill, while tilting a lot will move the cargo blocking his way. The game takes full advantage of the capabilities of the accelerometer and gleefully eschews many of the complaints that modern mobile gamers have about puzzling on-the-go.

Design & Development

Tilt: Quill's Quandary is my first self-published and solo-developed title. The game was born from a love of mechanical puzzles with interlocking pieces and the desire to recreate the feel of those puzzles in a digital format that alleviates the "one and done" nature of their physical counterparts.

Leveraging the accelerometer for input gives the phone a more toy-like feel and ties the objects on screen to physical space.

The core mechanic is built around differentiation of movement where the player chooses to move just the character or all objects (character and cargo). Combining this one-or-all navigational decision with differences in the size, shape, and placement of the cargo allow the player to shift the barriers comprising the level and navigate the character through the "moving maze".

The addition of static blocks, removable blocks, and a gating mechanic creates an amazing range of complex navigational situations.

Artwork developed in collaboration with Danny Rivera.

Additional Links

PocketGamer/AppSpy Review
TapGameplay Playthrough
MTV News Interview

Design Artifacts