Hey Wabbit,

I remember now...googooiol or something like that. I miss him..Him and a few others.

BTW here is another review about Orchids to Dusk-A Walking Sim About Death.

Orchids To Dusk is a wonderful walking sim | Rock, Paper, Shotgun - http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2015/12/06/orchids-to-dusk

............................Moderator comment...........................

Thanks Delenn :)

I had no problems downloading or installing this game on my Win10 HP laptop. But I found the game just too slow. SLow for the tiles to clear after each turn and then too much happening between levels.

The install location varies every time, sometimes in games, sometimes in programfiles, sometimes it remembers the last location (like this week) and sometimes on the perfect location preset by the developpers.

I learned to always check the patch before installing, WR also mentions it often in the discription to take note of the patch.

Win10 Home 64bit. Game loaded quick and played easy. I did have a problem with wondering where everything was in the game. So used to seeing the play button down on the bottom right, this was top left. No biggie. Some parts were very slow so I just skip those bits. Otherwise a relaxing game to play.

I had a chance to play through a good portion of the game and I like what I am playing. I was really drawn in by the vocal opening. However I can understand the file size too. As most people say "All games of these type share the same theme" I would like to see games eventually have full voice overs. The immersive music in the puzzle levels are wonderful They are high quality. But each of the story that is told in game, I would like to see the full voice over. A majority of us today have broadband connection but can also see where the developer had small file sizes in mind for those less fortunate to have it.

Downloaded 7 Gates from here several years ago and enjoyed it so much I bought it (a glowing testimonial considering what a tightwad I am). One of my favorite match-3 games, and quite addictive - I'll fire it up to play one level and still be playing an hour later.

It looks like a couple of Playrix games I've downloaded and played from here in the past, still enjoyable but it takes forever to get to the HOG section.
BTW, it looks like you've left a good chunk of last week's "Call of Ages" review mixed in this one.

I played it when it was offered last time - and would still like it.

So I will surf over to Origin and see what they have - thank you for the hint!

Is this game identical to the one published here in 2013? Thanks for the answer.

26 A Update: turned OFF my AVG - installed, just fine THANKS GOTD

Win7 Ultimate; would not install, nor would it bring up the file on the webpage:
Error details are here:


Problem Event Name: APPCRASH
Application Name: setup.exe_7 Gates - The Path to Zamolzes
Application Version: 0.0.0.0
Application Timestamp: 5073e4d6
Fault Module Name: StackHash_bf2f
Fault Module Version: 0.0.0.0
Fault Module Timestamp: 00000000
Exception Code: c000041d
Exception Offset: 774ad8f1
OS Version: 6.1.7601.2.1.0.256.1
Locale ID: 1033
Additional Information 1: bf2f
Additional Information 2: bf2fad4f846e226167d9682fa24bb27c
Additional Information 3: eda9
Additional Information 4: eda91533b922338153a41c7d8cb2825c

Hope this info helps: too bad it wouldn't load: Looks like a GREAT game

I have this game and have been playing it off and on for about 6 mos. I have finished each game to the end when I have played. The levels are not hard, the graphics and story are simple but nice. My issue is the same music over and over. I have solved that by completely turning down the music volume and using my own music playing in the background as I play. The HOG between "stories" or "levels" is easy enough and are pieces to be added to those missing in the god/goddess' pictures. The ending sews up loose ends but it would be great if there were more in the series than just this one. I'd love more stories and levels with cool power ups.

Downloaded, installed, and plays fine on Win 8.1. Fun though nothing amazingly different. Finished the first section (Hestia) and will see later if it gets anymore challenging or interesting; meanwhile, thumbs up though not "Oh wow".

For starters, I just want to signal that the game.giveaway.com TICKER is NOT visible on a forum (where I put it as my sign).
It isn’t visible even in the Spread the word section of this website.
See my last reply, for more informations, at 32nd comment on the previous GameGiveAwayOfTheDay given away on Sunday, November 15th, 2015: http://game.giveawayoftheday.com/questerium-sinister-trinity-collectors-edition/#comment-3305335

I submitted the compressed package, and the unzipped files, to WinDefender, SuperAntiSpyware, Malwarebytes and EmsiSoft Emergency Kit (those programs are installed or portable on this PC): no problems detected.
I submitted the compressed package to virustotal and metascan-online.
- Metascan-online found nothing for readme.txt and for setup.gcd but it found false positives for the G/GAOTD setup.exe --> virit found Trojan.Win32.DownLoader16.CH, F-Secure found Gen:Variant.Graftor.261296, K7 found Riskware ( 0040eff71 ), Fortinet has failed to scan, but the other 38 engines found nothing.
- Virustotal found the same false positives for both the G/GAOTD setup.exe and the compressed package --> F-Secure found Gen:Variant.Graftor.261296, K7Antivirus found Riskware ( 0040eff71 ), K7GW found Riskware ( 0040eff71 ), but the other 50 engines found nothing.
I submitted the G/GAOTD setup.exe to jotti and virscan: jotti found nothing, FPROT scan engine on virscan found W32/Felix:P:Lastsect_unkn!Eldorado.

The game installed well on windows 10 standard x64.
I install all the games in d:\games and usually I move the shortcuts from the desktop to that folder... But when the shortcut isn't created by the setup application of the game, I must do this task myself.
This time I HADN'T to create the shortcut by myself.
The game started and finished without problems, although "system requirements" say Windows XP/ Vista/ 7.
On the exit, the windows compatibility app manifested itself; it enabled/ticked/selected Disable display scaling on high DPI settings in its properties – compatibility tab, because I’m using high DPI settings (150%).
Altough it worked well also without that setting (it seems there was nothing changed in the game, like the first time I started it).

Thanks for this game, as usual, to Whiterabbit-uk (aka Stephen), to GGAOTD and to Immanitas!!!

Win 7 x64 as well.
Recently I've noticed that these Playtrix games freeze after a few minutes.
This one as well.

Maybe it's all those processors fighting each other then?
What's this 'affinty' fix you mention?

Win7 x64
Game crashes w/ Get Thread Context failed -- usually several minutes into a level -- makes game pretty much unplayable
Known problem w/ old version of Unity for multi-core cpu's
Sometimes setting affinity works
Best solution is for the dev's to update their game

Oops. Forgot the hugs....

Thanks for the game...and hugs to the Oh Furry One and his Family.

:)

Heya You Wrascally Wabbit,

I already had the game but I downloaded and and had no problems using Win7. So it worked for me this time too. I think it took me 3 days to finish it. It was an OK game....Typical story, bright colours..etc

Hey Wabbit...Remember the guy that always posted the reviews from Rock, Paper, Shotgun and then his nick would disappear and he would have to pick another one? I can't remember the nick because he had to change it all the time because of the forum. Well, here's a review of some free games from there.
Best Free Games of the week | Rock, Paper, Shotgun - http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2015/12/05/best-free-pc-games-of-the-week-7

Think I am going to check out...Orchids to Dusk by Pol Clarissou - http://polclarissou.itch.io/orchids-to-dusk And IT HAS A LINUX VERSION....YEA!!!!! It looks interesting.

I haven't been on GOTD or much of anywhere lately because I am learning Linux. I refuse to drink Microsoft's koolaid anymore. I have a bunch of my programs working and 95% of my games..plus Steam. Most of it worked right out of the box. Thanks to Wine, lots of fiddling around and MakuluLinux Aero Edition- http://makululinux.com/aero/ I just dual boot Win7 when I need it. Got 4 years to figure out what to do.

This is a normal part of the installation and verification process used by the Game Giveaway of the Day software.
The report is a "false positive" from your security program.

"Details
• The program Setup.exe tried to launch a web browser."

When the installation of the game is complete, the installer opens your web browser and takes you back to a GGotD page.
Your anti-virus/security software is detecting this as a "suspicious" behavior and generates all those reports as a warning, letting you know it's not happy.
Some malware may use techniques like this to drive you to an unwanted or undesirable web page, or one which may be "booby trapped" with malware/viruses, so the security software reports it so you will be aware of the situation.

In this case, it's normal and isn't a problem.

Hi

I'm running this on a WIN 8.1 64 bit laptop with no problems. One download at 12:01PM EST, all files were included and it installed flawlessly.

I played a few levels, and had no problems at all.

Thanks for a great game, I love Match 3 games. I'm not worried about the rewards, I listen to Audio books as I play and as long as there is not a timer that I can't disable I'm good.

Playrix games are some of the best games going.

Thank you WR and Playrix for this game.

I hope the people who are having problems manage to get things worked out.

I hope this gets mended, because I got it last time it was offered, and it's a very good game.

It starts off as a fairly normal Match 3, not hideously difficult but with a slightly different layout, sometimes requiring a different way of thinking about it. Colours, graphics and sounds are all good.

At the end of each level there's a kind of "Boss" section where you have to find some bits which are so tiny that they can be impossible to find. Even the Hints don't help - you can go over and over and over again, but there simply isn't anything there to find! However, you can skip this if it becomes impossible to complete, and move onwards.

The actual game does get harder as you progress. This is where I often have to give up on a game, because my eyes are not getting any younger . . . but I kept at this game, and somehow - it felt like a decade or so later - I actually managed to finish it!

So . . . it can be hard work, but apart from the Boss bits it can be done. And you get a real sense of triumph when you finally reach the end and win the prize.

I can't actually remember now what the prize was . . . perhaps I'd better start again and remind myself.

It's a very good game - I hope you manage to get a working file before time is up.

Installed and runs flawlessly on Windows 10 Home. I have Panda Antivirus enabled and had no issues with the game installing or running.

This is one ls the games that I play over and over. Probably played it 8 or 10 times. Good time waster.
It looks like some of the graphics have been upgraded or altered from the screen shots shown here.

I love the match three games and this one is really nice. The only thing I do not like is having to beat the clock. I do not like timed games, because I have many interruptions.

Downloaded and installed perfectly on my Win8 laptop. The game is colorful, and nice to look at. The matching is not as smooth or as fast as I like in matching games that I play. I cannot plan a move ahead of time because the game drops tiles down and does away with the tile I was planning on moving. It just wasn't fun or challenging for me. I only played a couple of levels before I lost interest. It is a nice little game... but, it just wasn't for me. Thank you for always providing weekend games. I always look forward to the weekends to see what you have to offer! :)

Thanks GOTD but I will pass on this one, can't stand match 3 games, but it does have nice graphics.

Ok Win x64 Pro. Full screen, usual options, clean & clear graphics. Took couple tries to get used to the sort of slanted method of drag drop to swap squares. Familiar format for the genre is nice one. Worth going a few levels to see what the extra goodies have to offer. Fans should enjoy. These usually get pretty tough as game goes along. Thanks GOTD.

Nice game. Thanks.

I like the interaction between the frozen and chained tiles. There's a three-in-a-row there just waiting to explode, but can't til you unfreeze the one piece. Then the chain reaction.

Reminds me of an OLD given away game, Beezle, in fill mode. (Beezle would be good to get again :-) )

= =

I wish we'd switch from using just 'match 3', because there are three variants. There's swap-3, click-3, and connect-3, all of which we've had here. 'Match 3' is generic - the others tell me more about the game.


Dave.

Why does the description of the game say "Ow, you have been chosen to find the treasures and return them to your people in 7 Gates?" OW? Does it HURT (so good) A LOT LOT LOT to play this game? OW! OUCH! OUCH! PAINFUL games would be a new one for me!

Why does an Immanitas Entertainment game install to the Playrix folder? Are Immanitas and Playix the SAME company?

There's something about the colors in the screen shots that I REALLY don't like.

That's a HUMONGOUS file size for a MATCH 3 game, isn't it? What's UP (UP and AWAY) with that?

I don't THINK I need another Match 3 game this week. I JUST got one six days ago that I haven't played yet.

Nice game playing on Win7 64-bit.

Eventually a new system of puzzle game - not as those offered during the last years.

I suppose it will get tough with increasing levels - potential for a classic keeper.

Thanks & enjoy the weekend.

I downloaded this game again.
I played it the last time this was offered, but there was a bug in it and it wouldn't go beyond the 6th Gate.....it just stopped, altogether.
I am taking a chance that this has been fixed.

Cool! Another game I lost when my external hard drive ate my homework. Thanks!

it seems your browser blocked the 'activated, what now' page of GGAOTD. No harm, game will be fine, You got probably an pop-up blocker active.

Enjoy

FWIW, I downloaded, installed and played the first 2 levels within 5 min. on a brand new laptop with WIN 10-64 Bit. As usual, Thanx GGOTD!

This is the first time I have ever had a problem downloading a game. When I clicked on setup, my antivirus said there was a threat and it removed the setup file so it could not be run.

Downloaded and installed OK, but when I started to play it stopped with the message, Fatal error in PC, GetThreadContextfailed. Then said that the game had stoppped working and had to be closed. Tried again with same result.
Pity as it seemed like an interesting match 3 game and I am addicted to match 3 games!

Tried multiple times to install, but like #2, I am also getting the same message.

I am having the same issues as others downloading the game.
On a win10 pc with Bullguard installed the zip folder showed
nothing in it.
On the second try I used 7zip to unpack the file, but the installer
was removed to quarantine on extraction.
On a win7 pc with the the same BG program installed, I was able to get the
game to install, but had an issue after it finished with this error;

Suspected file: Setup.exe

Risk: medium
Path: V:\7GatesThePathToZamolxes-wpo4d7f\Setup.exe

Details
• The program Setup.exe tried to launch a web browser.

Files modified
• V:\7GatesThePathToZamolxes-wpo4d7f\Setup.exe

Registry modified
• \REGISTRY\USER\S-1-5-21-2816398370-2736244762-2416516968-1001\SOFTWARE\MICROSOFT\WINDOWS\CURRENTVERSION\INTERNET SETTINGS\WPAD\20-0C-C8-3A-7C-CE:WpadDecisionTime (modified: old_value= 00000065 00000067 000000bf 0000007f 0000003d 0000002f 000000d1 00000001, new_value = 00000004 0000003f 0000000d 0000008b 0000003d 0000002f 000000d1 00000001)
• \REGISTRY\USER\S-1-5-21-2816398370-2736244762-2416516968-1001\SOFTWARE\MICROSOFT\WINDOWS\CURRENTVERSION\INTERNET SETTINGS\WPAD\20-0C-C8-3A-7C-CE:WpadDecisionTime (modified: old_value= 0000005b 00000066 000000b5 000000db 0000003d 0000002f 000000d1 00000001, new_value = 0000007c 000000b4 000000b5 000000db 0000003d 0000002f 000000d1 00000001)
• \REGISTRY\USER\S-1-5-21-2816398370-2736244762-2416516968-1001\SOFTWARE\MICROSOFT\WINDOWS\CURRENTVERSION\INTERNET SETTINGS\WPAD\20-0C-C8-3A-7C-CE:WpadDetectedUrl (deleted)
• \REGISTRY\USER\S-1-5-21-2816398370-2736244762-2416516968-1001\SOFTWARE\MICROSOFT\WINDOWS\CURRENTVERSION\INTERNET SETTINGS\WPAD\20-0C-C8-3A-7C-CE:WpadDetectedUrl (modified: old_value=, new_value =
• \REGISTRY\USER\S-1-5-21-2816398370-2736244762-2416516968-1001\SOFTWARE\MICROSOFT\WINDOWS\CURRENTVERSION\INTERNET SETTINGS\WPAD\{2DF19879-9EA5-4CBE-BE82-624473DC6BDD}:WpadDecisionTime (modified: old_value= 00000065 00000067 000000bf 0000007f 0000003d 0000002f 000000d1 00000001, new_value = 00000004 0000003f 0000000d 0000008b 0000003d 0000002f 000000d1 00000001)
• \REGISTRY\USER\S-1-5-21-2816398370-2736244762-2416516968-1001\SOFTWARE\MICROSOFT\WINDOWS\CURRENTVERSION\INTERNET SETTINGS\WPAD\{2DF19879-9EA5-4CBE-BE82-624473DC6BDD}:WpadDecisionTime (modified: old_value= 0000005b 00000066 000000b5 000000db 0000003d 0000002f 000000d1 00000001, new_value = 0000007c 000000b4 000000b5 000000db 0000003d 0000002f 000000d1 00000001).
The game did start without any issues and it ran fine to level three where I stopped it.
The game looks good as far as graphics and game play was smooth with a 4 core 3500 cpu and 8 gig of ram
The levels increased in difficulty quite quickly, with power ups harder to get and the time to complete the level becomes less.
I have been using the game giveaway sight for a few years now and this is the first issue I have had in a long time.

I downloaded it to w7 pro 32bit - it installed and played with no problems - maybe the problem
has been fixed.

I downloaded in the first minutes

No issues at all, works perfectly on 2 Window10 machines

Hope you all have better luck later

Just thought i should mention that the last lot of pics are from the previous game giveaway (Call of the ages)and not this one

................................Moderator comment...............................

Thanks. The games games games section is updated every week, but a lot of the information, such as useful sites etc remains the same, so i usually copy it over from the previos week, then update the relevany parts. forgot to delete last weeks images.

This is a nice match three game, a little generic of course - except from the background story that doesn't take place in Middle America (as I expected) but in the Balkans. But then again, I gueass the story could be exchangable with ancient Inka or Egypt or China or what not...

I've only played the first six levels now, but already found it quite challenging to get all the gold awards. Or should I say frustrating? What annoys me a little is the amount of luck that's involved, especially when stones keep falling and matching on their own, and you can't interfere.
I often want to make a certain match to clear one of the last remaining tiles but the game just won't let me do it. Instead I have to sit and watch the stones match and match and match automatically in a part of the board that's already clear, while the time is running out. Worst thing is when the last automatic match takes away just the stone I wanted to move in the first place.
So if you are a 'gold award completionist' this game seems to be rather frustrating. If you don't care about that, have a go and try it!

By the way, the game works quite well for the color blind among us, because all the stones have distinctive shapes. The developer only missed the amulet bar at the bottom of the screen. Why can't those little color markings have the shape of the respective stones?

I download a lot of times.

But it still show this message.

"The setup files are corrupted.Please obtain a new copy of the program."

At this point in time it seems the downloaded file is missing the main setup file, I have downloaded the game several times and only get the read me and gcd file.

Update:

There now appears to be three files, some community members have had no problems installing the game, others including me are still having problems unpacking or installing the game. I get the eror message 'Windows cannot access the file'.


In the mean time, for those who aren't able to get the game to work (and of course those who do), if you are wanting another good game for free, check out the latest free game from Origin (they have an 'On the House' feature every few months. The latest offering is the excellent Jade Empire: Special Edition (see the Games games games section below for details). The Origin client is needed to get this game. Some community members object to installing Origin because they feel it installs to much bloatware. I've never had any issues after installing Origin. It has not slowed down my computer in any way and its footprint is negligeable to the 'n'th degree.

I've received 16 decent games since they added the 'On the House' feature a couple of years ago, including some AAA titles, some classic retro games and some recent arcade games (eg Theme Hospital, Dead Space, Sim City 2000 Special Edition, Wing Commander III, Ultima VIII, Zuma's Revenge, Syndicate (the original one), Star Wars: The Old republic, Bejewelled 3, Battlefield 1942, The Sims 2, Peggle)

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7 Gates: The Path to Zamolxes:



In Brief:

7 Gates: The Path to Zamolxes is a colorful match three game with a six sided (hexagonal) rather than the usual 4 sided configuration, which lends itself to a more random placing of the tiles and therefore more replayability.



Installation:



The downloaded zip file is 79.1 MB in size that unpacks to a read me and a wrapped setup file (the orange colored file with the key symbol), plus there's a setup file with security (setup.gcd) that's protected from being hacked (because the previous giveaway system was easily cracked). This file may cause some security software to alert the user to a possible malware attack, Any positive hits you may get (as one community member did with one of last weeks games) 'WILL' be false positives.

The game giveaway team check every game giveaway for malware using several well known anti -malware suites. There has never been a game giveaway infected with malware since the project started back in Dec 2006. The owners know that allowing such things would compromise their business, so they make sure all software given away via the gamegiveaway sites are thoroughly checked for all types of malware before allowing community members to download any files.

Some community members have been having problems installing games since the security software was added last year. It's been found that turning off your security temporarily or configuring it to accept the setup.cgd file usually sorts the problem out. Also try right clicking on the orange colored set up file and select Run as Administrator.

The game installs to the following path

C:\Program files (x86)\Playrix Entertainment\7 Gates - The Path to Zamolxes\7 Gates - The path to Zamolxes S1.exe"

The installed game is 273MB in size (Much larger than the setup file). There are two shortcuts installed to either the desktop (game shortcut and a shortcut to Playrix) There's also a folder installed to the start menu program list containing the games executable shortcut, a link to the developers web site and an uninstaller.

During the installation wizards progress you are given the opportunity to select your own installation path if you wish; (it's highly recommended, especially if you have a second HDD or a partitioned drive as it will help to keep your system running smoothly - the more you fill your root drive (usually the C: drive), the slower your computer will run, especially as it fills up – if you’ve got a decent sized hard drive of more than a few hundred Gigabytes it’s always a good idea to partition it into at least two drives so that you can keep the operating system and other essential applications separate from other programs and games.


If you have problems installing 7 Gates: The Path to Zamolxes or miss the giveaway you can get it 24/7 from Toomky Games and MyPlayCity and Gametop

Introduction:

Travel through ancient temples and find the hidden treasure in a colorful Match 3 game 7 Gates: The Path to Zamolxes! Very long ago the Dacians were a prosperous nation until the invaders came. The Dacians turned to their gods asking them to hide the treasures from the enemies. After so many centuries the time to discover the ancient treasures has come and you are the chosen one! But first you need to help the gods restore their sacred temples. 7 Gates: The Path to Zamolxes is a Match 3 game which is perfect for those who like interesting stories and logical puzzles. Put the gems in chains of 3 or more to remove them from the game board. Complete the level before the gold bar is empty and you will earn a gold time award. The faster you pass the level and the longer chains you create are the more scores you get. But some levels have additional conditions to fulfill otherwise you won't pass. For example, you need to collect a certain number of yellow or purple stones.
Or you need to find the part of an ancient amulet. The more levels you pass the more complicated the game gets. There will be frozen tiles that can't be removed from the game board until you unfreeze them. Help the Gods restore their temples and they will lead you to an ancient treasure in a tricky game.

Reference: Accessed HERE 5th December 2015


There are reviews of 7 Gates: The Path to Zamolxes worth reading over at Big Fish if you are unsure about downloading this game HERE. The game was given away two years ago (August 2013) where it received a positve 82% out of 420 votes. you can check out the previous 55 comments HERE

The Game:


7 Gates: The Path to Zamolxes is a colorful match three, with a six sided (hexagonal) configuration which lends itself to a more random placing of the tiles and therefore more rplayability. The initial boards are fairly easy, but, once you've passed the first several boards you'll find the difficulty increased. It was taking me 15 minutes or more to complete a level past the eighth or ninth. The last few tiles to be removed were a little frustrating, but perseverance always pays off. There is a timer, but it doesn't lock the level once you've reach the end. Instead it's used to award gold silver or bronze which can be seen on the level map. After 12 levels I'd only got two gold times and two silver, the rest were bronze times, which aren't timed.

Some stones are frozen, so they cannot become part of a chain and be removed from the game board until they are unfrozen. To unfreeze them, create chains of three or more tokens next to the frozen tokens to remove the ice and thereby unfreeze them.
Other stones are locked, but can become part of a chain, but not removed until unlocked. To unlock them, create a chain of three or more tokens. This will break the chain and allow the token to be removed by creating a second chain of similar tokens. You'll also find tiles stacked up to three times. The darker the tile looks the more stacked tiles will be found.

Hint screens will appear at the beginning of the game to introduce you to the various artifacts and token types.

The game is divided into seven regions, each having an artifact that you have to recover. In the first region there are four pieces to recover. Once you've removed all of the tiles from certain levels in the region, the artifact appears. You then have to move the artifact off the board by creating matches below the artifact piece. Also at the end of each level you'll see an image of a statue that as you progress through the region, they are uncovered to show a golden statue beneath. Once uncovered there's a hidden object mini game where you have to find the bits for some magical items such as the fire goblet, magical jewel and sacred fire Once you've found the missing pieces you have to place them in the correct position on the board. you can skip the hidden object mini game if you wish. The first of these mini games has three items to complete, but in later regions statues you uncover more magical items.

Each region has a special amulet that can be recharged by making matches of a particular color, for example the first regions amulet requires you to create matches with the color yellow, the second the color violet, the third green. you can see each amulets color at the bottom of the game board. The first amulet (The shuffle amulet) is unlocked at the start of the game. Using this amulet enables you to shuffle all of the tokens on the board if you are stuck. The amulet can only be used once its been filled by creating the appropriate color matches. The second amulet (The amulet of fire) can be used when you've unlocked the second region, this amulet allows you to change a single tile into the color of this amulet. Each region has 12 levels and there are 7 regions, so there's a total of 84 levels. I've not played past the second region so don't know what the rest of the amulets do, but I suspect each amulet allows you to change a single tile to the color associated with that tile. Only amulets that have been unlocked will charge up.

Completing a level before the gold bar is depleted earns you a gold time award which is displayed on the level map. You can find the bar to the left of the main game will earn you a gold time award. Once the gold bar is depleted a silver bar takes its place, if you complete the level before this one ends you'll get a silver time award. The bronze time award is awarded thereafter.

At the end of each level you'll be told how long the level took to complete, how much you earned in time bonuses. You'll only get bonus points if you complete the level within the gold or silver times. Plus the total score.

Apart from clearing all of the tiles on a level additional win conditions such as collecting a number of stones of a specific color, or collecting a piece of an artifact (which spawns on certain levels once you've removed all of the tiles) are required to complete the level.

Each region is introduced with a short story board which you can skip if you wish.

Video & Images:

You can see around 110 images of the game as a slideshow HERE and some videos of game play HERE, HERE and HERE



System Requirements:


Windows XP/ Vista/ 7/ 8
CPU: 1.8 Ghz
RAM: 1024 MB
DirectX: 9.0
HDD: 285 MB

Conclusion:


7 Gates: The Path to Zamolxes is an average match three with decent graphics and game play that should hold your attention. As you progress through the levels they do get successively harder as more components such as frozen, chained and multi layered tiles are added. If you want a challenging Match Three, this game is for you. I found later levels quite hard due to the configuration of the boards. You can expect levels to take up to 15 or more minutes to complete once you've passed the first several levels. :)

The story adds to the game, but, if you want you can quickly pass these by clicking on the skip button,


Scoring:

Gameplay: 7
Graphics: 7.5
Audio: & sound effects: 7.5
Re-playability: 7
Originality: 6

Total = 7 out of 10

========================================================

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Problems:


If you have any problems installing or getting Call of the Ages working, please go HERE for help. I've posted most of the common problems and solutions in a FAQ thread, which you can find in the sticky section of the forums by following the above link.

If you think the game is infected - IMPORTANT - PLEASE READ

For those of you who are getting hits by your anti malware suites; it's because they are picking up the Themida based protection, which was put in place to protect the game from unscrupulous community members that were hacking the giveaway wrapper which then gave them unlimited access to a registered copy of the game, which was being put on peer to peer sites. Some community members were even uploading video tutorials on You tube telling you how to do it yourself.

Themida based applications are sometimes seen as a threat by anti-malware. I can assure you this game and hundreds before, that have given community members cause for concern have been totally safe. The game giveaway team have managed to secure well over a thousand games for us since they first started giving away games back in late 2006; firstly via the main site (Oct 2006), then via the game giveaway site (early December 2006). There has never 'ever' been an infected game given away.

If you are able to configure your anti-malware suite to allow the 'seemingly offensive' file through security, the game should then install normally. if you can't, or don't know how to, then the other way would be to temporarily turn off your protection. You do so at your own risk, but please do take into account what I've already said above; in a nut shell, every malware occurrence reported here since the game giveaway went live in Dec 2006 have been false positives due to overly sensitive anti-malware suites.

It would be against the teams best interest to allow such an occurrence as it would destroy their good standing with the big search engines and I'm sure many who have frequented this site for a long time would leave. The giveaway team use several anti-malware suites to test every game given away here.


Another thing to consider when you think the game is infected, if it really was, there would be hundreds of community members posting about the infection; we rarely more than a few posts for any particular game; though, since the gcd file that contains the Themida code was introduced in 2012 I have seen many more community members reporting infections due to the Themida based code found in the giveaways wrapper protection. However, out of the thousands of downloads each week, those numbers are insignificant and supports the fact that the results they are getting are actually false positives. They have always been proven to be so.

If you are posting late in the day I would also suggest posting in the main giveaway forums; in the game discussion section, because I cannot moderate 24hrs a day over the weekend. I've created a thread HERE for that purpose. If you've installed Call of the Ages but it doesn’t work for some reason, it should still be registered, so someone may be able to help at a later date. Unfortunately if your problem is actually downloading it, once the giveaway deadline is reached you will no longer be able to download the game unless you've already started downloading it before the cut-off. Sometimes you can still register the game after the giveaway has ended so long as you managed to start the download before the giveaway ends. I've tested this and the grace period lasts for up to 1 hour. Apart from the above instances; i.e. already installed, but having problems running the game, (with the possibility of receiving help from the community via the giveawayoftheday game discussion forum); or still downloading after the cut off period, but within the 1 hour grace period, or registering within an hour of the cut-off period. Once the giveaway period is over there’s nothing that can be done to get the game (unless its available from one of the free game sites) until the game is given away again (though that isn't always guaranteed).

It's worth checking the giveaway game discussion forums the day before the giveaways go live to see if we are getting a large sized file (I usually post a comment about approximately how large a file is, though if I'm particularly busy I may neglect to do this). It is especially important for those who have slow connections and even more so if the game is popular. We can have up to forty thousand (40 000) community members downloading over the 24 hour period, with the bulk of community members downloading in the first 12 hours of the giveaway going live, there is always a massive strain on the giveaway servers. The bigger the file size, the more community members will be downloading at any one time. Because the bandwidth is shared equally among all community members, downloads can become excruciatingly slow, so if you do have a slow connection, its important to start your download as early as possible to avoid disappointment. Because these games are free, the giveaway owners cannot invest in more bandwidth without compromising the whole project, so we have to be satisfied with what we have at present.

A download manager can help speed the download up and also protect the download in case of an interruption. There's nothing as frustrating for those with really slow connections to have the connection break after an hour or so, then have to start from the beginning again. I would ask community members if you do have decent bandwidth please avoid using a manager as it does add to the number of downloads occurring at any one time, for example some download managers will download your requested file in up to 32 packets simultaneously, that will take 32 download spots, thus slowing down everyone else's download speeds. For those with slow downloads (due to having a slow connection e.g. a 2MB Broadband connection or less) I would advise using a download manager if the file is larger than around 200MB. My broadband connection is 100MBs, so I don't need to use a download manager, (I do have one called Internet Download Manager, but don't use it when downloading files from the giveaway site). For me a 1GB file usually downloads in about 1.5 minutes or less. My connection is quite a long way from the provider so it is slowed a little, but is still quite good at a download speed of around 12 to 14 MB's per second.

I hope the above goes some way in explaining why we sometimes have really slow downloads.

It’s always worth checking out the free games sites because sometimes the games we get here are also available for free from them. MyPlayCity (MPC) has the most with over 1000 games to choose from and Toomky Games is highly recommended. If you have problems installing today's game or miss the giveaway you can get it 24/7 from Toomky Games and MyPlayCity and Gametop


If you do download any games from MyPlayCity, Gametop or the other free game sites please 'do' watch out for toolbars etc. Make sure you un-check the check-boxes during installation, and, in the case of MyPlayCity, every time you boot the game up, (this may have changed now as these free game sites tend to change the format frequently)....... I've posted links to all of the common free game sites below in the games, games games section. If you do download a game from any of these sites you do so at your own risk. We cannot be held responsible for problems arising from an installation recommended here. :)


For now I won't be recommending you download games from Jenkat Games. They have changed the way you get games from their site. Diane has posted information about this over in the game discussion forums. If I have time or remember, I'll link to it. TooMyk Games are now safe to download from. They have removed the games that were suspect and have cleaned up their act. As always, you download from those free game sites at your own risk. The giveaway site is the safest site I know of where you can get free software and games. The only disadvantages with downloading from here is you have to download and install within the day of the giveaway (apart from the instances mentioned above and if and when you upgrade or buy a new computer legally you aren't allowed to transfer games given away previously, unless they are being given away on the day you upgrade, or if you've purchased a license. :)

You just have to look at the sites track record since the game giveaway site was created back in December 2006. No games given away here since the inception of the gamegiveaway site have been infected with malware, there are no toolbars installed, nor home pages hijacked or browsers changed. There is one slight annoyance, but that only occurs if a community member isn't paying attention; i.e. when the final window pops up after installing a giveaway, called 'the Software Informer' installation window. Some community members have complained that they were given no choice in its installation. That is not true; when the final window pops up, there are two buttons, one asking if you want Software Informer installed and the button to close the giveaway window down. Some community members have clicked on the wrong button, probably because they weren't paying attention. Thankfully Software Informer is a genuine application, that can easily be uninstalled by the usual means. It's actually a useful piece of software, especially if you have a lot of applications running on your computer. Basically the program will list the programs that need updating, or programs that have available updates. They wont be automatically installed (thus cancelling many giveaway registrations); you have to click on individual buttons to update each program/application. :D

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Games, Games, and yet more Games:




There's a game awards sale on at the moment following the Video Game awards ceremony in L.A. (ends 10am PST), with discounts on many of the nominated titles (between 20% to 50% off). The weekend deals include 30% off Besiege which is in early access, (a physics based building game in which you construct medieval siege engines and lay waste to immense fortresses and peaceful hamlets), and 80% off Bound by Flame., (You are a mercenary possessed by a flame demon in a desperate world ravaged by seven Ice Lords. In this RPG where every choice counts, you will have to choose between unleashing the powers of the beast within and rejecting its demonic influence). Plus there are approaching 200 other games on sale, including the weekly round up of deals. 50% off Conter-Strike: Global Offensive, 50% off The witcher 3: Wild Hunt, 60% off The Elder Scrolls Online (Highly Recommended)50% off Life is Strange, 50% off Pillars of Eternity, 50% off Tales from the Borderlands, 67% off Strider, 60% off Dreamfall Chapters, 50% off Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare Gold, 90% off Deponia, 80% off Dark Shadows: Army of Evil, 66% off Rescue Team, 75% off Cuppa Innata, 75% off Battleplan: American Civil War.

All of the following games are less than a pound (approx $1.50 dollar or less): 86% off Terra Incognita - Chapter One (£0.11/ 16 cents), 85% off Eaten alive (£0.12/17 cents), 76% off Star Saviours (£0.19/29 Cents), 76% off Bad Rats: The Rats Revenge (£0.19), 76% off Revolution Ace (£0.19), 82% off Forsaken Uprising (£0.35), 75% off Goo Cublets (£0.39), 51% off The Juicer (£0.39), 41% off Dinosaur Hunt: Africa Contract (£0.29), 75% off Goo Cublets 2 (£0.39), 51% off Star Chronicles: Delta Quadrant (£0.39), 41% off Invasion: Brain Craving (£0.47), 34% off Reveal the Deep (£0.52), 60% off Spheroid £0.63, 80% off Radium (£0.79), 50% off Galactic Hitman (£0.79), 66% off Season Match 3, (£0.94), 75% off War in a Box: Paper Tanks (£0.99), 75% off Mirror Mysteries (£0.99), 50% off Ice Cream Surfer (£0.99), and 75% off Pacidic Liberation force (£0.99)

There are too many great deals to mention here, just check out the specials section for all the games on sale HERE.

There's loads more in the weekly sales and the 48 hours sales to choose from; and almost certainly something for everyone. The next set of weekly sales starts on Monday with usually a few hundred titles added. :)





You'll also find some excellent deals over on the following Game sites.

GreenManGaming They usually have coupons to the value of 23% and sometimes more off pre ordered games. I've just pre ordered Just Cause 3 XL and XCOM 2 using a voucher and saved £22 on the price paid in the Steam store
Gamersgate Summer Sale
GOG (DRM free games)
Gamestop
GameFly (soon to be sold off)

I've removed the Desura link because the owners are bankrupt and there has been no activity on the site in months. The servers are still live (at least until Bad JoJo's subscription to the servers has ended, Bad JoJo are the owners of Desura and Indie Royale, or were until filing for bankruptcy). If you own any games via Desura I advise downloading all of the drm free games you have on that platform and on the Indie Royale site before the sites are taken down.




Free Game Sites:

Toomky Games
MyPlayCity (over a 1000 games to choose from)
Gametop
FreeGamePick



To be honest there are too many game deals around too list them all. Just visit the sites I recommend above and I'm sure you'll find something that suits you for a very decent price. If like me you prefer Steamworks games, many of the above sites also sell steamwork games.

If that's not enough, check out the Game Discussion forums HERE for details of other games either free or on deals such as the Indie Game bundles (there's over 20 of them - If you purchased all of them you'd be paying around $80 for around a thousand dollars worth of games); or check out the four day sales at IndieGameStand. you'll find the indie bundles thread HERE. The thread is outdated, but all of the links will still take you to the latest bundles.






The latest IndieGameStand game is Orbital Gear a sidescroller shooter where you utilize the gravitation of celestial objects to give your mech momentum through space. Arm your Mech with two of twelve different weapons and destroy your enemies. Orbital Gear features classic multiplayer gameplay with new mechanics and 3D graphics.

Orbital Gear has classic deathmatch as the basis for multiplayer pandemonium but it also have a special game mode called Orbital Warfare, a mode where you battle the opposing team with the goal to destroy the opponents base. Victory is ensured either with your mechs weapons or by charging your doomsday weapon with energy cores, collected from fallen enemies.

You can get the game for $1; pay over the average to get a second version for free to give to a friend or family member . (The price at the time of writing was $2.08. It rarely goes above $2 unless the bonus content includes a second or third game).
The deal ends Tuesday 8th Nov 2015 5am (GMT)



The latest DIG game is Egyptian Senet a board game from predynastic and ancient Egypt, it is the earliest known record of a backgammon , checkers and chess like games.

The oldest hieroglyph representing a Senet game dates to around 3500 BC.The full name of the game in Egyptian was meaning "The game of passing".

Games have been around for thousands of years, but none are older than the ancient game of Senet, invented by the Egyptians roughly 3500 or 5000 years ago. It is believed that this two-player board game originated as a popular form of recreation with both royalty and peasantry. But by the mid-13th century BC, Senet had evolved into a more religious ritual. Some depictions from this time period forward show the game being played not by two people, but rather as a deceased player competing against an invisible adversary, interpreted by some to symbolize the deceased players own soul.

The board has become a metaphor for the afterlife with pawns moving across the board just as a soul moves through layers of the netherworld after death. Reaching the final space and leaving the board is the goal of the game, just as reaching Horus and leaving the netherworld was the goal for the Egyptians after their death for attaining rebirth with the gods Isis & Osiris, Sekhmet & Bastet holding the Egyptian Ankh or the papyrus scepter.

The game board consists of 30 squares, arranged in 3 horizontal rows of 10. Pawns move from left to right through row 1, then drop down and move from right to left through row 2. Dropping down again, pawns move from left to right along row 3 and finally, off the board. The game uses the rules developed by Timothy Kendall in his 1978 work, Passing Through the Netherworld :The Meaning and Play of Senet, an Ancient Egyptian Funerary Game.

The game includes five special squares, governed by their own rules, each containing a hieroglyphic. Square 15 is the House of Rebirth; square 26 is the House of Beauty; square 27 is the House of Water: square 28 is the House of the Three Truths; square 29 is the House of Two Truths; and square 30, the last, is the House of Horus, the Egyptian falcon-god and lord of the sky.

Egyptian Senet is a challenging game that combines luck and strategy, features authentic photos of ancient Egyptian temples, plus artistically crafted graphics and animation of an ancient stone game board and pieces, set in an echoing, tomb-like chamber. Ritualistic music plus sound effects of stone pieces moving recreate the atmosphere of predynastic Egypt.The App's Icon shows the Egyptian Queen Nefertari playing Senet in her tomb, she was the great wife of the pharaoh Ramesses II (Ramses). Also many Egyptian Queens have a similar photos playing Senet such as Nefertiti the the great royal wife of Akhenaten,and the Queen Hatshepsut the wife of Thutmose II.

Supported Languages: (English, Arabic, French, Spanish, German, Italian, Dutch, Russian, Japanese, Korean, Chinese, Portuguese-Brazil)


Pay £0.99 for the game or you can get two keys if you pay more than the average of $1.00 (at the time of writing ). One Steam key to share with a friend or family member perhaps? You'll find that deal HERE. They also have five bundles of several games that'll cost you less than $1.50 each HERE (DIG Bundles 47, 48 & 49, reBundle 9 and Greenlight 3). You get Steam keys for all of these games except the Greenlight bundle, however, if a game is Greenlit, you will get a Steam key.
The single game deal ends just after Midnight Monday 7th December 2015 and will be replaced with a new game.

Most of the bundles available retail for around $5 give or take a few dollars (apart from the Daily Indie bundles that only cost $1.49 for six games), but you can pay as little as a dollar for some. There are some excellent bundles out at the moment. I highly recommend the first four sites as they regularly change their bundles, at least weekly. Bundle Stars is the most prolific, usually with at least 10 bundles, but sometimes a lot more. some bundles stay for months, others for only a few days. I also recommend buying the Greenlight bundles as you will get quite a few being greenlit and save a large amount of money on newly released games. I reckon at least 75% of the games from those bundles have been Greenlit since I purchased my first Greenlight bundle. (I've bought at least 50 bundles with only Greenlight games and they have never cost more than $3 to $4 per bundle, with savings up to 90%. The flying bundle is the only one that will inform you when a game has been Greenlit and will send you your Steam keys, the rest you have to check your accounts page to see if they have added Steam keys. sometimes it may take several weeks after the game has been released before you get your keys, but generally its either the same day or a few days at the most.





Bundle Stars (26 bundles)
Groupees (3 bundles)
Indie Gala (5 bundles)
Humble bundle (2 Bundles)
Indie Royale (this bundle is no longer live)
Bundle Bandits (0 bundles)
Blink Bundle (0 bundles)
Play Injector (0 bundle)
Get Loaded (0 bundles)
Games Rage (0 bundles)
Flying bundle (1 bundles)

FREE GAME:

The free game from Origin has just changed from Command & Conquers: Red Alert 2 to Jade Empire: Special Edition (Highly Recommended).

Step into the role of an aspiring martial-arts master and follow the path of the open palm or the closed fist. In this multi-award-winning action-RPG, your choices and actions will determine the fate of the entire Jade Empire. Will you prevent the destruction of this beautiful land, or will you crush it beneath your heel? Are you a warrior who uses his strength and fighting mastery to bring peace, or will you instead use your power to bring pain and ruin?
The choice is yours.

Game Features:


The Original Award Winning Jade Empire
An incredible, engaging story that makes you the noble hero or the treacherous villain!
A wealth of fascinating characters to interact with.
Beautiful, mysterious lands to explore, discover, and save...or conquer.
A rich blend of role-playing and exciting real-time combat.
New monsters and enemies.
New fighting styles.
Customizable, intuitive controls including support for game-pads and keyboard/mouse.
Increased graphics resolutions and new visual effects.
Improved combat AI and difficulty levels.
New world map interface.

Check it out HERE.


You do need a free Origin account and install the Origin client to get these free games. Once you've installed the Origin client and signed into your account select 'On the house' from the 'Free Games' drop down menu. Then select download now. The game will then be registered to your Origin account permanently.

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A Request for help:

Developers rely on good feedback to improve their games. If you download this game please take some time once you’ve played it a while to leave some constructive feedback either positive or negative. The more constructive feedback we get, the more likely developers are going to give more games away. The giveaway site already has a very good standing with the search engines. Developers want their products out there on the WWW, this site has the potential to do that. The game giveaway project gives away on average between 9 to 17 thousand downloads for each game depending upon what genre and how obscure the game is. That’s a lot of homes these games are being downloaded into and a lot of 'potential' cash that’s being lost by the developers. If we get better games because of better feedback, the community are likely to continue to benefit from the generosity of the developers. Satisfied community members are then more likely to visit the home sites of those developers and purchase games that they may not have bothered with before they discovered the developer via the game giveaway site, thus giving the developers more incentives to give away even more decent games.

Please leave some feedback once you’ve checked the game out. It can be positive or negative, but please explain what your reasons were for the feedback you post. You could also leave suggestions for improving the game, for example, this game could do with more block types for the levels editor, add more power-ups, describing the ones you think would be suitable, add some mini games (which seem all the rage in some arcade games now) or enable the user to be able to change the in game music easily.

Thank you in advance to all those who take the time to post a constructive comment, and a big thank you to Playrix Entertainment for sharing and to the game giveaway team for getting these games.

Regards

Whiterabbit aka Stephen