GAUGE (PC) Review

GAUGE begins without the stereotypical menus that let you select your mode, options, and whatever. After figuring out that you must push the spacebar to begin, the fun starts, and in less than a few seconds... 'GAME OVER.' What has just happened? There was a horizontal gauge, and a bar inside it that could be extended by pushing the spacebar, and decreased by letting go of it. You 'reboot,' and try one more time, and understand that the bar must not touch the edges on either end, or lives will be lost. The catch? The longer the bar, the more score points get accumulated.

Generally, while there's a help section available, you learn playing this by... well, playing, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, as this title isn't something overly complex. In fact, the only other major mechanic is the ability to create a secondary bar (after touching a power-up) that you control with the Ctrl key, increasing score multiplication, but also raising the risk of losing a life as handling both bars can prove to be quite the tricky feat.

...And that's all there is to say about this. GAUGE is a simple, score-chasing arcade title that's easy to learn, and, judging by the scores uploaded in the leader board, very tough to master. Yes, it's not something that you'll play for weeks upon weeks, not to mention that it can get somewhat repetitive too soon, as there's not really much to do, but it certainly has its charm, and it can even be addicting for the few hours that most will spend on it. In all honesty, however, no - that's not all there is to say about this.

In terms of looks, GAUGE is very minimalistic. Here's the thing, though. GAUGE uses a plethora of insanely trippy special effects, whose main purpose is to pose an additional challenge on your gauge-filling business, whether through the use of changing colours, rapid zoom-ins and outs, weird voices, and pictures (creepy baby included). It's a nice idea, but the implementation is simply vomit-inducing. Playing this for more than 10 minutes can be quite tiring for your eyes, your brain, and, if sensitive to such visual magic, bad for your actual health - this is clearly one of those games where the common Epilepsy warning should be on the front cover.