i'll take that as a green light. ;-) still enjoying the game. at first i thought i would like to be able to put spin on the ball by clicking while moving the paddle, but after playing for a few days, i'm ok with directing the ball just with where it hits the paddle. i appreciate the way the ball interacts with different materials, like the satisfying crunch of gradually breaking down stone or the resonating echo of bouncing off metal. the ghosts add a unique challenge, too. a small recommendation: it's hard to click on the links in the menus. you have to click directly on a letter in the middle of a word. if you click on a gap between letters or on the first or last letters, it doesn't work. it would be nice for the entire area of a menu option to be clickable. thanks again for offering this!


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

Actually meant to say more but I lost connection to the giveaway admin server then promptly forgot about it. Posting after the event is always useful. Please do continue. Thank you.

a little late getting to play this, so i know input may not be useful. when i installed the game in october, i got the black screen and an error message about software vertex processing. i checked everything -- video drivers, directx, different resolutions -- to try to get the game to run and gave up. today i revisited the problem and noticed that the setup files were installed alongside the program, so the Egyptoid2 directory included the correct files (Egyptoid2.exe, data, LogFile.txt) as well as the setup files (setup.exe, readme.txt). when i deleted the setup files, the program launched fine. at 1024x768, there were two cursors, but at 800x600, everything is perfect. smooth, responsive play with nice power-ups. i love a good brickles game! thanks for offering this. if it's more hassle than not for me to post so long after the fact, just let me know and i'll keep my thoughts to myself :)

(system info: winxp home sp3 on an acer d250, 2gb ram, 1.6ghz, 1024x600 resolution, a1ctl 1.0)


...........................Moderator Comment......................


Thank you for your feedback tinyearl

i have played this a long time ago and really liked it. my son, who is 10 yrs. old, likes the graphics when a bunch of them explode at once. haha!

I like it! I don't usually get into this sort of game, but the Easy mode is just about right for me (don't know if it's age of mouse, or Age of Lilah!). I actually got to Level 8 once, so it'll keep me occupied for a while. I know that when others are complaining that a game is too easy, it's probably one I need to check out! The powerups are fun, even tho I haven't figured them all out yet. And I like the 3D/graphics. Thanks, all.


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

Thank you for your feedback Delilah

Thoroughly enjoyed Egyptoid when it was offered. Missed Egyptoid2 the first time, so I'm glad I caught it this time. Your site has been a godsend for me while I am deployed with the Army!!!

Nice little game. Easy enough for me to play at the highest difficulty level which is unusual as I don't play this type of game often. This version was a good time killer.

Good one on Win 7 x64. Full screen. Forgiving on Easy tho game bar
still has that sort of lag sometimes or overshoots the move. But extra lives easy to come by. Black spooks are neat ball redirecting trick acting the way holes do. In here, out there.
Just a nicely designed & colorful baller. For that 9.5/10.

Thank you ggotd! Downloaded, installed and plays great on my windows 7. This is a wonderful game! Is there any chance of you getting "Lovely Puzzles" again? Thank you for all the great games you give us.

This game is boring, and after a score of about 3228 (on easy) the game was finished, all levels (all 10 of them) completed.

Seems like a bit of a waste.

i donwnloaded this on my old lap top played it for an hour or so worked great tried to download on my mini computer, first it said the time for this download had expired, (it was 5 pm) uninstalled it, reinstalled it then I got all sorts or errors about bad sound card, read what # 19 suggested about the files in the drop box but don't know how to do that. so went back to the computer that it worked on earlier and started it and got the bad sound card info, so now i doesn't work on either machine. I love this game, was very sad it doesn't work for me


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

Read my previous comment on your first comment.

Did anyone who had the problem manage to solve the cursor disappearing and the freezing on the 'Notes on the Old Papyrus' screen?

I would really love to get this game working if at all possible.


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


Have you tried downloading the freebie from Gametop (Egyptoball)? it may work. (It's the same game but the name has been change).

Love it and those little ghost-skelton thingys. Nice touch for Halloween. My reflexes are awful so this is my kind of game. But it is pretty high up on offering lives.. I love Hyperballoid for the same reason.....Pretty graphics and can be slow at times.

@Mary #33 What you do is..Hit escape to stop the game. It goes to the menu, click on "Save and Exit". It saves the game...then if you want to go back to the game just hit "Play" again and in the middle it says.."Resume or Continue"(Can't remember..I am old.) And the game will begin where you left off at.

Thanks to Star Ashes and GGOTD for the awesome fun game. And, of course, That Wrascally Wabbit for his review. Thanks for those new/old(or I don't recall you mentioning them before) breakout games.. like Taito arkanoid and it’s sequel The Revenge of Doh. :)


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

Thanks for the feedback Delenn. :)

it is 5 pa central time and it say the giveaway for the day is over, doesn't it go till midnight?


.....................moderator comment...................

Set your cache to refresh everytime you visit the game giveaway. That should fix the problem. In the mean time delete your internet cache then refresh the browser

It says there's four hours 50 mins left. To UK users remember our clocks have gone back an hour. So tomorrows (now todays) game will start at 7am GMT.

I was sorry to read that so many people found the game too easy even on the Difficult setting. I guess I don't play enough of these, but I was wiped out pretty quickly on the Normal setting. I think part of it is that the horizontal movement doesn't feel precise enough -- I've gone past the puck now & then by misjudging the position and it'd be great to have a mouse sensitivity adjustment for the game itself.

I definitely enjoy the game, though! Works well on Win7 Ultimate as you've probably heard from previous posts. Thanks, GGotD & Star Ashes! :)

I like this game. thx.

I love this game! I also love the 3 play options: Easy, Normal and difficult. Due to my really bad reflexes, I play in easy mode! lol

My suggestions to the publisher are:
1). Don't lock the cursor in the game window! I also play in windowed mode and would like to move the game window to the center of my screen instead of having it stuck in the top left corner.

2). Create a "pause" button. (some of us have 6 cats, 2 grandkids, a husband and can't hold our kidneys for very long! ;)

3). Create the ability to quit and save the save the game.

The only way I can get out of the game is by pressing my Esc key. I'm not a keyboard control person. I use my mouse for everything! :D

Big thumbs up and thank you GOTD and Stars Ashes!


..........................Moderator Comment.....................

Thank you for your feed back :)

Great game! Good controls, and enjoyable gameplay. I played a lot of arkanoid style games, and this is one of my favorite ones. Egyption style is the best, I like pyramids and all that things about pharaos.

By the way, another free game for the weekend, Superbike Racers, good but tough bike racing game, I really love it, you can find it here http://www.gamehitzone.com/download-free-games/superbike-racers/

This game is rather nice, and the music and sounds are well done. I did run into a slight bug though, related to the design of one of the levels. In level 7 of Anubis, it's possible to get the ball stuck as it bounces between the two blue portals. After coming out of the one, it bounces into the corner of the room and re-enters, then bounces off the corner between the wall and an unbreakable block, forever repeating this cycle. Here's a screenshot depicting this scenario...
http://i43.tinypic.com/33u4dqw.jpg

There might be other places where this could potentially happen, though this is the only one that I encountered. Perhaps if a very slight randomness were applied to the ball's direction each time it impacts a surface, situations like this could be avoided, as it would be bound to break out of the loop after a number of cycles.

Also, note that I had 79 lives, despite playing on the 'hard' difficulty. That seems a bit excessive, and makes me wonder why there are lives at all, seeing as there's a virtually unlimited supply. Perhaps lives could be a little less common. It might also be interesting if over the course of a round, the ball's speed could slowly increase, with only the 'slow-down' pickups as a means to keep it in check. The speed might also reset when losing a ball. This way, balls would become harder to control the longer they're in play, making it more likely that you'll need some of those extra lives. At hard difficulty, the ball might speed up faster, while at easy it might not speed up at all.

Overall, the gameplay feels pretty solid, aside from the aforementioned easiness. If I had to make another suggestion, it would be to make scored points more obvious as they're acquired, and incorporate some kind of score multiplier system for the rapid destruction of objects. As it is, I don't really care about my score, since it feels somewhat random. If the scoring system were improved, online leaderboards would be another obvious addition.




..........................Moderator Comment.....................

Thank you for your feed back :)

I'm not the biggest arkanoid fan - eyes and fingers getting a bit long in the tooth, if you see what I mean. So the fact that this one may be a little slow actually makes it easier for we oldies to get to grips with!

The graphics are excellent, for a long-time Egyptophile, and the 3D effects very good. Stalking into the next chamber is like flying through the air.

It isn't a game I'd play every day, but there aren't many that I would, to be honest (a quick game of Patience over a cup of tea is my everyday tipple). However it's one that I shall certainly keep, and enjoy playing when I plan for a couple of biccies with my cuppa.

Installed without problem on my laptop with Win 7 Home Premium 64. Thank you very much!

I have been playing this on my XP pro laptop since the last time it was given away. I find it very enjoyable, and challenging. I've only managed to complete all the temples once, but trying to get there again is fun.

I am having problems with this software. I would like to uninstall it and try again from square one. How do I uninstall it even though it is not showing up in my installed programs? Please help, TY.




..........................Moderator Comment.....................

Just delete the installed folder. Most of the game giveaways are free standing and require you to delete them manually if you want to delete them.

To Moderator: Got the game working. I used Ccleaner and rebooted the computer later this morning. I changed to the next higher resolution; the "notes" screen disappeared after a few seconds. I then tried it with the original resolution; it took longer for the "notes" screen to disappear. The game works in both resolutions.

Thanks for another goodie. But I plan to check out the others you posted too. I go through stages where all I want to play are breakout type games.

Downloaded on XP and Win7 and both seem to work fine so far, although I probably won't play as much on the Win7 as it's my laptop and I'm not all that good with a trackpad and these type games.

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

Watch out for the Thanksgiving sales and the christmas sales on Steam. you'll be able to get Ricochet Infinity and Shatter, two of the better breakout games (oh yeah and Reaxxion as well0 for up to 80% off, which makes them really cheap. :) I'd also highly recommend you try Incrediball, maybe the latest Magic Ball game (now called Smash Ball 4), I'd also check out Actionball2 and Hyperballoid 2, bith free from MyPlayCity, though watch out for toolbars on those two. There are so many more thta i personally think are brilliant (Arcamania 2, Breakball 2 Gold, Clash. there's so many more. I'll have to post more recomendations in the Arkanoid thread I posted earlier.

I also tried to install and run Egyptoball, with the same results.

I'm having the same problem with E2 that I had a couple weeks ago with E(1), namely, it installs OK, but when I try to run it, all I get is a black screen. I'm using a Kohjinsha SH11 with Xp Home sp3 in either 800x600 or 1280x600. I can close the program using Alt-F4, which produces a request to send an error report. I've tried every combo of compatibility setting I can think of, but still no go. The 'puter is just over a year old, so of course the drivers are all up to date. Any other suggestions?

Me and my nephew absolutely loved the first Egyptoid so I was delighted to see today's giveaway. The game works, but hangs upon saving for me (either at the end of world 1, or by selecting "save and exit"). Vista 32 bit, and installed as Administrator. Anybody got any ideas?

Works great on my 64-bit Windows 7 computer. Good advice above for those having problems. This game is awesome, some great new features make the game even more exciting.

I tried clearing out my temp files, deleting and reinstalling three times but still can't get the game to run after it's activated on my Win7/64bit system. Drivers are up to date, resolution fine but goes through a bunch of error screens then to a blank one that I couldn't get out of without task manager. Maybe I'll try again later, but probably not since I spent too much time on this already. I've never had a problem like this with any of the GGOTD games. I'm bummed...it seemed like a keeper.

Ok, but much too easy. I hope I don't sound like I'm blowing my own trumpet, 'cos I'm really not, I'm sure I am very average at these Aracnoid games, but even 'difficult' was just tediously easy. The game suffers from way, way too many free lives (as did Egyptiod 1) and carrying bat attributes through to the next level just made it stupidly easy in my opinion and no challenge to play. No challenge = no satisfaction. I actually preferred the first Egyptiod, which was also easy, but not 'stupidly easy'. My opinion is they've spoilt it, except for young children, who would be scared by the ghosts. Could be much better if they just made it harder.

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

Try the free version of arcamania 2 called Arcamania 2 Retro. It's a little harder than the average breakout, though an experienced player should beat it.


http://www.300ad.com/arcamania2_retro.php

It's got some unusual level designs and some wicked power ups. :) There's two commercial versions available called Arcamania and Arcamania 2

@7 If reinstalling gives you the same problem you couuld try to place my copy of the file wich i placed in dropbox for you
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/7318152/MenuSound.ogg
place it in C:\Egyptoid2\data\Sound

thanks ggotd, great game

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

We don't usually allow links to such downloads, but i don't see why this can't be allowed; especially if it fixes the problem. I've checked the file and it's safe.

Installed fine on my win 7 x64 (and on my mac under Fusion with Win 7 x32). On my (regular) windows system the play is jerky and freezes for tenths of a second occasionally. I suspect this is because of all the crap that I have installed on that system. The play is smooth in my virtualized Win 7. It is a typical archanoid type game and makes me want to get the "real" archanoid out and see if I can figure out how to install it from 5.25 floppies :)

One complaint, when it's changed to windowed mode, the window is put in the upper left corner and is not movable.

Another minor complaint, when I lost, it said "Your mission is not carry out ..." I would suggest that they change it to something like "Your mnission failed." unless there is some reason later in the game for this strange wording.

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

You can download the original Taito arkanoid and it's sequel The Revenge of Doh from any abandonware site.

Arkanoid:

http://www.abandonia.com/en/games/265/Arkanoid.html

Arkanoid II: The Revenge of Doh

http://www.abandonia.com/en/games/3228/Arkanoid+II+-+Revenge+of+Doh.html

You'll find more of the early arkanoids such as Turoid,Blockout and Electronoid at the bottom of the first links page.

Win 7-Home premium. My cursor also disappears on the "Notes on the Old Papyrus" screen. Works fine on other games including the original of this game.

"I found that I had to set it on the most difficult setting to make the game even slightly challenging. As it suffers the same as many 3D arkanoids in that the ball does seem to travel incredibly slow."

The game, and all arkanoids for that matter, really need an option to either "Increase the baseline ball speed after each successful level" or "Increase/decrease baseline ball speed based on the number of lives over the default". My preference would be on the second option as the number of lives reflects how easy or difficult the game/level is for you and is thus a more direct feedback.

The problem with the 8,000 level games is that they cease to be a challenge for most people after level 15 and game play turns into game tedium. Other game genres counter by introducing "boss levels" or increasing the difficulty of the opponents but very few arkanoids even make the attempt. Since the difficulty in arkanoids is really the ball speed and all arkanoids have speed-up/slow-down "power-ups", which indicates that the programs already monitors the speed of the ball, then I've always been puzzled why the programs don't utilize a "macro environment" variable to keep the game challenging.

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

Thanks for your feed back Chris.

Hey could I install this on my flash drive?


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

Try it and see :)

I'm a noob so please let me know whats "Software Informer" all about? I don't want any spyware on my system? Thanks


......................Moderator Comment.....................

You can check it out via the following link:

http://software.informer.com/


Basically it scans your computer and then informs you of updates to programs you have installed. I think it also tells you what drivers need updating 9though not sure about that though as I deleted the program after running it for a while.

Nice to be able to get this one. Looks like they have added the ability to save your game which is a plus. Thanks for the game!

I was thrilled to see this one today - we got the first Egyptoid from you and for some reason, never got the 2nd one when you offered it previously. On Windows XP, it unzipped easily, installed quickly and plays very well....and you gotta love a game that exits quickly when you tell it to and doesn't hang up your system closing. Playability is definitely a 10, I agree with Mr. Moderator on Ricochet Infinity being awesome, but this game is fantastic also....I really love this one. Thanks so much you guys - and know that you are much appreciated for what you do!!

Thank you, Thank you!! I downloaded the first one a while ago and already you are giving away the second one!! Thanks so much!!

Very nice playability - but DO NOT play with a kitten close by - mine tried to help by destroying all the bad guys (ghosts) and anything else that moved - I eventually had to lock her out of my office - I hope your users have half as much fun as I have had in the first ten minutes of the game - for this kind of game (and I'm not a pro) very nice graphics (and I too, played Taito) and nearing 60yrs old - reaction time is not as nearly good as before. Keep smiling, and keep up the good work!

Same problem as Joe -post #4 - "Does not work on my 64-bit Windows 7 computer. The mouse disappears after I click on the “Play” button. The mouse works up until that point though."

I also received a message stating that it may not have installed correctly, so after testing it and the mouse disappearing, I reinstalled using recommended settings - same problem.

Drivers are up to date, and screen resolution option on game is matched to my system. When I tried to change the game option, I ended up with a blank screen and had to crash the system to get out.

After downloading and installing I get the error message that: "the sound file is bad DATA/Sound/MenuSound.ogg" and the program will not run. Does anyone have a suggestion for a fix? Thank you, Jeff Bremer

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


Delete the installation and redownload the game, then re-install. hopefully that will work.

You could also try updating your sound drivers and even use a different unpacker on the giveaway zip file. (just suggestions)

Thank you!!!!! This is the BEST game ever, since you gave us the first version earlier I have been missing this one so much. The few places you can buy it wanted $20.00 and to me that is way to much for a game no matter how much I love it. OMG I am soooooooooo happy today!!!

This is an awsome game. I have played many like this and this is in my opinon one of the best but don't take my word for it give it a try it is a lot of fun 10/10 5*****rating good job game makers keep up the good work.


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

If you think this is the best, try one of the ones I suggested above. Ricochet Infinity, is probably the best available, though there are a whole bunch that i could recommend that I think are better than todays game.

check out the breakout thread over in the forums. There's quite a decent list of freeware and commercial games that i've recommended in a thread called 'Arkanoids and Breakouts: A list of decent freeware (and not so free)'



http://www.giveawayoftheday.com/forums/topic/2607/page/3#post-40812

It's not been updated in quite some time, but is still well worth visiting as there have been lots of great breakouts mentioned.

Does not work on my 64-bit Windows 7 computer. The mouse disappears after I click on the "Play" button. The mouse works up until that point though. I use a Microsoft Wireless Laser Mouse 5000.


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



Try using a different screen resolution. It works fine on my Win 7 ultimate 64 bit system (and a Pro system as well). You could also try updating your graphics drivers.

Anyone who votes thumbs down on this is a fool.

INVALID KEY

So, what shall we do now??


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


clear out your internet temp folder and try again

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.

Regards

Whiterabbit aka Stephen

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Problems installing, activating and running today’s gamel>:

If you have difficulty downloading or activating the game you can try again later or do one of the following - for example once downloaded when you click on the dual activation and set up file you may get the message “Failed to connect. Please try again later” Check to see if your internet explorer isn't offline (thanks to MrSnoozles/Mike and GMMan for that fix). If the previous suggestion doesn't work go check out previous comments from the last several weeks and look for comments from GMMan and Mike. They have also posted their possible fixes for this problem.

Mike suggests that you check to see if Internet Explorer is offline (even if you use firefox). If it is make sure that it's online thn try again. I’ve always tried re-booting my modem and/or router with some success, though Mike has said that doing that does nothing. Still, it’s worth a try if all else fails.

If you are getting the black screen problem right click on the games executable and select properties then click on the compatibility mode and select the disable visual themes. This should fix the problem, if not try disabling the display scaling on higher dpi settings and disabling the desktop composition.

Other fixes include changing your screen resolution, installing the latest direct X (remember that XP uses DX 9 or earlier only, Vista uses DX 10 or before and Win 7 DX11 or before). Also try updating your graphics drivers. The main two chip manufacturers are NVIDIA and ATI both of which offer driver downloads for free. Just go to the respective manufactures home page and you'll find a link to the driver download page. To find out which graphic card or graphics chip your computer uses type in Dxdiag in the search field (Vista or Win 7) or the run command (XP); this opens up the DirectX diagnostics panel. click on the display tab and look to the left panel. You should easily see what graphics card or chip you are using. (This is required information when selecting the correct download from the developers site).

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Installationl>:

The game downloads as a 13.2MB zip file that unpacks to a read me that contains the terms and conditions and a wrapped dual activation and set up module. Just for the newcomers amongst today’s users that means the game will be registered once it’s gone through the set up process, so there’s no registering the game with a activation code.

The game installs to C:\Games\Egyptoid 2\

There’s no shortcut installed to either the Start Menu/Programs list or the desktop, so you’ll need to create your own by opening up the installed games folder and creating one via the games executable. The games icon is an improvement on the original Egyptoid icon.

The game should work on all windows operating systems from XP onwards. (I’ve tested it on XP Pro with SP3 32 bit, Vista Home Premium SP1 64 bit and Win 7 Pro and Ultimate 64 bit). If you miss todays giveaway you can get it 24/7 from gametop though it's known as egyptoball. See end of the review for a download link.

Introductionl>:

Egyptoid 2 received a positive 76% of votes from 292 total votes back in December 2007 when it was first given away. There were 55 comments which you can read http://game.giveawayoftheday.com/egyptoid-2/ .
It was then given away again back in May 2008 where it received a positive vote of 80% out of 548 votes, with 86 comments which you can read http://game.giveawayoftheday.com/egy-2-ptoid/

You investigate 7 deserted temples, find secret treasures, fight ghosts and escape from the evil magician traps. But you are lucky – you have an ancient army, called Egyptoid. Blending it together with the magicians symbols you'll achieve great magic power that none can resist!

http://www.starsashes.com/egyptoid_2.html

The Gamel>:

You are a treasure seeker. A piece of ancient papyrus showed you the way to a lost temple that contained tombs of untold wealth and an ancient magical weapon called the Egyptoid. The Egyptoid will show you the way to the secret treasure and help you gather it. Scattered around the temples are forgotten magical elements that when combined with the Egyptoid activate ancient spells. Only when you’ve collected all of Anubis’s keys will you be able to enter the secret chamber to gather the treasures of the Pharaohs.

Reference Taken and then edited from the help menu in game

Basically Egyptoid 2 is similar to the original Egyptoid apart from some graphical enhancement’s plus of course a whole new set of levels to destroy. There are 17 bonuses, including the lightning cannon and the mega magic cannon, these two are the only additions from the first version of the game. Other bonuses that are also found in the original, but are slightly different from your normal Arkanoid are the three different levels of ball destruction from high, maximum and absolute. As with the first game there are also seven special symbols to collect. Collecting three of the same will give you magic spells that range from ‘the glance of Horus, Breath of Atum, Lightning of Hathor, Fire of Ra, Curse of Atem, Fireball of Oseris, and the ‘Pitch of Darkness’ that when added to the bonuses makes a total of 24 bonuses. The spells will be expended as soon as you collect the three symbols. So ensure your bat is in a suitable position to take advantage of the spells power. That is if your bat just so happens to be under an area of very few bricks you will not make the most of the spell. The spells are basically the same as those you got in the original Egyptoid apart from that the developers have changed the names around a little, for example the Fire of Ra becomes the Flame of Ra (and there’s a Fire of Aten,) and the Pitch of Darkness was known as Outer Darkness. Also the graphics are better. To boost your score there are lots of gems to collect.

With respect to playability, I found that I had to set it on the most difficult setting to make the game even slightly challenging. As it suffers the same as many 3D arkanoids in that the ball does seem to travel incredibly slow. This would be an ideal game for those who are new to this genre as well as younger children. If you like 3D arkanoids and want more of a challenge I would suggest checking out the games I’ve suggested in the section at the end of this review. The first one has been amongst my favourites for a few years and the second one is much better than its predecessor Action Ball Deluxe and is now free from MyPlayCity 24/7 (Actionball 2). Apart from Actionball 2 you’ll also find several more excellent arkanoids over at MyPlayCity including hyperblloid 2 (watch out for toolbars being installed) which has a levels editor. Alawar did have a download link for community based levels, but I’m not sure if that exists any longer.


Videol>:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ALWGdzKBaE

Conclusionl>:

In my opinion this version is better than the first one in the series, but if you were not in the enviable position of getting it free today and had the choice of buying either one, I’d definitely buy Egyptoid 2.

With respect to playability, I found that I had to set it on the most difficult setting to make the game even slightly challenging (though I have been playing these games for more 30 years (starting with the very first one by Taito); because it suffers the same as many 3D arkanoids in that the ball does seem to travel incredibly slow. This would be an ideal game for those who are new to this genre as well as younger children. If you like 3D arkanoids and want more of a challenge I would suggest the following for starters. The first one has been amongst my favourites for many years.







Suggestionsl>


There are hundreds of breakouts available on the net. The few suggestions I've listed below only scratch the surface but are amongst my favorites. (I have over 200 breakouts in my games library). There have been few new releases over the last three or four years apart from Shatter, Actionball 2, Hyperballoid 2 and Magicball 4 (all the Magicball series had a name change a couple of years ago to smashball for some unknown reason)

As 3D arkanoids go Egyptoid is reasonably challenging when you compare it to the likes of the Magic Ball series which are very easy by comparison. I've listed a few below that you can purchase, though Actionball 2 and Hyperballoid 2 can now also be downloaded for free from MyPlayCity, but despite unchecking the toolbar and home page hijack check boxes I still got a MyPlaycity toolbar installed when I recently installed the MyPlayCity version of hyperballoid 2 (I think I may have given away my activation code for this game some time ago) so I would urge you to support the developers of these games by purchasing them if you can afford to.

Incrediball: The Seven Sapphires:

http://www.bigfishgames.com/download-games/861/incrediballthe7sap/index.html

Action Ball 2:

http://www.alawar.com/games/action-ball-2/

Nuclear Ball 1 & 2:

1)

http://www.ursegames.com/games/nuclear-ball/nuclear-ball.php

2)

http://www.ursegames.com/games/nuclear-ball-2/nuclear-ball-2.php


Gem Ball:

http://www.ursegames.com/gem-ball.php

There are of course many more arkanoids, two of the best include Ricochet Infinity and Acky’s XP Breakout as well as more recent releases such as Shatter. You won’t find these free unless you go to ‘illegal’ peer to peer sites but you will find lots of arkanoid/breakouts over at MyPlayCity and other free games sites like Gametop and FreeGamePick. Do watch out for the toolbars and home page hijacks when using these sites though. A couple of the ones I list above such as Nuclear Ball and Gem ball may be amongst the freebies though they have had name changes (Nuclear Ball changes to A Ball). Caiman games also has loads of freeware breakouts, but at the moment their download section is offline while they transfer everything to a new site. The following has been tagged onto this review from a previous breakout giveaway. you'll find some repeat statements which I've not got the time to remove, so please forgive me for the duplicate postings. ;-)


Similar Games available for freel>

You'll find loads of Arkanoid/breakouts HERE, HERE (Giveaway forums) and HERE (Caimans – almost 200 2D and 3D breakout games, though the download section is deactivated at the moment for reasons I've already mentioned)


You can also download a previous gamegiveaway Sawnoid every day for free over at Gametop as well as several others such as A-Ball (which is also known as Nuclear Ball), Geometry Ball, Scaraball, Cosmoball plus others, though you will get your browser opening every time you shut the game down. Thankfully this is one of the games they have had for quite some time so there’s no tool bar or home page tick boxes to bother with, but just in case they've changed it since I last checked make sure when you are installing the game that you watch each step of the installation wizard.



You’ll also find 13 breakout titles over at MyPlayCity HERE, that now include several of Alawars breakouts such as all of the Strike Ball games (Strikeball, Strikeball 2 and Strikeball 3), as well as one of my early favorites called Actionball Deluxe and it's sequel Actionball 2; oh yeah and not forgetting the second Hyperballoid game, which in my opinion was a big improvement on the original despite the first one having a massive number of levels (over a thousand) with gorgeous graphics called (not surprisingly) Hyperballoid Complete Edition (or if you purchase it from Big fish Hyperballoid Gold edition) - the down side w.r.t. the original, was that even with the speed up power-ups, the ball used to go too slow for me, (however; GMMan did create a speed-up mod for me); there's also previous giveaways (though not Alawar games) such as Egypt Ball and Egyptian Ball as well as several others that you can download for free. I recommend all of the Alawar titles especially Hyperballoid 2 (Which has an editor for making more levels - there may be custom made levels to download via Alawars site, but I've not checked in some time) and the original Actionball Deluxe (the sequel also has upgradeable power-ups) and Strikeball 3 (The third in the series is similar to the earlier Magic Ball games {Magic Ball 2} but with better graphics and power ups that are also upgradeable, plus the game is slightly more challenging than any of the Magic Ball series (which for some reason Alawar decided to change the name from Magic Ball to Smashball Frenzy)). Unfortunately the best (IMO) arkanoid/breakouts such as Ricochet infinity, Acky's XP Breakout, Reaxxion and Shatter are not available for free via any of the free game sites apart from illegal ones. You can purchase Shatter from Steam for £6.99, though during the big sales over the summer and Christmas period and maybe thanksgiving you can get up to 75% off. Both Ricochet infinity and Acky's XP Breakout have editors and for the former thousands (literally well over 60 000) of downloadable levels for free. There are also free level packs for Acky's XP Breakout, but not to the same extent as Ricochet. you download the levels for ricochet directly from the game and can upload your own creation from the game as well (which probably explains why there are so many - all the levels are graded for game play, graphics etc and get a score of A to D with +'s and -'s (for example B+; though the best of the best are starred as well)

ps. You'll find the Egyptoid 2 for free over at Gametop 24/7, though it's had a name change to Egyptoball:

http://www.gametop.com/download-free-games/egyptoball/



















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