Go Up

The pitch

Welcome to Go Up, the exciting free mobile game that challenges you to protect the balloon as it rises higher and higher into the sky. Get ready to put your skills to the ultimate test with this amazing balloon game that'll keep you on your toes and your eyes glued to the screen. Picture this. You have a tiny balloon you need to protect. You need to push away all the pointy and heavy things that get in the way of your balloon going up. But it's not that easy. The sky is full of all kinds of strange things like blocks, beams, and triangles. If your balloon even touches one of these, it's all over. Exciting, right? But it gets even better! The higher your balloon goes, the harder the game gets. The obstacles become trickier and more difficult to avoid. You can push everything out of the way, but watch out! If you send blocks flying everywhere, you will find it difficult to protect the balloon.

Controls & how it runs

You have a “shield” or barrier (often a circular protective plane) that you can move around the balloon to push objects aside. You swipe or drag on the screen to reposition your shield around the balloon. (While the store page doesn’t explicitly describe the swipe controls, that’s the common mechanic for this kind of game.) You must time your moves carefully pushing obstacles too late or too aggressively can send them flying in directions that block the balloon again. The higher you get (the further in the level), the more frequent and more complex obstacles appear.

Getting a run going takes exactly one press: Press start, up top, and the game boots inside this page — nothing downloads in the background and no form wants your details before the first jump. The cabinet is drawn for a portrait (upright) screen and listens to mouse, keyboard or touch, whichever the game prefers. This cabinet stands tall: it was built for portrait screens, so a phone held upright gives it the frame it wants — though it will squeeze politely into any window. Given a fullscreen button, use it — scores look better at full size, that's just science.

Pro tips for arcade cabinets

• Treat your first run as a scouting mission. Arcade cabinets hide their cruelty in the second minute, not the first — learn where the difficulty spikes before you start chasing numbers.
• Small scores compound. Grab the easy pickups on every pass instead of gambling the whole run on one heroic line; heroes respawn, banked points don't evaporate.
• Watch the edges of the screen. In classic arcade design the next problem almost always enters from somewhere you weren't looking — build the habit of scanning the borders.

Go Up — quick-fire questions

Does Go Up cost anything to play?

Not a token. The cabinet is free from the first run to the five-hundredth — no wallet, no sign-up, no toll booth hiding three levels in. The adverts around the page are what keep the floor's lights on.

What sort of game is Go Up?

It stands on our Arcade row — that's the family it plays most like. The pitch above is the publisher's own rundown of what it throws at you and what it hands back.

Can I play Go Up on my phone?

Happily, yes. It runs inside the browser on phones and tablets the same way it does on a computer. This cabinet stands tall: it was built for portrait screens, so a phone held upright gives it the frame it wants — though it will squeeze politely into any window.

Do I need to install anything first?

Nothing whatsoever. Go Up is an HTML5 game: hit the start button and it boots on this page, and shutting the tab sweeps the cabinet clean behind you.

Before you wander off

Personal best banked, or still chasing it? Either way the full Arcade row is powered on and waiting — The main floor: 415 cabinets of pure arcade stock — the quick, the loud and the gloriously unfair. If it beeps, flashes and dares you to beat a number, it lives on this row.