Don't know if the developers will still see this so late, but I finally got a chance to try the game. I got to level 17 in my first try.

It's nice for killing time in between other things. I'll give it a thumbs up, but it does get repetitive very quickly.

A few suggestions:

-Maybe find some way to break up the repetitiveness. Maybe some sort of bonus round with different gameplay every 5 or so levels?

-I agree that the castle repairs eat up way too much of your money. Perhaps lower the cost of each repair or leave the cost as is, but have more of the castle repaired each time

-A second form of defense might be useful. Once the enemy archers appeared, I started having trouble with crowds of enemies directly under the castle. Maybe there could a close range attack that wipes out multiple enemies?

-Just a thought, but maybe add an option to increase the castle's defense against attacks (separate from the repair option) to the purchase screen to help deal with stronger enemies later in the game

-It would be nice to not have to restart on day 1 the very first time your castle crumbles. Either having the player restart on the level they died on or adding lives/continues (perhaps having the player start with a few and then allowing the player to earn or purchase additional ones) could help

-Not really necessary, but maybe there could be a short introduction movie (or even a text story) included in the game itself

Anyway, not a bad little game for what it is. Thanks again GGAOTD and Wheemplay!


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

Thanks for your feedback

A fun little game. I felt the difficulty ramped up a bit fast as has been commented. I know it is a simple flash game, but a little more in game info would be nice. Things like actual effects of different power up categories. I thought strength would help kill stronger enemies faster which didn't seem to be the case. Overall good job and thank you Wheemplay.

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


Thank you for your feedback

This is my second comment after having played the game for a while. I actually think it is a fun, simple game that you can start playing immediately. I had no problems with accuracy and can go days without anyone getting near the castle. However, I still wind up dying around day 12, and without any hints it is a real trial-and-error process to determine the best strategy. Thanks to everyone else for their comments and suggestions. I'll go back and give it another go or two to see if I can advance. I'm not sure a save game feature does much good, because the choices made in the first 10 days are so critical that restoring the game won't help. I like the idea of some aerial power-ups or filed-clears as a way to get a breather. Thanks for a fun game!


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

Thanks for your feedback Jim

wow, this game is easy up until level 14. At that point it becomes way to complicated to play, you're too busy trying to repair your castle and there is not a lot of money left over to upgrade before the opponent archers step in..

Kinda interesting game! Got up day 27!THESE CASTLE DEFENSE GAMES CAN BE A PAIN THOUGH!! I wonder what was most popular software ever given away by gotd was??

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

by download numbers judging from what i've seen after checking download numbers it was a match 3 possibly Atlantis Quest

Well I downloaded this yesterday for me (I am in the UK) but did not really have time to test it but played it until I died (day 7).

I loved the concept: being the lone archer, having stats to increase, choice of ammunition etc. Unfortunately Rick posted his wonderful explanation a few hours after this because I did feel like earlier posters ... that the choice was between stats and tower health.

Now I am glad I did not delete the game. The graphics are just right for this type of game; the portability is a big plus as I can take it anywhere on my USB and I would prefer to be playing this rather than the card/miner games.

In conclusion, if the developer were to add a little roll-over hint on items/stats in the stats page and/or more detailed hints on saving, changing ammunition etc on the game page then I think this little game would be a perfect one to pick when you have time to kill.

Good morning WHITE RABBIT!

Review: This is quite nice graphics wise but the gameplay is a bit intense. Good for a flash game in my opinion.

As for the failed to connect people... I must point out that if either their internet connection is wonky and especially if their Micro$oft Internet Explorer engine is set to "work OFFLINE," then your other suggestions such as clearing cookies, rebooting the modem, etc., quite simply will never work.

In my own experience, it was ALWAYS either a temporary internet "outage" and usually that the Micro$oft Internet Explorer engine was set to work offline (by itself no less), and despite the fact that I do use FIREFOX!

Here is a repost of my previous suggestions for people who "fail to connect."

a} Test your Internet connection (try hard refresh (CTRL+F5 is best) on known good site. If your connection is down, you WILL fail to connect to GOTD/GGOTD. Wait for your connection to be restored by your ISP or fix your connection. …OR…
b} Be SURE Mi¢ro$o£t INTERNET EXPLORER is set to “Work ONline.” GOTD states they use “M$ Internet Explorer engine” for verification programme. Thus you must dig up M$ IE and fix it there. Any other browser you use (Firefox, Opera, etc., should already be online if {a} above is true. BUT, if M$ Internet Explorer is off line you WILL fail to connect. Period. No matter which browser you run. Absolute fail in this event.
~~These two steps, {a} and/or {b} above, have ALWAYS worked for me EVERY time that message appeared, and it is QUICK and EASY! However, during the past few years, others have reported the following worked (after FIRST trying a & b, each of the following in this order):
c} Reboot all modems and routers your operate through.
d} Check the “security settings” on M$ Internet Explorer and all other browsers you may be using. Be certain they allow cookies and all permissions for ALL GOTD and related sites in general.
e} Clear ALL browser caches. Even if you do not use M$ Internet Explorer, CLEAR IT TOO if {a} and {b} failed.
f} Close all browsers and other applications and REBOOT your system.
g} Be certain you only have ONE version of M$ Internet Explorer installed. Multiple instances / installations may conflict.

I sincerely wish others to post what works for them. It is quite sad that, as you wrote above, only 1/2% of people bother posting comments here.

Thanks again whiterabbit-UK for your most excellent work. Cheers.

Let me just add to what others already mentioned- those arrows are expensive! It looks like you get ONE arrow for the price of 30+. Better to just stick to the unlimited default arrows, at least for the first several levels. Also, there should be a better way to select the arrows than moving the pointer to the spot above the archer and clicking- the action is usually quite frantic at the point you would want to actually use that $1000 arrow (too bad if you miss...) and one can ill afford to move, click, move back. Almost easier and safer to just fire three or four normal arrows.

Love the concept of the 99¢ phone-app-priced PC game, by the way.

Made it to level 43... Score 18,805

Getting sore mouse clicking finger, but still having fun. :)

Maxed out dexterity first, then strength, then accuracy.

The only arrows I bought were the fire arrows. I tried the frozen arrows earlier, but got the highest score when I was just buying fire arrows.

Apart for the sugessions by Whiterabbit, I suggest the developer to provide control through keyboard to switch between different type of arrows. When the attacking group becomes larger, taking off the time to switch between the different kinds of arrows can cost you a lot. It will be easier if I switch to say "Fire arrows" by pressing "A" button, "Ice arrows" by clicking "S" button, "Iron arrows" by clicking "D" button and the default arrows by pressing "z" button on the keyboard.

I also agree with the whiterabbit on the 1st point. The game gets too difficult and the rewards are not in proportion to the difficulty of the game. The castle gets damaged very fast, but it requires a lot to repair. The arrows are too expensive and so are the other upgrades. I think it would be better if the developer adds something for mass killing.

Thanks for the game. :)

Game has potential, Str seems to be what Dex should be, Acc is doing its job. Str should give me the right to "one shot" certain soldiers an allow less hits needed to take down others.

Maybe instead of buying elemental arrows you could make them randomly appear on the field? or drop out of the sky to be hit for a limited time shot? Ex: 30 seconds of Ice, Fire, Etc.

I'm not against buying the arrows it just seems pointless when you can't break the lvl 20 mark while grinding the mouse for more arrows, perhaps a multi-shot? rain of arrows? theres far more soldiers at times than I can provide fire power.

I am advising a rebalance on the Str/Dex and consider what I've said so far.

First I can't get online, then once I'm on, my joints are too swollen up to try out the game. Oh well lol

I'd just like to at least thank GGAOTD and Wheemplay for the free game. I always appreciate it. :)

Tried one game; died at level 9.

I'm using a little netbook with a touchpad instead of a mouse, this can make aiming & shooting a little bit difficult.

Got to level 42! I maxed out dexterity first, and it's important to get a good start without having to repair the castle when you have little money to work with.
Wound up needing to click faster than humanly possible, that's when they got me.

Pretty fun when it's new, like a lot of flash games. :)

Thanks for the HO Free Game Link under the "Archer's Duty" picture at the top, it just took me to hell and back. What a nightmare of a link for nothing. I eventually did a Restore on my computer to get rid of all the crap from it

I gave it a thumbs-up.

Nice, simple shooting game that provides a distraction but doesn't require a lot of thought. Sometimes that's just what I need.

Very nice game! :) Thanks

People are being very kind to this game. I played it twice, like everyone else here, to approx level 14.

Let's not mince words. The game is rubbish. Free, not free, for money, or giveaway: Rubbish.

Hi Whiterabbit aka Stephen. Thanks for this great game. I agree that it does need some easier levels and I hope the developer implements this next time around.

I have downloaded virtually every program posted here at the Game Giveaway. I can't say the same for the other "Giveaway" site GAOTD. I rarely download anything there anymore and take today's program as an example. The thing doesn't work. Last comment posted NINE HOURS ago was "division by zero error." NO UPDATE from the developer or from GAOTD. They never post my comments. Nine hours and no comments. Are they asleep or something?

Maybe it's time to forget the GAOTD and just have the Game Giveaway of the Day instead.

Thank you Stephen for your fine reviews, comments and moderation. I have passed the Game Giveaway URLs around quite a lot and have brought you some more followers. Game Giveaway is a worthy project thanks to your efforts Stephen. Take care. :Ronald:


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


Hi Ron, like the game giveaway site the main sites comments are moderated by volunteers. Usually weekends are for family, which is possibly why the comments aren't moderate as much. I'm retired and am home 24.7 so see my family all the time so can afford to spend more time moderating. Even I don't do as good of a job as i used to; partly because I tend to sleep a lot during the day (party due to the fentanyl patches I have to wear), but I do try and moderate as often as I can. Prior to me moderating these forums (about 30 months ago) this side of the project was exactly the same as the giveaway side at the weekend. That is the comments were only moderated maybe three or four times throughout the day. I noticed that the comments were getting fewer and fewer as time went on; which I felt may have been affecting the number of games we may have been getting. I contacted the owners and asked if i could moderate. basically i said i didn't see any point in continuing with the reviews i wrote if they weren’t going to be moderated until up to six hours later. i felt that they were a waste of time. That's one of the reasons I ended up moderating. I also felt that those who bothered to comment deserved to see their comments as soon as possible after they posted them, and to answer any query's that the community made. I though that doing so would encourage more to leave feedback, which seemed to work a little, but i still think with only 0.5% of those who download commenting we could do with more feedback. I’ve always felt that if developers saw useful feedback it may encourage them to give more games away. Whether that has worked I’m not sure.

I also find the game set at too high a difficulty level but otherwise it's not that bad for a flash game.

For those into hacking the save game is buried somewhere under:
C:\Documents and Settings\{username}\Application Data\Macromedia\Flash Player\#SharedObjects\CZ3RSKAA\localhost\FromMemory
Use a hex editor on it. If you try to add too much the game won't load properly but you might be able to get away with a few extra fire arrows.


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

Thank you for your feedback. :)

After sitting here playing a few levels of this game it seemed easy at 1st then got a little harder as it went on.

I agree with the moderator and others on here that there should be a help file, and difficulty level selection. There is another thing that I noticed and that is no way to just turn off the music. You can click on the little speaker ICON and it will mute the whole game, not just the music itself.

Visual of the game I would give it an 7 (On a scale of 1 - 10). It looks great, but if you are really looking to hard, you can almost see the pixils (I am running the latest drivers for my card and it is basically brand NEW). I never got past level 6 on the game, so i really can't give much comment about later levels.

I have played a lot of Wheemplay games in the past and they showed no lag on them, and this one is the same. The machine I am using is running Windows 7 Home Premium (64-bit) and is pretty well maxed out on everything.

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

Thank you for your feedback. :)

kinda kool, could be awesome !
I do think a short/quick intro would keep em playing- give 'em the hints:
~that 1 in the air is it & plan for it
~ show a little dotted curve around the attacker- far: aim in front/close: hit the helmet
~yea, we love our upgrades, where's my boiling oil is right - LOL

and just what does that ice arrow do, I had it halfway up and can't tell yet..arggg-back to the castle-later :)


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

Thank you for your feedback. :)

3rd try... past day 30, and 7,872 points.

I'm finding this game to be addictive so far. :)

Downloaded as a fun diversion for a few hours. Thanks!

Installed to program without a hitch.

First game, only made it to day 15.

Second day, didn't see what day I made it to by the end, but it was past day 20. Gold medal score at 7,000+

I like the game! :)

Hint... concentrate on improving dexterity before improving anything else. Then you can fire arrows much faster! (how I did much better on second game than on first when I concentrated on improving accuracy first...)


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

Thanks for the tip. :)

Whoops, made a mistake in my review. Looks like STRENGTH is what makes the arrow flight path flat, and accuracy just determines how near the mouse-click the arrow will land.

And apparently you can overwhelm the input buffer just by clicking faster than the game can process the clicks. Level 31 currently, and after I stopped clicking at the end of the level, about 25 more arrows were shot (clicks still in the buffer.) It's a bit annoying, because that means when I start shooting in a new location (say closer to the castle), it's not until 25 arrows later than my archer's aim actually moves!


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

Thank you for your feedback, I'll bear that in mind next time i play this game. :)

@Merlyne wrote: "rather annoying that you have to start at day 1 every time."

Use the continue button - that will start you back at the last level you finished. (Apparently I made it to level 38.) Looks like you only restart at level 1 if you click Play.


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

Thank you for your feedback, I didn't really spend much time on writing up todays review. didn't think about saving. :)

Fun for a bit, but gets boring. Also, there's a noticeable lag when more enemies are on the screen. Once I passed level 28 or so, there are so many enemies that there's a several second delay between my clicks and keypresses and the actual effects. Eventually killed me on about level 35, as I was clicking in front of my castle, but the game was still processing my clicks on the left side of the screen.

Since there's no help in the game, here's a brief one from what I discovered:
Archer attributes:
1) Accuracy - how straight your arrow flies. The less "accuracy", the more of an arc it travels in (making it harder to aim, I guess. I got the hang of the parabolic path easily enough.)
2) Dexterity - how quickly you can shoot the next arrow. I focused on this after a while, it makes the most difference.
3) Strength - how fast the arrow flies from your archer to the enemy. Does NOT affect how many shots it takes to take down the stronger enemies. I focused on this early, when I didn't know what it did. But now I recommend focusing on Dexterity and Accuracy first.

Arrows:
1) Fire - area effect, hits all enemies on the screen as if they had been hit with one arrow.
2) Frozen - area effect, slows all enemies on the screen. THIS IS THE MOST USEFUL! Buy these once your stats are maxed, then pick up the others.
3) Iron - counts as two hits against an enemy. Useful for some bosses, but since you can only buy 15 of them, not useful at all in later levels.

Hotkeys for arrows:
1) Normal arrow
2) Iron arrow
3) Fire arrow
4) Frozen arrow

Notice that while the hotkeys match the icons above your archer's head, they DO NOT match the order of the arrows in the inter-level upgrade screen. So don't get confused.

And don't bother trying to click the arrow icons to change - the time to move your mouse to hit the little icon, then move back to the enemies, is slower than firing three to five arrows.

Strategy suggestion: early on, aim just in front of the enemies to take them down before they reach your castle. Upgrade dexterity only, until it is more than half. Then upgrade accuracy. Don't upgrade strength or buy arrows, except maybe a couple of Frozen arrows in case you're being overwhelmed. Once your dexterity and accuracy are near max, start buying Frozen arrows and upgrading strength. After a few upgrades you'll start being able to fire arrows quickly, just aim at the bottom left of the screen and click like mad (so the arrows form a wall the enemies have to pass through.) That will get you near level 30.


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

Thank you for your useful feedback. Now I'll enjoy the game a little more knowing which attributes to concentrate on first :)

Hmm.. seems most of my suggestions are already on here. I have to agree with WR review completely on the game. I hate to even take the space to comment since I have so little to add.

I agree about how annoying it is to have to restart on day 1. I would recommend that to solve this maybe give the player a number of lives. Then when those are used up you go back to day 1 and start over. This would also allow the developer to add into the attributes, etc that you buy the ability to buy more lives. Overall a good time waster (for short periods imho), but not really so much one I would have downloaded if not on here. I feel that I will keep it and come back to it occasionally. I might even give more like it a chance. THANK YOU GGAotD and Wheemplay.

Past that suggestion there is not much more that I can add about the game. Though I do VERY much support that you should have to comment to be able to vote and also perhaps there should be an additional place at that top to show the number of downloads. If nothing else I was surprised to see how many there are on average. With those numbers you would think there would be many many more comments/reviews and even thumbs up/down.


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

Hi G. Only 0.5% off downloaders bother to comment which is a pity. I've always left a comment, even before I started doing the reviews. I was always glad of a new game. It seemed polite to at least leave a comment, but as I've said many times, "each to their own". I'm sure many don't have the time to comment. Oddly, Wheemplay games tend to get unusually low numbers of downloads even though some of their games have been really good. We will probably only reach 6 or 7 thousand downloads by the end of the giveaway. It's the match 3, hidden object and time management games that seem to get the highest number of downloads (Usually).

I can't belive they sell this for 0,99 dollars.
BECAUSE ITS FREE ON THIS WEBSITE http://www.gameslist.com/embed/Archers-Duty-Game

Dont you think Wheemplay is a scam? They only pack flash games that are free over internet

A nice game, its funny ;)
but very unbalanced, if you know what to skill ;)
and for many pcs it would be unable to play on high levels, because it lags a bit.
But I like the game, it needs many improvements, so I hope they dont finished the game yet ;D

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


Yes of course

Hi
I am having a problem with the setup I keep getting a error can not conect to server try agian,but when i do it comes up agian,this has been happing at the other site too,the other giveaway site,anyone else have this problem?
David


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

This is a common problem David. I've given fixes for this in nearly every giveaway we've ever had.

1) ... Reboot your modem
2) ... Reboot your router
3) ... Reboot your computer
4) ... clear out the internet cache, in particular the gamegiveaway cookies (they may have become corrupted)
5) ... Check back to the comments of other games given away few weeks ago and look for Mr Snoozles comment. He made another suggestion (which I keep meaning to add to the FAQ's I've been preparing for months)

Thanks for comments. Ok Win 7 x64 Ultimate unlike last week's cube.
This one, as mentioned, is just a little time waster that can benefit from suggested improves. Add Sound, Music Options & Saves for a start. Sure graphics, gameplay etc. bumped up but hey for a little click click thing seems would be a whole nuthter game. Dressed up with additional elements could add to the but doesn't seem the developer's intent. Played 10 levels going for Strength over Repair.
Shoot in front of attacker seemed to help. Anyway, more games plz.
Thanks GOTD.

Running Windows Vista Premium

Downloaded and installed fine. I like the fact that it is flashed based The learning curve was very easy. OK graghics and game play was ok as I only played a couple levels every ran smoothly.



I like the game easy to play if you have a little time to burn just start it up and start fireing your arrows, great stress releaver. the only thing That I may suggest is to add difficulty levels and mabey a save game option would be nice.

It might be also nice to have an option to recieve the Flash file only not wrapped in an exe for those who might want to upload the game on a website.

Thank you GGOTD and Wheemplay for Todays download

#4: "... It is VERY hard for a person such as myself to decide to D/L anything when the thumbs are close to equal, but they are at about 300/300 and comments are at only 75...

…………………….Moderator comment…………………..

... the voting doesn’t mean much because there are those who vote simply because they don’t like that particular genre... I’d also say that whatever I or anyone else says about the game, each person has a different idea as to how good a game is. you may read a load of negative comments about a game but that doesn’t mean you won’t like it. :lol: "

I couldn't agree more about trying everything for yourself, when/if you can.

FWIW, I don't/can't know all the reasons someone doesn't want to try an app or game featured on GOTD, but if it's because someone's afraid of *garbaging* up their system, there are loads of alternatives, many mentioned from time to time on the regular GOTD site. While the VMs I favor aren't great for games -- V/Box Experimental 3D support is far from perfect -- Wondershare's Time Freeze [an earlier GOTD] has proven invaluable to me... after a re-boot your system's restored. And particularly if you tested a Lot of games you could always set up a bootable VHD [Virtual Hard Drive] -- to restore you'd simply copy/paste a saved *.VHD file, same as I do every day [sometimes several times a day] for win7's VPC VMs. You'd use such a setup the same way you might dual boot into different OSes -- without a lot of apps installed, my VHDs are between 5 & 12 GB, so they're certainly manageable.

..........................Moderater comment......................

Thanks for the info Mike. I used EazFix for some time ( a previous giveaway) and was really pleased with it. I messed my system up testing some free games for the free games project, which totally trashed my operating system. I couldn't get back in to restore to a previous time; EazFix was written in to the MBR, you could activate it during boot-up and restore to a previous save, which I always did before trying anything new. I lost that program to a hard drive failure, but the developer was kind enough to give me a free licence when I wrote to them telling them how pleased I had been with the program, but had not been able to afford the program because it had almost doubled in price since I last saw the price (from $29.99 to $49.99). We've since been given a similar software from the same developer that does exactly the same thing, but I missed it (and now can't remember the name).

Fun game. I would add aiming or trajectory markers to make it easier for us older folk to hit our targets. I tried upgrading my accuracy but my castle has suffered and I lost it when the hordes got larger.

I suppose playing makes you more accurate but it would be nice to have the option of trajectory markers.

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

That's an excellent idea. Being able to toggle it on and off. Or it could be included if the developer added difficulty settings.

I get a dialogue box in Windows 7 that it may not have installed correctly. Maybe this is because I don't use the default install path but direct it to a folder where I keep programs like this. Anyway, I have the option to choose "Reinstall using recommended settings" or "The program installed correctly." I just clicked "Cancel." The game seems to work fine.

The computer I'm using is a somewhat old netbook, so I got quite a bit of input lag. I only progressed until level 5 or so before I quit. I would like to see this game have a help screen, because when I started I had no idea what I was supposed to do.

As for the arrows, there is a little indicator above the archer's head. I'm not sure if you should click on one of the boxes in that area to switch arrows, but that's what I expect.

Hello from China. Downloading did take 10 minutes, but at least I can actually get on GGOTD (can't for Gmail, some how).

P.S. How would a guy carrying a spear actually hurt a building?



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

Haha GMMan, good point, but it is only a game afterall. Perhaps the developer should take up some of my ideas (@ comment #1) where I suggest using battering rams, ballista, Trebucke and catapults. They could also consider miners that dig under the foundations of the castle then use pig fat to create a heated cauldron hot enough to collapse the castle walls (got that idea from the film Ironclad, lol)
p.s. I didn't realize you lived in China, (where abouts?) :lol:

To change the type of arrow use the arrow head icon on the top of the archer this game is great


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


Thanks Prince

It's a nice enough game, but I cannot even pass level 14 and it is rather annoying that you have to start at day 1 every time. As an addition to the long list of recommendations I would also recommend to have you restart the last level when you have not survived in stead of beginning all over again. It's a nice time killer if you do not have much time, I agree. I normally do not like shooting games, but the graphics are cure and I simply like the mediaeval setting and the arrows. More explanation about the upgrades would be welcome though. It is a great shame that the levels are so difficult, because now I cannot really play the game and see what else is in store. Thanks for the give away though.


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


Thanks for your feedback. Good idea.

This game reminded me of a similar archer defence flash game called 'Bowmaster Prelude' that I played many years ago. For it's time, I think it was very well polished and the gameplay had some depth. It had a leveling system, critical/maim hits, enemies had weaknesses and you had a range of arsenal that you slow gained access to, a wide range of enemies etc.

It also reminded me of 'Castle Attack 2', a flash game that was made to promote Stonghold Crusader I think it was. It rather fun and had elements of uniqueness to it in that you not only had to defend, but to beat the level you needed to finish building a castle at the back and you could speed up construction by reducing the amount of archers you had defending. You also had 3 special attacks [boiling oil/catapult/rolling logs] that you could use strategicly to wipe out enemies en masse or if you were in trouble. That kind of thing really adds to the medieval feel of the game as well and made you feel like a boss when you just rolled all the enemies on the screen.

Both of these were superb. (If you know of others please point me to them :3)

So from playing these games previously I didn't enjoy this one as much. This game has a lot of space for improvements. Similar to what others have said, the difficulty increases yet you can don't have much options to deal with it aside from repairing and spamming the left mouse button. I didn't see the usefulness of buying additional arrow types as they were too expensive to be practical, it would also be nice to have them set as a hotkey like 1,2,3,4 etc so you can switch quickly. I think I can kill guys faster with just the normal arrow than having to click on the icon to change the arrow type and then start firing again. I would also like to see those arrow types to be unlockable and be effective against certain types of enemies as well as an arrow that does splash damage to deal with the masses of enemies that appear when the game gets difficult. Another thing, I'd like to see is upgrades for the castle itself, either for more HP or armour.


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

Thank you for your feedback Daniel. Very much appreciated. Let's hope the developer makes an appearance on this comment section or at least see's the suggestions made here and elsewhere and then actions them. I do think if the developer adds all or most of the suggestions made by all of the users here this game could have much more potential. :lol:

Quite a fun little game from Wheem play. Portable too, you can drag it around to where ever you take your USB-stick.

Just copy the executable "Archer's Duty.exe"

It is not (yet) clear to me how I can exchange my standard arrow with an iron arrow after I bought it, but that will probably be clear after bit longer playing this game (I didn't find the time yet).

Thanks White Rabbit and GMMan for solving the saving problem with CubeDrift (#1). I missed this comment the day CubeDirft was given away, but I already saw it at GAOTD the other day when White Rabbit posted over there.

Very thoughtfull to post it again today.
It really amazed me what kind of reactions White Rabbit had to suffer from people at GAOTD about being not on topic, gheez....


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

Same here Alf. I bought fire arrows but couldn't figure out how to use them. There must be a toggle somwhere. :lol:

b.t.w. thanks for the support.

I do like all kinds of RPG games where one has to spend points in attributes to improve one's skills, so I thought I could give this one a try.
I installed it and played a few levels. It was very easy to find out what the different attributes are good for. So I started a new game and focused on accuracy and strength for a few levels. I aimed my shots at the most left part of the screen. So I was able to hit all enemies before they reach the middle of the screen. When I noticed that my shots were accurate enough, I began to spend money on dexterity (speed).
When the archers appeared my tower got a bit damaged. I still didn't spend money on arrows, but foced on dexterity, strength and (less important) accuracy.
When I maxed out those attributes, I spend money on arrows.
As I was able to kill all the enemies instantly as soon as they appeared on the screen, I never had to repair the tower.
On day 34 I lost interest and quit the game. The enemies never reached the castle, all attributes are maxed out, I have more than 2000 coins.
I guess the game will become extremely difficult in the later stages, but it is too repetetive for me to find out.

There is one question though: Does the archer use the different kinds of arrows automatically or do I have to switch between them manually?

Thanks Wheemplay for giving us the opportunity to try out this game.


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

Good question CSR. I couldn't work out whether i was using the arrows i purchased. the first ones i bought were fire arrows, but i never saw any when firing, so I think you may have to switch using a toggle, or maybe the number keys. You are right about an help file. The game needs one to give us more information about the game. I’m impressed that you managed to progress so far though. I only managed day 16 or 17 before my castle was destroyed.

did you see any different castles or environments or were they all the same?

I'd agree with you about the repetitiveness, which is why I'll only play this game as a stop gap or time filler. I enjoyed playing it for a short time, but could see that it would get tedious after a while.

Good, fun little game. It would be nice to know what advantage the different attributes actually give to help decide where to spend money (if there is any left after keeping the castle repaired). There doesn't seem to be any help file to give guidance. Game seems to get almost stupidly difficult and almost unplayable (unless you're a hyper active 10 year old) as the levels progress past around 15.

I watch GOWOTD as much as possible. I am a lurker, I normally read and decide from there. I thank everyone doing the games end for their games (havent downloaded any), but again, I watch, and enjoy reading the posts.

PLEASE change this service that you offer to allow ONLY THOSE THAT POST to VOTE!!!!!

It is VERY hard for a person such as myself to decide to D/L anything when the thumbs are close to equal, but they are at about 300/300 and comments are at only 75.....

Other than that this is an awsome service!!!

Mule


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We've had this discussion many times w.r.t. only allowing those who download to vote. It's a good idea, but it's never been implemented. That said, the voting doesn't mean much because there are those who vote simply because they don't like that particular genre. They haven’t even bothered to check the merits of the game, it's game play etc. What you don't see is the actual number of downloads there are each week. Depending upon the game we can get as many as 20 000 though 10 000 is the usual and for unusual games that many are not familiar with it can be as low as 6000, but very rarely less than that. I'd say if so many users are downloading the game it's worth trying. I'd also say that whatever I or anyone else says about the game, each person has a different idea as to how good a game is. you may read a load of negative comments about a game but that doesn't mean you won't like it. :lol:

I agree that the game is not fantastic, but is a nice little time killer, especially if you just want to shoot something. Could be good for kids to practice their aim. Glad more games are coming soon. Thanks to Wheemplay and GGOTD.

Game installed fine and runs fine on my windows vista 64.
Graphics are ok, but I found the game play a little redundant and unnecessarily difficult. I could not keep up the health of the tower while trying to build my accuracy and weapon strength. I could not get past day 14 after roughly 1 hour of play.

Not my cup of tea, I prefer more cerebral games rather than the point click click click type.

Thanks for the opportunity to try it out.


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

I agree with you on the difficulty aspect. It would be better if there was an easy mode as well so that you feel like you are getitng somewhere. according to the features list there are different areas to play, but I haven't a clue how far into the game.

I got to day 16 and was not able to improve my attributes much because most of the money was spent on a rapidly deteriorating castle.

To all those that downloaded CubeDrift last weekend. GMMan posted the following about the save issue:

Actually, CubeDrift does have a "save" function. It will indicate what levels you've finished on the level select screen (as gold). You can skip up to 10 levels (available ones are in blue). After those ones they are all locked (in grey). The game will actually resume on the first level you did not complete.

The only reason that non of the above worked was because the game shipped with a completed profile. Just delete data\ogpice.cdx to reset the profile.

The .cdx format is simple. It's in a key/value format. Each level is numbered and takes up two lines. The first line is the level number, and the second is the level completion state (either "u" for unfinished, or "d" for done). Repeat for each level in the level pack. The file is automatically generated upon starting a level pack.

Reference accessed HERE

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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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Installation:

The game downloads to a 10.1Mb zip file that unpacks to a read me and dual activation and setup file. The game installs to the following path by default, but you can change the path during the installation wizard:

C:\Games

The game unpacks to a single file which is 9.62Mb in size. There is no Start menu shortcut nor an uninstaller; to delete the game just delete the executable. You’ll need to create your own shortcut, so make a note of where it was installed to. You can change the installation path during installation if you wish.

As with all Wheemplay games the games executable installs directly into the games folder with no folder of its own.

The game works okay on my Win XP, Vista and Win 7 computers.

Introduction:

Grab items, collect crystals and avoid touching bad guys! Submit highscore and get awards!

Features

• Medieval battles!

• Unlimited addictive levels with different approaches

• Achievements and highscores

• Highscores and awards

Reference accessed HERE 15th July 2011

Defend your castle

As more knights attack the castle you can see it slowly crumble

The Game:

Todays game is a flash game where you have to defend a castle against successive waves of enemy knights. The aim of the game is to stop the attacking knights from destroying your castle. The levels get successively harder as you progress. At the end of each level you are able to spend the money you have earned from killing the previous wave of attacking knights. You can spend it on improving your dexterity, strength or accuracy which help to improve your attack or on better arrows or repairing your castle to improve the defence of the castle. As the game progresses you'll see different types of knights from ones that weild spears, to swords, crossbows, and axes; then you'll get knight on horseback, which are not only even more difficult to kill, but move a lot faster.

To survive in this game you really need to spend the money you earn carefully to ensure that your defences are strengthened and your attack improved as the game progresses.

You can upload your final score to the internet if you think it's good enough. :lol:

Video:

The following is a very poor video, but it will show you what the game is like. You’ll need to move the video forwards over a minute to actually see the game. It was taken from the browser version of the game. You can see it HERE




Conclusion:

Todays game is very basic, but don't let that put you off. This is an ideal game for those odd minutes you may want to kill, maybe while you are on a coffee break at work or in between playing a bigger more interesting game, or just to fill five minutes here and there.

There's not much substance to the game, but I found it entertaining enough. Personally I wouldn't purchase it even at the price they are offering it at (that said, it may be worth buying just to support the developers, they have created some excellent games that they have given away over the past several months). You can find the game on loads of browser game sites like Kongregate where you can play it for free and if you are good enough upload your scores to the internet.

Overall I'd give this a 6 out of 10. It becomes a little tedious after a short time.

Thank you to wheemplay and the game giveaway team for giving us this game. there will be another game tomorrow and it looks like we have several more games in the pipeline, so, watch this space. :lol:


Suggestions for the Developer:

1) ... Add difficulty levels. The game is rather hard once you get past around level 12 onwards. I wasn't able to spend much of my money on attributes such as strenght and accuracy becasue most of my money wnet on repairs to the castle. Maybe reduce the amount of money required to repair the castle.

2) ... Add more weapons for the defenders such as crossbows which would have a much longer range and more accuracy or boiling oil which would kill large numbers of attackers who were by the walls of the castle

3) ... Give the attackers seige wepons such as the trebuchet, catapults, ballista and battering rams

4) ... Include larger castles with multiple walls so that the attackers would have to break through several to get to the castle keep

5) ... give the defender the ability to send knights on horseback later in the game to help repel their hoseback attacks

6) ... Include open warfare between defender and attacker

7) ... Improve the graphics

8 ) ... Add more attributes such as horsemanship (assuming you added horseback knights) and leadership.

9) .. Include achievements for surviving or killing so many enemies etc.....

10) ... Include more defenders, some with AI so that you wouldn't have to aim for them. These could be earned after playing so many levels, or awarded when you win an achievement.

11) ... give the defenders different types of armour

12) ... allow the attackers to kill defenders (assuming you add more defenders to the game)

13) ... Add attacks from the sea, with ships etc

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