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Gear Works is a fantastic puzzle game for Game Boy (and other systems) that
doesn't get talked about much. Yes, it's 2018 and I'm writing a FAQ for a Game
Boy game. As of now, there is no other FAQ for it, so I'm writing it.
The Game Boy version has been slightly simplified, compared to other versions.
In this game, the Game Boy's resolution and "color" palette are used to their
full extent. There are no wasted pixels in Gear Works. I often find myself
holding the screen very close to my face when making detailed decisions about
where to place the gears.
The premise of the game is that you're building clocks into world
monuments. From the PC manual:
A plan of the current monument you are working on will appear at the
beginning of each level. The flashing rectangles in the monument
correspond to the current level of the monument you are working on.
Each rectangle represents one Play Area.
There are 12 total monuments/levels, one for each hour on the clock. Each
monument contains rows of rectangles, as many as 4 and as few as 1. Those
rectangles represent individual puzzles you have to solve. (The game
calls the monuments "levels" and the manual calls the rectangles "play
areas." I guess I'll just call them puzzles.) Each row of puzzles shares
a time limit. (See section 02d.) If the timer runs out before you finish
a puzzle, you will lose a life and return to the first puzzle in the row.
If you are in a row of just one rectangle, this is no great loss!
When you complete all the rows from the bottom up, you see a picture of
the monument with its newly installed clock, and you are given a password
for the next level. This is very helpful in the later levels.
When you complete all 12 levels/monuments, the game will loop back to
level 1. The last puzzle in level 12 shows the word END in the background.
When each puzzle starts, you'll see "white" gears already on the
playfield. Gameplay consists of placing gears on the playfield until all
the white gears are turning. You have infinite randomly-generated gears to
place, but only so much space to put them!
Gears come in 3 sizes. I'll refer to them as small, medium, and large.
Every gear must be placed on a peg; you cannot place a gear where there is
no peg. There are 4 ways to place gears next to each other so that they
will mesh with each other:
000 000 A large gear will mesh with
00000 00000 another large gear when placed
00000 00000 on the same row or column, 2
000 000 pegs away. (1 peg between them)
000 A large gear will mesh with a
00000 small gear when placed on
00000 pegs diagonal to each other.
000 o
ooo
o
OO A medium gear will mesh with
OOOO another medium gear when
OO OO placed on pegs diagonal to
OOOO each other.
OO
OO o A medium gear will mesh with a
OOOO ooo small gear when they are placed
OO o on pegs immediately adjacent to
o each other, on the same row or
ooo column.
o
No other combinations will allow the gears to mesh with each other. There
is no way for a medium gear to mesh directly with a large gear. There is
no way for two small gears to mesh directly with each other. All chains
and combinations have to be made using these four pairings.
Gears will lock up if you place them in a way that keeps them from
turning. If a gear is turning clockwise, all gears touching it will turn
counter-clockwise.
If you place two large gears next to each other, they will mesh and turn
just fine. If you then place a small gear diagonally between them, they
will mesh, but they will not turn. It's impossible for three gears meshed
in a triangle to turn. This can also happen when two medium gears are
placed diagonally from each other, with a small gear adjacent to both.
This can sieze up your entire chain. This will cause the temperature to
rise faster (see section 02c) and can only be fixed using a bomb. (see
section 02e)
You CAN place 4 gears in a square pattern (large gears) or a diamond
pattern. (medium gears) Be careful when trying to complete a large chain
of gears that circles back to itself; this is unnecessary, and it may
cause gears to conflict with each other if their directions don't match
up.
Most gears can turn in either direction, so you typically only need to
worry about creating patterns and chains that mesh well with each other.
However, there are some large gears that can only turn in one direction,
indicated by the tiny pixelly arrows shown on the gear. To place these
gears, you can either study your placed gears to decide where to put the
directional gear (this can be slightly time-consuming), or you can place
it like normal and see if it turns. If it doesn't turn, bomb it. (this is
faster, but of course it may cost you a bomb.)
Crossing gaps: Many levels require you to place your gears in such a way
that you can cross small gaps in the pegs. To cross a horizontal or
vertical gap where there is 1 peg missing, you must use 2 large gears. To
cross a diagonal gap (which really isn't a gap at all, but it can look
like one in some levels) you can use 2 medium gears or a large and small
gear, placed diagonally from each other. If a gap is too large to cross
with gears, then you are likely looking at a level where two gears are
linked to each other "behind the scenes," such that when you turn one, the
other will magically start turning as well. Just link up all the gears you
can reach, and you'll see that other gears are now spinning too. There's a
point around halfway through the game where virtually all the levels start
having these invisibly connected gears.
Directly below the peg board, there is a temperature gauge that spans the
whole width of the screen. It fills from left to right. When it reaches
the far right side, you lose a life, and you are taken to the first puzzle
in the row you were in. If you were already on the first puzzle, this is
no big deal. If you were on the 4th puzzle in a row, you have to re-play
the first 3 puzzles to try the 4th one again. The temperature gauge does
not reset until you complete the entire row, so if you take too long on
the first 3 puzzles, you will not have enough time to complete the 4th.
This is why having 4 or 5 puzzles in a row is such a challenge.
The temperature gauge acts like a timer, but some things can cause the
temperature to rise faster, effectively eating up your time. If you place
gears in such a way that your chain locks up, so that no gears are
turning, the engine will heat up faster. Use a bomb to fix the problem as
soon as possible.
The manual says that the temperature rises faster when the engine is
turning more gears. This suggests that you should link non-moving gears
together, then finally link them up to the initial spinning gear later
rather than sooner, too keep the temperature down. However, I haven't
personally found this to be the case, and in fact some of my "coldest"
clears have been done by building the entire chain directly off of the
first spinning gear. Shrug.
If a gear is rusty (see section 02d), the temperature will rise faster. I
mention this only because it's in the manual. I've hunted for rusty gears
using the oil can (see section 02e) but I've never found one. Sometimes I
can't understand why my temperature is rising so quickly, and this may be
the explanation. Whether or not it's worth the time to switch to the oil
can and check for rusty gears is up to you. I never do it.
If you've played the game, then you've noticed that there are 2 creatures
that roam around the peg board. These guys are called Poffins. The larger
one will sometimes remove a peg from the board, so that you can no longer
place a gear there. The smaller one will go to gears you've already
placed, and will rust them so that the engine has to work harder to turn
them. This causes the temperature to rise faster. (This is according to
the manual; I've rarely had to deal with rusted gears, and I completely
ignore this Poffin. I've had gears sieze up completely, and I assume it's
because they got rusted, but there is no visual indication that a gear is
rusted.)
If you place a gear on or very near a Poffin, it will fall from the peg
board. You can also attack them directly using the crosshair item (see
section 02e). In both cases, the Poffin reappears immediately at the top
of the screen, so the benefit gained from attacking them is marginal.
At the bottom of the screen you'll see four squares with icons in them.
Press A to enter a sort of "item selection mode," where you can select one
of the four icons with the d-pad. Press A again to select that item. The
cursor on the play area will change depending on what item is selected.
Press B to use whatever item is selected, then use A to switch back to
the gear icon to continue placing gears.
Gear: When the gear icon is selected, you are in the normal gear-placement
mode, and the cursor will show an outline of the gear you are about
to place.
Bomb: A bomb can be used to destroy a gear you have already placed. Move
the bomb icon on top of the offending gear and press B to remove it.
Bombs are the only way to fix a chain of gears that is locked up, so
it's important to conserve bombs as much as possible, in case you
make a mistake.
Crosshairs: With the crosshairs, you can take aim and shoot the Poffins
off the board. This may be useful if you suspect the bigger Poffin
might break off a peg you need, but when it starts pulling, it's too
late to switch items and shoot him. But hey, if he's sitting on a
peg that you know you're going to need, go ahead and shoot him. I
hardly use this item, because it eats up valuable time, and the
Poffins always reappear immediately at the top of the screen anyway.
Oil can: According to the manual, the oil can is used to fix a rusty gear.
Gears are rusted by the smaller Poffin. As far as I can tell, there
is no visual indication that a gear is rusted. I've tried oiling
every gear with the oil can, and I've never seen anything happen.
You start with 5 of each item whenever you load up a level with a
password. You gain more items, seemingly at random, every time you finish
a puzzle. If you're like me, you just hope that you get more bombs between
puzzles, and you ignore the other items. You cannot hold more than 15 of
each item. Even if you die and restart a row, your item counts carry over,
meaning that if you died because you ran out of bombs, you will start the
row over with 0 bombs. Often it's worth it to just re-enter the password
and get those 5 default bombs.
I don't really care about points; when I play Gear Works I'm just trying
to get through the levels. But honestly, I don't know what I'd change
about my gameplay strategy to try and maximize points. Maybe try and place
more unnecessary gears?
In the color versions of Gear Works (on different systems), different
gears are different colors, and those colors indicate how many points each
gear is worth. At the end of each round, all the gears that are turning
are added up and put toward your score, shown at the bottom-right of the
screen. Any gear that is not turning is subtracted, I think even 2x. On
the Game Boy, you can see that not all gears are the same color, and I
assume this reflects their point value. (I've never actually read the
manual for the Game Boy game, but I've read it for Game Gear and PC.)
I suspect there is a correlation between how many points you earn and how
many new items you are given at the end of a round, but I haven't studied
it or anything.
- When you pause the game, you can still see the entire peg board, as well as
all your placed gears, the outline of your current gear, and the image of
your next gear. This means if you are having trouble completing all the
puzzles in a row without running out of time, just pause the game between
placing gears. You can look at the screen, decide where to place your
current gear and next gear, unpause, place them, and pause again. You can
complete levels much "faster" (with lower temperature) this way.
- Learn to recognize when certain peg patterns require specific combinations
of gears. For example, a small gear at the bottom of a single column of pegs
can only be turned using a chain of alternating medium and small gears. Fill
those areas quickly, because you know that you'll need those gears
eventually. Since you don't know what gears you'll get later in the round,
you want to be able to be more flexible with the more forgiving areas.
- Try not to "commit" to a single way of completing a level. For example, you
might not end up getting as many small gears as you're hoping for, so you
should be ready to build many different kinds of configurations, dictated
by what gears you actually get.
- If a gear comes up that you don't need, try to think ahead and place it
where you can still use it in the future. If you REALLY don't need it, try
to place it where it will still turn, so that you'll gain points for it
at the end of the round (and this usually saves space, too). If there's
nowhere you can stash it where it will still turn and not get in the way
of future gears, putting it somewhere where it won't turn is still better
than using a bomb to make room for it.
- Count on having lots of big gears. After the first few monuments, you'll
find youself with very little "free" space in each puzzle. Always plan on
using big gears wherever possible, because they sure take up tons of room
when you're not ready for them. It's not fun to have to repeatedly bomb a
big gear just so you have a spot to put the next one. In some later levels,
the only way to complete a puzzle is to use big gears everywhere possible,
and use small and medium gears only where big gears can't go.
- You can end a puzzle on purpose by pressing A and B at the same time. This
is helpful if you know you can't finish a puzzle, but don't want to wait for
the time to run out.
- If you run out of bombs and you fail a puzzle because of it, you'll have to
restart your current row from the beginning, and you'll still have 0 bombs.
Sometimes it's best to just reset your game, re-enter your password, and
start the monument over with 5 bombs. If you were on the bottom row anyway,
this is a no-brainer. Unless you have a whole bunch of lives or something.
- If two gears (or two chains of gears) are turning, they don't need to be
connected to each other. The only objective is to turn all the gears, not
to create one large chain. You can save time and gears in some of the later
levels by keeping chains separate, and this also avoids having to deal with
matching up gears that are turning in conflicting directions.
These are questions that I frequently asked... myself, while getting the hang
of Gear Works. If you send a question to the email address at the bottom of
this guide, your question will be the #1 most frequently asked, and I'll put
it here if it's legitimate.
Why aren't these gears linking up?
- Gears can only be paired in 4 ways, shown in crude ASCII art above. Learn
those pairings well. The cursor will blink if you hold a gear over a peg
where it will mesh with another gear.
Why aren't my gears turning anymore?
- There are 3 things that can stop your gears from turning:
- You have placed the gears in a way that they cannot all turn; for example,
you might have two large gears placed next to each other with a small gear
diagonal from both, "between" them. Or you have two medium gears diagonal
from each other, with a small gear adjacent to both.
- You have placed a directional gear in a place where it cannot turn in its
required direction. Check your large gears for one that has tiny arrows on
it, and try bombing it.
- In rare cases, I've had my gears sieze up, with no directional gears, and
all matchups valid. I was able to bomb gears until I had pinpointed the
problem in one single gear that simply wouldn't turn anymore, for no
visible reason. I tried using oil on it, to no avail. The only solution
was to bomb that gear. If this is the case, it's rarely worth the time and
bombs needed to find the offending gear.
Why can't I place this gear? It should match up perfectly with the other gears
and I'm mashing the B button like crazy, but the gear isn't placing!
- Honestly I don't know. I've run into this myself; I don't know if there are
unwritten rules about situations where a gear cannot be placed, or if it is
a bug in the game. I've even tried again with a different gear of the same
size, and it worked. It's rare, but it's frustrating.
Why did my temperature gauge fill up so fast?
- The gauge fills up faster when your gears are siezed up and not turning. The
manual says that the temperature rises faster when it is turning more gears,
but I haven't found that to be consistently true. I still can't fully answer
this question.
How do I reach those other gears?
- See the "crossing gaps" paragraph in section 02b. Basically, look for gaps
that are small enough to cross using two big gears. Failing that, just turn
all the gears you can reach, and one of them will be invisibly linked to a
faraway gear, which will magically start turning.
Why is B the main button?
- No idea.
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06 - Other Junk
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This FAQ was written by me; my name is Splain. This is my first FAQ, so I'm
not familiar with any of the politics involved with other sites copying it or
whatever. So, my official statement is that I don't care if this FAQ gets
copied and put on other sites. It won't, but maybe if that happens, I'll learn
why it bugs other people so much.
There's a guy on Youtube called Zenic Reverie who recorded 7 long videos of
Gear Works gameplay, which ended up being very helpful to me while figuring
this game out. Thanks to him!
Quick shout-out to whoever it was on the Gear Works dev team who made it so
that if you lose all your lives and go back to the title screen, the game
auto-fills the password with the level you died from. Nice!
Comments or corrections can be sent to peoppozo.msn@com. But, you know, switch
the . and @ around.
