Giveaway of the Day - King’s Smith

King’s Smith

Installation:

The downloaded zip file is 59.7Mb, so if you are on dial-up it may take a while to download. Once unpacked you will find a read me with the conditions of use and a dual activation/set up module. Installation is simple – click on the set up/activation file, and then select the path you wish your game to be installed to. The default path is C:\Program files\KingsSmith.

The installed file is 128Mb in size and shortcuts are installed to both the desktop and start menu programs list. There is no shortcut to the uninstaller, but you can find one within the installed game. You can create a shortcut to that if you wish. You’ll find details of how to create a shortcut in the start menu/programs list in the games discussion forums:

http://www.giveawayoftheday.com/forums/topic/2594

Introduction:

Can you fulfil your dreams? Will you become a King’s personal smith? There can be only one! Prepare for a challenge!

King’s Smith is a new time management game from Running Pillow, the developer who gave us Galatron a few weeks ago.

Who says a woman can’t be a blacksmith? Well, pretty much everyone, except your grandfather. He’s a master smith, and is willing to take you on as an apprentice in King’s Smith. As a young apprentice blacksmith of your grandpa you are slowly learning how to become a master blacksmith. Through your journey around a kingdom, meeting new challenges, you will encounter many strangers and learn many new abilities that will help you to upgrade your armours and equipment, which you can then sell to make a nice profit. Make a name for yourself, and you may just find yourself working as the King’s Smith!

The Game

King’s Smith is a time management game which is simple and straightforward to pick up the game play easily. When you first start an account (you can set up multiple accounts, so this game is ideal for the whole family) there is a simple tutorial that walks you through the stages of the game. I’ve taken screenshots of all of the early stages which you can see via the link below under images. The graphics are cartoon like and well done though not as crisp as games like farm frenzy. The game is fully mouse controlled and will save your progress up to the last completed game. It will not save progress part way through a level. The game is timed, but only for the purposes of awarding you either gold silver or Bronze stars. The game will always at least award you a bronze star, even if you take more than the allocated time to complete each level.

As the blacksmith you must buy rusty, old equipment from the vendor in the wagon. He will offer many types of wares at different prices. You will be able to tell whether the price is good or not by the thumbs up and down. If you turn down the price another wagon soon appears. Occasionally there is also a blackmarketeer, who will sell you improved goods for a good price. After you buy from the vendor, you place your rusty part on a stone platform where it will create revenue for you, or alternatively put it in your workplace. (the building with the outdoor fireplace), a worker will leave the home and work on your piece. Once completed, you hang your ware either back on the stone platform or sell it at the bottom right. People will come look at your goods and offer money for them. You can haggle with the price. To help you a thumbs up or down will appear telling you whether the price is good or not. Do remeber to move any equipment that you placed in the smithy once it has been repaired otherwise you’ll be losing valuable income. As you progress new selling platforms become available and new types of buildings for making gold or jewel encrusted wares available. The more you process a an item you’ve purchased, the more profit you will make. try to get the most expensive items on the stone platforms as they will create more revenue for you at regular intervals. there is an indicator that will let you know when revenue is going to be credited to you.

Like other sim games, the stats are all on the bottom and you will get audio confirmation for many actions taking place. As the play progresses, more items will be offered for you to repair or improve then sell on or earn cash by keeping the equipment. In addition, you will need to buy raw materials that are on sale often, and build more buildings to expand your business. Blueprints for new buildings will become available throughout the game. Occasionally the raw materials can be purchased at sale prices. this is the best time to purchase your raw materials. Later in the game you can purchase power ups that improve the amount of discount you can get. It will get quite busy as you progress, but upgrades from the shop will help ease the work load occasionally. Once you meet your goals, which are listed to the top left of the screen, you go on to the next level. The end of level stats board will count up all your resources. these are allocated points which are then converted to gold coins, which can then be used to purchase upgrades or new items to buy. You can also upgrade the vendors wagons so that they sell more items to you each visit. There are more options to choose from like gold swords, more buildings to erect and employees to hire. There are five areas to complete each with several stages, so there’s lots to accomplish in this cute looking time management game

Images:

You can see general in game screenshots via the following link:

http://s571.photobucket.com/albums/ss160/Whiterabbit04/Kings%20Smith/?albumview=slideshow

Tutorial images and level progress to level 6 {over 100 images}:

http://s571.photobucket.com/albums/ss160/Whiterabbit04/Kings%20Smith/Kings%20Smith%20tutorial%20screens/?albumview=slideshow

Features:

• Manage your own smithy

• Buy new patterns, upgrades and bonuses

• Travel through exotic countries

• Repair unique pieces of equipment

• Become a master blacksmith

Plus much more…

PC System requirements

• Windows XP/Vista or Mac OS Leopard
• 900 MHz processor
• 3D graphic accelerator
• 512 MB RAM

Conclusion:

Don’t let the quaint graphic fool you into thinking this is a simple game. Initially the game starts off quite slow. slow enough for me to enjoy playing this game. (I rarely enjoy time management games as I like to play at my own pace). I liked the ability to be able to haggle with your vendors and clients for a better price. The game reminded me a lot of the Farm Frenzy series which is about the only time management game other than this one that I really like.

The game was easy to learn and play thanks to the straightforward tutorial that is devoted to the first level, though it continues whenever something new is introduced into the game. I managed to capture all the screens up to level six. I wasn’t able to play anymore with the demo i used to write up this review. The game started off a little slow initially, but soon speeds up. I found the game play was quite addictive. The cartoon characters and background were entertaining and the music appropriate, though as mentioned below, you can change this to whatever you fancy if you wish. The easy going speed and the graphics are ideal for the family game and I think you’ll have lots of fun playing together with this game. It’s worth a good 7.5 out of 10 or even maybe an 8 for family orientated game play and a riveting game plan. (I rarely give games 8 or more, so this being from a genre I don’t usually play would indicate that I think it’s a worthwhile game to keep in your games library. I’ll definitely be keeping this one. Thank you to Running Pillow and the game giveaway team for giving and finding this little gem of a game.

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Additional Information

Music:

If you don’t like the in game music, or feel like a change (changing the music to some of your favourite music can help towards the enjoyment of playing the game) you can easily change the music by swapping the music files for ones of your own. You will need to rename your music files to the ones found within the installed games music folder because they are in the .ogg format. This is easily done by using one of the many freely available converters. There are several audio converters to be found in the freeware library. I would back up the original music just in case you run into problems; but, if you forget you can always install the demo and use the music from that if required.

You’ll find the music files by following the path:

C:\Program files\KingsSmith\resources\audio\music

You can find free audio converters via the following link:

http://www.giveawayoftheday.com/freeware/cat/Audio_Video_Audio_Encoders_Converters/

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Other similar games:

You can download several time management games from Gametop called Lovely Kitchen, Apple Pie, Wendy’s Wellness, Travel Agency and Cake Queen.

You can download any one of the above free games via the following link:

http://www.gametop.com/category/time-management.html

You can get loads of time management games from MyPlayCity now. Just look at the titles available totally for free:

Cake Shop 2, Fashion Craze, Nanny Mania, Beach Party Craze, Magic Farm: Ultimate flower, Cake Shop, Wendy’s Wellness, Jenny’s fish Shop, Lovely kitchen and Farm Frenzy 1 & 2. All of the MyPlayCity games are available from the following link:

http://www.myplaycity.com/top_games/

Please do remember that the games from both sites will open up your browser when you close the game down, but it is totally innocuous. You may also find that during the installation process check boxes will appear indicating tool bars and even your home page may be changed, but you can stop this by un-checking the box. Gametop are increasingly resorting to pop ups as well, so ensure your pop up blocker is primed. All that said, the games from both sites are safe and of a good quality, so if you’re looking for more time management games for free, they are the places to visit.

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Download, install and active it normally. But when I click King’s Smith icon to begin playing, I was kicked out of the game. I’m using Windows 7, Java v6 u21, have you any suggest please?

………………………………….Moderator comment……………………………….

I haven’t got around to installing win 7 yet so can’t say whether it’s the new Os that is the problem. hopefully others using the latest windows platform will be able to confirm or negate whether this is a win 7 problem. in the meantime you could try updating graphics drivers and your direct X drivers. 9Not sure whether the game is compatible with DX 11 though. try installing DX 9.oc as well. though if it wants to overwrite X 11 i’d leave it. Also see if you can play in windowed mode.