Giveaway of the Day - Fishdom H2O: Hidden Odyssey Premium

Thanks for the game – have other versions of Fisdom and enjoy greatly!! Got dial up – so in a couple hours will be a happy dude!!!

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 why your reasons for the feedback you post. You could also leave suggestions for improving the game, for example, this game could do with a 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 todays game:

Some users are reporting a problem with running the game. They are getting a black screen issue, though one user said they were able to play the game in windowed mode, but when they switched to full screen the screen would go black. I forgot to mention in my review that this game requires at least 128MB of graphics RAM. If your graphics chip is less than this it may not work and could explain why you are getting a black screen. If you do get this problem you could as a temporary measure try playing the game in windowed mode, but to make the screen as large as possible (as hidden object games are better played in full screen) change your screen resolution to the lowest setting possible. this is usually 800×600 on modern systems, but may go a little larger. I realize that this is a bug bear, but if you want to play the game it only takes a few seconds to change the screen resolution. you can revert back when you are done. Make sure the control panel window is placed centrally on your monitors screen because when you change to lower screen resolutions you sometimes lose the ability to change settings due to the window being too large. One users also reports that you may cure the problem by right clicking on the executable and selecting compatibility, then check ‘Disable display scaling’ This hasn’t been confirmed yet. If none of the above work I have also posted other possible fixes including doing a clean boot to see if there are any conflicts between the game and programs that are automatically run when you boot up windows, that said one user tried this and said it didn’t make a difference; however your computer may be loading up other programs so it still may work for you. I’ve also as an alternative to a clean boot suggested you try Game Booster as an alternative. Game Booster switches off non essential windows programs plus any others that you specify. This would be an easier option than doing a clean boot. If you do try a clean boot create a restore point first so that you can revert back easily. Please read all the comments below for other suggestions before you try a clean boot, thank you.

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.

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.

I will be posting a FAQ’s in the forums soon that will cover problems when installing game giveaways in the mean-time its easy enough to search through the comments from previous giveaways. I did post GMMans fix over in the forums a few weeks ago so that shouldn’t be too hard to find

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main menu

Installation:

Today’s game giveaway is Fishdom H2O: Hidden Odyssey a hidden objects game based on the Fishdom franchise.

The giveaway downloads to a 82.1MB zip file that unpacks to a read me and dual activation and set up module. To new game giveaway visitors that means just install the game and it should automatically register because the activation module is wrapped in with the set up file. The game installs to

C:\Program Files (x86)\Playrix Entertainment\Fishdom H2O – Hidden Odyssey (64bit)

Or

C:\Program Files\Playrix Entertainment\Fishdom H2O – Hidden Odyssey (32bit)

The installed game is 120Mb in size. The game works on win XP, Vista and Win 7 platforms. a shortcut is installed to the desktop (together with a link to Playrix’s home page) as well as a shortcut in the Start/Programs list. You’ll also find a shortcut to uninstall the game via the program list if you wish to delet the game.

Introduction:

This is one of those genres that in my opinion has been done to death over the last three years. The weekly releases of games from this genre was the main reason why I cancelled my Big Fish game membership two years ago, because nearly every new release, which at one point was one a day, seemed to be hidden object games. I don’t dislike them per se, but I did find there wasn’t much in the way of originality apart from a few such as the Dream Chronicles franchise or games like Mishap: An Accidental Haunting and its sequel. The following paragraph was copied from Playrix’s Fishdom H2O: Hidden Odyssey page and introduces the game:

Help Jennifer, a young marine biologist, win the Best Aquarium Award. Dive to the bottom of the sea and find various hidden items in numerous eye-teasing locations. Get cash for them to buy cute sea creatures and beautiful ornaments to create three unique aquariums. Choose from tons of accessories and supplies to make the life of your exotic swimming pets fun and comfortable. Become a genuine aquarist, polish your design skills and win trophies in this dazzling hidden object spin-off of the original Fishdom™ – a game by Playrix where dream aquariums come true!

Reference accessed HERE 16th Sept 2011

The Game:

Unlike most Fishdom games this is not a match three but a hidden object game. It’s a typical hidden object game with a relaxed and timed mode. There’s not much else to say about the game play as we all know what a hidden object game is. In my opinion (after playing through an hour long demo) there is little variation between the hidden object levels; there is some but not much. That said there are a lot of objects to find, so the repetitive nature of the background scenes isn’t too much of a put off. You do have to be careful not to click randomly otherwise a school of fish appears and obscures the game field at which point the fish release clouds of bubbles to further block out the hidden objects. Also there are no set levels; the main objective of the game seems to be earning cash to build one of several aquariums that have to be unlocked (you can see an image of the four aquariums available with this game below).

In-game images showing different environments

Apart from the usual find a list of named items you’ll sometimes get definitions of words like ‘lens to improve eye sight’ which of course would be glasses, or you may be asked to find a certain number of a specific item, then there are ‘Gold Rush’ events that give you 30 seconds to gather up as many gold items as you can and quick rounds where you only get 15 seconds to find at least one object out of three.

As with other Fishdom games ‘Fishdom H2O’ includes an aquarium, which you build up by earning cash which can then be spent on items and fish for your aquarium. The addition of the aquarium of which there are three to complete in my opinion gives the game a little extra something and is an ideal family game (the children will love the aquaria).

Choice of Aquariums

Options

For me the aquarium was the clincher for this game despite its simplicity. It’s not the best, but each of the aquariums are fun to build, with around 30 beauty objects to decorate the aquariums with. That said there was only nine fish to add to your tank. I would have liked to see more fish inluded. There are two cup awards to earn for each aquarium which adds some replayability to the game. There is also a screensaver that is linked to your aquarium progress. You can turn the screensaver on or off via the game or via the control panel. The game starts with a profile screen that allows you to create a profile; you can create more profiles if you wish (ideal for a family orientated game). You are then asked whether you wish to play a relaxed or timed mode, which can later be changed via the options menu (you’ll find a toggle in the form of a tick box), a custom cursor toggle, a windowed toggle as well as a hints toggle which is turned on by default, so unless you uncheck it via the options menu you will be given tips throughout the game. You’ll also find a music and sound effects adjustment slider for changing the volume. When in game you start off with five hints which you can access via the hints button to the bottom right of the playing area. Once these are used up you have to find more via each level that you play, you can only have a maximum of five hints at any one time. They are in the form of seahorses. not every level has one, so be sparing in your use of the hints for when you are really stuck. The game has a save feature that automatically saves the game when you shut down. You can also turn off the hints or change the mode via the options menu, which is accessible from the in game screen.

Cut Scene

Features:

• Underwater hidden object fun

• Over 1000 cool items to find

• Themed aquariums to design

• Fully interactive and customizable environment

• Tons of accessories and decorations

• 20+ amusing sea creatures

In Game Image

Conclusion:

I found the hidden object part of the game too repetitive, but the aquarium redeems the game somewhat. That said, if I just wanted a fish tank sim I’d be better buying a dedicated game like Fish Tycoon or FishCo. Overall Playrix have put together a decent game that for free is a big bonus. There are new HOG games being released almost on a daily basic, many of which have sumptious graphics and mini games interdispered amongst the main game; that said, today’s game giveaway holds it’s own, so despite having lost interest in this type of game I’d give the game play 8 out of 10, though my overall score is 7 out of 10 due to less impressive elements such as the music. The developer should give the user the option to select music from their own Music folder instead of being forced to listen to music that is rather bland. You can change the various music files by going into the installed games folder and opening up the music folder which can be located via the following path:

C:\Program Files (x86)\Playrix Entertainment\Fishdom H2O – Hidden Odyssey\Base\Sound\Music (remove the (x86) for 32 bit computers)

You’ll find several ogg files (for exampe Collector.ogg, deep_diving.ogg, pirates_theme.ogg etc). The replacement music will need to be converted to the .ogg format if you wish to use your own music. you’ll also need to rename the music to replace the files that you wish to be changed. (I’d back up the originals just in case you do something wrong, though if all else fails you could download the demo to a different path and copy over the music from that game as they should be the same)

Scoring:

Game play – 8
Graphics – 8
Audio – 6
Re-playability – 7
Originality – 6

Total = 35 out of 50 or 7 out of 10

More Aquaria

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Similar Games:

You can find 30 hidden Object games for free over at MyPlaycity, for example, Potion Bar (a previous giveaway), Jane Croft: The Baker Street Murder, hide and Secret, Spirit of Wandering, Natalie brooks: Secrets of Treasure house, Mystery of Unicorn Castle, Alices Magical Mahjong (yes this has hidden Object elements), Antique shop, Confectionary, Crossworlds – The flying city plus loads more. You can find them all HERE