As a senior, I have been dealing with a high level of stress, non-stop since the beginning of the year. If it’s not assignments being thrown at me left and right from my teachers, it’s all the emails and reminders I’m getting from colleges or about graduation. I needed to find a new stress coping mechanism as I have been unable to find time to do my normal de-stressing activities. 

That’s when I found a visually beautiful puzzle game that used colors, had a simple layout and a relaxing music soundtrack: “I Love Hue.” 

Published by Zut! Games, “I Love Hue” is a puzzle game that has players moving and arranging colorful tiles into harmonious gradients. The game makes players think critically as it subtly teaches those playing about understanding color, harmony, and perception. 

There are six stages in total, with seven levels within each stage. Starting with “The Vision” stage, players are tasked with trying to solve the puzzles using in as few moves as possible to earn prisms, which are needed to unlock new levels later on in the game. The blocks are scrambled and need to be put back in order according to color and shade.

I found the beginner levels to be easy to solve, yet still challenging at the same time. I was already addicted by the third level and completely immersed in solving these puzzles. It wasn’t like a puzzle game I’ve played before; it played tricks on my eyes and had me second guessing myself. This game is not one that you can simply finish, as new levels are constantly being added, plus players are able to go back and retry levels over and over again to try and get a lower move count.

Since the goal of the game is to match all the pieces into a cohesive gradient, the colors start to muddle together and look similar to each other. At times, I would think that a certain block was one shade and try to put it in it’s correct place, but next to the other squares, it looked completely out of place and wrong. And some colors were so close together in hue that it took me hours to find the correct spots for them. It was very strenuous on my eyes as well, having the colors muddle together making it hard to order and solve. The game really is a brain buster as it forces you to take into consideration the rules and techniques of color theory. 

As players progress through the levels, the puzzles increase in difficulty and the pieces get smaller. The color schemes become more complex and have less in common, like having complimentary colors blend into each other. There are certain squares that are unmovable to act as a guide to where each piece is supposed to go based on their hue. 

However, I wish there was a way to play with other players. The game feels so isolated in the sense that I feel like I am the only one playing it and there’s no community of people to interact with, like “Among Us” or “Fortnite.” I think adding a feature where you compete against other players, in real time, to solve these puzzles would make the game better and more intense. 

“I Love Hue” is a great game to play when you want some “me” time or when you want to take a break from work of any kind and relax, but don’t want to completely turn your brain off.