Giveaway of the Day - Troll

Troll: (~7Mb)

Preamble:

I’ve not got time to re write my previous comments on this game, nor to write a new review. An appointment to see a thoracic surgeon yesterday has left me totally blitzed. (I had to see him due to a loss of 3 inches to my vertebral height over the thoracic region of my spine (due to breaking my spine in four places, which has impacted on my breathing) so I’ve just cut and pasted the previous comments I’ve made. This game received mixed blessings when its been given away previously; name of the king in the story line behind this game is King Uterus, (obviously a males humor); plus there were other negative comments about the graphics and the use of a cartoon nude that momentarily pops up during game play, plus several instances of mooning (using cartoon characters). Bearing in mind this game is now seven years old I personally think the graphics are good. The style is quirky, but I like that in a game. The actual game play is vaguely breakout, but with a difference from your usual ball and bat game. Instead you use your weapon (an axe)or shield to swat away (or when using the shield to deflect) fireballs that have been fired by dragons flying overhead (usually by belching), plus invading undead and a variety of other creatures including Trolls. You also use your weapon to kill these as they approach. If they make it to the bottom of the screen part of your village is destroyed. The game has elements of Pong and Space invaders as well as breakout. Overall it’s a great game in my opinion. Don’t let the old graphics or the school boy humor put you off this entertaining and somewhat different breakout game. From the levels map you can choose two or three directions to travel ([em]to choose a new level[/em]) after each turn and you can also re-play levels that you’ve already played. The game has loads of re-playability due to the random nature of the enemies, fireballs and power ups that you can pick up.

Introduction

Troll, a quirky break out game with a difference had been given away twice previously. The first time it received a positive 73% of 154 votes. The comments posted were less than complementary initially, but those who actually played and got to grips with the game posted much more positive comments later in the day. Some were offended by the name of the king (King Uterus), that you’ll find if you read the story accessible from the main menu, and others were offended by the isolated occurrences of in game cartoon nudity and mooning by cartoon characters.

Personally I think this is quite an unusual breakout game; unlike most others of the 2D variety; and as with other Rake in Grass games, for example Jets ‘n’ Guns, there’s an element of comedy in some of the art work and animations

You can read all the comments by following the link:

http://game.giveawayoftheday.com/troll/#comments

Oddly the second time this game was given away it got an appalling positive score of only 34% from 537 votes.. You can read all the comments from this second giveaway:

http://game.giveawayoftheday.com/troll-again/#comments

Became a brave troll warrior and save little humans from orcish tyrany in a beautiful fantasy adventure.

The quest will take you through six lands from green plains, across the mysterious swamps and desert, through snowy mountains and dark horror forest to the terrible wasteland, the home of orcs. You will have to defeat many foes and face hideous and powerfull creatures to finally fight the freedom for peacefull people from the Plains.

Reference accessed Nov 27th http://troll.rakeingrass.com/index.php

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The Game:

You can read basic information about the game by clicking on the HTML document called Troll that can be found within the doc folder where the game is installed; just open the file and click on the help link to the top left of the page. This opens up a page with detailed information about the game play as well as the key bindings if you prefer to use the keyboard rather than the mouse to control your Troll.
Key Bindings:

LEFT_ARROW, Z : left

RIGHT_ARROW, X : right

DOWN_ARROW, LEFT_CTRL : weapon strike

UP_ARROW, LEFT_SHIFT: block

RIGHT_CTRL, SPACE : cast spell

You’ll also find details of all the power ups and bonuses that you’ll encounter in the game. These include several score multipliers, bonuses in the form of spells such as the swarm spell that summons a swarm of wasps, which causes your troll to run around manically, thus affecting your control over him. I would recommend you avoid this one because it will cause you to lose quite a lot of life through missed fireballs. There’s loads more such as the Stone skin spell, shrink, block gates, double and triple ball (breaks the fireball into two or three balls thus doing more damage), magic arrow, heavy impact, dispel (cancels out any spells still running), plus lots more. Some become available once you have captured one of several castles, though you must be adjacent to one of the huts, or other places such as Baba Yaga’s hut, or the pyramid. There are two kinds of magic spells in the game; duration spells and cast spells. Duration spells are used immediately and their effects last several seconds. Cast spells can be used anytime during the level by RIGHT_CTRL or SPACE. The last taken cast spell is shown in single slot above the “magic” sign to the right of the playing field. Duration spells are in lower three slots.

To access the game you need to create a profile, and then you are taken to the levels map. The only levels you can play are the ones with crossed swords or those you’ve previously won. When selecting levels you are able to select any level that is adjacent to the level you played, which as already mentioned is denoted by crossed swords overlaid onto a castle. You select your level by clicking on a castle turret. Each castle has a name which can be seen at the bottom of the screen when you hover your mouse over the castle, with names like Crystal Palace, Windy Hill, Skull Keep, Fort Despair and poison valley, you can see that the overall theme is dark. Besides the castles you’ll find several other buildings which include a pyramid, tents and a few others which bestow specific magical abilities (see the help page in the Troll HTML document for more details). You need to be adjacent to one of these buildings to activate the ability. For example the ruins called ‘Monk Stones’ you can invoke the gods of sky to help you with their magic.

Watch out for the funny animations such as the cccp sputnik like ship that wanders slowly across the map screen occasionally, dragons and even old nessy (the Loch Ness monster) and the odd mooner and naked streaker, all of course done in the best possible taste. (legs crossed – British humor – Kenny Everett)
You can see which power ups are running by looking to the right hand pane which shows the power ups caught in four boxes labeled ‘magic. Above these are the life indicators for both the enemy (red) and the troll (green) that are in the form of old bulb thermometers though there is a score at the top of each indicator. The enemy is marked out of 100 and the troll out of 10. Above this is the score, then the word Troll which is initially in bold gold lettering. As you collect letters these change to white. Once you’ve completed the word, you’ll see a figure to the left of the playing arena pop in with a billboard saying ‘Bonus!’, this will give you an access to a secret level (different for each of the six scenario’s). If you fail to collect all letters in one level, you can play the level again to get the remaining ones. You can’t miss the little fellow with the billboard though because he waves at you manically. You have to keep your eye on the fire ball breathing monster above and the monsters attacking your village from below. There’s no let up at all. Thankfully, if you lose the level, you can restart the level without losing any progress apart from the score you made in the level prior to losing it.

The theme remains similar throughout, that is you have to prevent the fireballs from destroying your villages and return the fire balls and kill the monsters attacking you, Each level has it’s own monsters and art work. It’s not as easy as you think, with each castle needing a specific amount of damage done to it by the returning fireballs. Your progress can be hindered or helped by the power ups that fall frequently. The most important (IMO) are the life power ups that help to repair damage done by fireballs.

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Images

As a Slideshow:

http://s109.photobucket.com/albums/n61/Whiterabbit_01/gaotd/Troll/?albumview=slideshow

all on one page:

http://s109.photobucket.com/albums/n61/Whiterabbit_01/gaotd/Troll/?start=all&special_track=album_paginate_top_view_all

You can see more screen captures over at Rake in Grass via the following link:

http://troll.rakeingrass.com/screenshots.php

Video:

Unfortunately the bandwidth has been exceeded so I’ve removed the video which you could see here; however it’s still possible to see the video by following the link below.
I’ve posted a link to my photobucket upload just in case the bandwidth runs out. Just click HERE if the above video no longer shows. In fact if you aren’t in a rush would you click here in preference to watching it via the game giveaway comments section, thank you.

Music:

I think most community members are going to hate the music. Unfortunately, unless you’re a dab hand at editing script (using a text editor that supports hex) you’ll have to put up with it. I personally think it fits in with the medieval theme and don’t mind the music so long as it’ turned down.

Features :

• New concept advancing and expanding good old arkanoid destruction…
• Performed in a cute fairy graphics…
• Accompanied with beautiful music…
• Powered by engine with many visual effects…
• Running in 800×600 in Hi/TrueColor…
• 6 completely differend scenarios…
• Divided into many levels ordered into the adventure campaign…
• Infested with 40 monsters…
• and 5 hideous bosses.

System requirements:

Minimum:

CPU 400 MHz
32 Memory RAM
Good 3D accelerated GFX card (8 MB)
Win 9x
DirectX 8.0

Recommended:

CPU 800 MHz
64 MB RAM
GeForce 2 MX + (32 MB)
Sound card
Win 9x / ME / 2000 / XP
DirectX 8.1+

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Conclusion:

Personally the cartoon nudity that some found unacceptable the first time this was given away, in my opinion is nothing to be worried about. Though if you are a parent who wants to shield their children from anything remotely related to nudity, or words that refer to parts of the female reproductive system, then I would keep this in your passworded accounts. For me it’s well worth keeping. It’s got some original features when comparing it with other breakout clones, and it’s also quite hard to beat. There’s only one difficulty level, and you only get one life, but as already mentioned if you lose you can resume where you left off, so no progress is lost. Well worth 7 out of 10.

You’ll either love or hate this game.

Thank you Rake in Grass and the game giveaway team for another excellent and in this case very unusual game.

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Further information:

The closest I could compare this game to is the Freeware breakout game Wrecker Ball Dream by Glinkie Games, which you can find a link to in the freeware section of this site i.e.:

http://www.giveawayoftheday.com/freeware/2005/03/21/wreckerball-dream/
or via:

http://www.glinkiegames.com/main/

There’s even a troll forum where you can read information about the game, though the last post was nearly 18 months ago.

Troll forums:

http://forum.rakeingrass.com/viewforum.php?f=4&sid=660819f210163b26d7df7aa3ee78ae83

The games home page is:

http://troll.rakeingrass.com

For loads of free arkanoids/breakouts check out the thread in the games discussion forums. You’ll find lots of free ‘full version’ shareware games as well as freeware and browser based games:

http://www.giveawayoftheday.com/forums/topic/2607

Hi Wouter, isn’t that the case with most arcade games. I’ll grant you, the game play is actually quite difficult at first, but once you get used to the keys, and know which bonuses to avoid or pick up, this is quite a challenging game. As for the graphics, I agree to a point, they look a little messy, but this is quite an old game. I’d actually say they are quirky rather than messy graphics, but for me it this that adds to the game play

I’m sure as already mentioned above that this is going to be one of those games you’ll either love or hate. I do think its worth persevering with it though. Don’t let your initial feelings about this game put you off. I didn’t like it the first few time I played it, but persevered because of the breakout link (one of my favorite arcade genres) and now think its a really good game.

Besides, how could the developers of games like Jets and Gun, Archibald’s Adventures, Undercroft and Crystal Caves make a bad game, lol.

p.s.

The bandwidth for photobucket images and videos is quite small, so, depending upon how many community members look at the video I’ve embedded above, it may disappear sometime today. I’ve posted it to a different account to the images, so hopefully they will continue to show.

PPS,

If you’re offended by the cartoon depiction of nudity and the use of anatomical names of parts of the reproductive organs you may not want to download this game. Personally I think its all meant to be tongue in cheek (though I was a little wary of the use of some words in the introduction to Jets n Guns (another game by this developer) due to having children who had access to the game. I do think the words used in todays game are less obnoxious. When my daughter saw this the last time it was given away she asked what the word Uterus meant. That gave us an ideal opening to explain about reproduction; something which I personally think is much better learned from your parents at a young age rather than hear it second hand in the play ground. Still, everyone is entitled to their own opinion.

Please just remember, this is JUST a game.