Hill Climb Racing Review (Mobile & PC)

Hill Climb Racing reinforces the notion that a game doesn’t need an enormous budget to break records, nor a flawless concept or artistic vision to amass a global following. It tells it how it is, with as little as a childish visual palette, a finicky control system, and an erratic gameplay hook that feels both ridiculously simple yet awfully tough to navigate. Frankly, Hill Climb Racing doesn’t capture anything more than the absolute basics. Yet, given the context, it just works. It’s a simple button-tapping navigational tool that knows how to keep your hands glued to the wheel, with just enough vehicles, upgrades, and bite-sized incentives to tempt you into flooring it for hours. Eat your heart out, Trials.

Herein lies a textbook time-wasting piece of work. Hill Climb Racing, at its very core, takes the fundamentals of a classic 2D side-scrolling game and packages them into a simple yet oddly addictive palm-sized jigsaw of flailing cartoon obstacles and broken necks. And that is all that this game is: a by-the-numbers experience that requires you to either hit the gas pedal or the brakes with a single touch, and navigate a seemingly endless corridor of coins, fuel, and abstract objects that befit an old-school Loony Tunes sketch. If you think that sounds a little too basic, well, that’s because it is. And yet, even with such a transparent exterior and an almost moronic visual presence, Hill Climb Racing has a fair few additional layers to it. It’s taking the time to acknowledge the “little things” that’s the problem.

Here’s the job: take a fairly incompetent driver—Bill Newton—and ferry him through a hilly network of beaten paths and vertical tracks in one of several cars. With just two button prompts to utilize—the gas and the brakes, naturally—you have the task of keeping your balance, collecting fuel canisters to help you travel further, and coins to aid your quest for more vehicles and upgrades after each session meets a rather unfortunate climax. If you break your neck—an act that can only be achieved by miscalculating your movements—or just so happen to deplete your fuel reserve, then you either need to invest your in-game currency in various upgrade pools, or make another daring attempt to travel a little further down the road. Again, an incredibly simple concept, but one that has also kept tens of million of people entertained for the best part of a decade, give or take. Go figure.

While Hill Climb Racing leaves a lot to be desired, the game itself provides a good amount of challenges and milestones to unlock, with a solid selection of vehicles—monster trucks, sleds, and Santa’s Sleigh, weirdly—as well as vehicular improvements that allow for you to experiment with new mechanics and strategies. Again, it’s as simple as leaning into one of two buttons and keeping a firm balance as you gradually teeter closer towards a goalpost. But, with certain rogue-like elements that allow you to develop your ride and push yourself just that little bit further, it does ensure that you have a new avenue to explore, be it in the form of a new truck or a stat-boosting perk that serves only to elevate your journey and shove you closer to the next hurdle.

Of course, as with most free-to-play mobile games, Hill Climb Racing does harbor its own share of in-game transactions and premium upgrades. The good news is that they’re not essential for progressing in the game. However, the game does monetize a lot of its content, including the act of acquiring coins and gems to accelerate your progress. It’s a little cheeky, but if you can turn a blind eye to it and spend more time on the scenic route—the course that requires more practice and effort, that is—then you shouldn’t find yourself drowning in peek-a-boo perks with shiny labels and price tags.

Suffice it to say that, if you’re a fan of old-school web browser Flash games—the overly simplified titles that you would’ve often played during an IT lesson in middle school, no doubt—then Hill Climb Racing ought to feel like a great piece of nostalgia fodder for your dying canon. Of course, it’s best not to expect anything even remotely spectacular, as it is, in short, a ridiculously simple and silly experience that doesn’t divulge much more than the bare necessities of a somewhat dated tab-hogging pastime. But, if you can comb over that, then you’re likely to find a lot to soak up here. Visually, it’s about as on the nose as you can imagine. But again, it serves its purpose and compliments the general theme of the game surprisingly well. And as far as mechanics go, well, let’s just say that you don’t need to be all that flexible to hack out a few miles here. The point is, if you have two thumbs, then you won’t find a shortage of gameplay hours in this uphill battle.

Verdict

Hill Climb Racing simplifies the tedious balancing act of Trials’ lopsided uphill struggle to create its own, slightly less frivolous iteration with the usual aspects of a traditional web browser-like game. It’s isn’t pretty by any stretch, nor is it in possession of anything particularly special. But, like Trials, it delivers a silly and annoyingly more-ish experience that can leave you clambering up, down, and sideways for hours on end. It’s still a pain in the neck, and it does make a habit of testing your patience even during the best of times. But then, at least it makes an attempt to soften the blow with a quality selection of in-game upgrades and quirky vehicles to keep you plugging away. It’s the little things that count, isn’t it?

While you’re unlikely to find a perfect afternoon gig in the mountainous world of Hill Climb Racing, you are likely to encounter an oddly compelling challenge that’s both amusing and addicting. The fact that it’s a free-to-play game that can fit snuggly into your pocket also makes it a solid choice for those painfully long road trips, too. Don’t think any more of it. It’s simple, wholesome fun with a festive sleigh and a simple physics-based gameplay style. If that sounds like a job that you would naturally turn towards to remediate your boredom, then you might as well give Hill Climb Racing a whirl.