Good web site you have got here.. It's difficult to find good quality writing like yours nowadays.

I honestly appreciate individuals like you! Take care!!

the game is .....removed........ I have it seen sinking the white and still it got an extra shot, .....removed....... sometimes I have seen double extra shots even if I did a valid shot, however if I do not sink a ball I don't get an extra shot and if I sink white the normal rule of "next player" counts for me.

I hate...no wrong..I don't hate...I HIGHLY dislike cheaters and I even more dislike cheating games. deleted.

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

Please refrain from using expletives when posting. This is a family oriented site and some children may read these comments. Thank you. I've removed the offending words.

Agreed. I tried today's version, but it doesn't compare to the older version. Won't be keeping today's giveaway.

I tried again. Deleted old downloaded file and downloaded the game file again.... I even disabled kaspersky and uninstalled winrar. Still getting the same message. Also I do not get an option to use different archive as I run setup.exe which automatically opens winrar self archiver. I do not have any say in that...

Please help..

Sumit Bansal.

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You should not run the executable directly from the zipped file. It needs to be unpacked first, then installed. If trying to unpack the archivee comes up with the same message, then you can use a different archiver. No one is forced to use the same archiver.

Install 7 zip, then right click on the zipped file that you've downloaded. From the drop dpwn menu you should now have the option of selecting 7 Zip instead of selecting the default Extract Me. Before you add a second archiver do check the event viewer first.

Thanks for the input, mike! I'm actually not qualified to say anything about any "cell/tablet" devices since I've never used one. I just figured things would be worse trying to play the game with a finger. Good to know that it's different or possibly better!

Another Game giveaway, another “Failed to connect. Please try again later”. I guess I'll be off from trying anymore games from this site in this new year :/

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

Hi Ariel, do you get the same problem with applications from the giveaway side of the project? Thousands of community members are able to download and install thesae games with no problems, so it would indicate that the problem is at your end. Have you tried any of the fixes suggested in the FAQ's thread? Try looing at the event viewer immediately after trying to install a game to see if there are any logs of the incident. A log may give you an idea as to what is wrong.

Yay! I like pool! Pool is Cool!

But I can't seem to get the Hidden Object of Match 3 parts of the game to come up. It doesn't seem to be anything at all other than pool. WHAT'S UP with that?

Hey, maybe this NEW (!!!) company will be the one that finally offers us a GOLF game!

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

Hey, yeah, it would be nice to get a decent golf game here on the gamegiveawayoftheday project; we have had some decent crazy golf games, but not for some time now.

Steam have added a couple of good ones recently (Perfect Golf, The Golf Club, Total Pro Golf 3) plus a crazy golf game called Vertiginous Golf. Any one of them are worth getting in the next Steam sales. :)

Installed and works fine in Vista 32. Took a while to decipher the controls but this is actually a fun game (didn't expect that from the comments already posted) ...half an hour had passed before I knew it. The AI could definitely use improvement, after the first game I easily won every time. And the pop-up at the end of a game is virtually unreadable - black text on a dark brown background. An oddity, to me, is that sinking the cue ball not only doesn't end your turn but you get to place it anywhere on the table! Never played that way before.

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Agree with you on oth counts i.e easily winning and the score board at the end. Thanks for your feedback.

"...to keep their applications up to date. It informs you about new versions of the software you use."

But we cannot update GAOTD games.

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

Hi jgf, it will give you information about all programs on your system that can be updated. Of course, if it's a giveaway version you'd have to pay for it if you allowed the upgrade. It will also inform you of updates available for paid for software on your system. If like me you have many programs installed, then software informer can be a useful tool to have. That said, I don't use it any more, partly to keep down the number of applications I have installed. It's the same reason I don't install most giveaways now. I've purchased most programs I'm likely to use, but only install them when I need to use them, then I uninstal. There are some giveaways I'll install, but its becoming rarer and rarer these days (the last one I installed was Zoner Photo Studio as my life time version is v14.

Installed and ran fine on Win 8 64bit. This game is a fun game to play, while relaxing between doing things. It did take some getting used to the controls, but the game was relatively easy. Not that I was able to hit accurately, but it was close to accurate. I did find the game relaxing to play, but as another person noted, the shots do not go exactly how and where expected. I think the company did a nice job with the graphics, at least by how they look on my computer. This would not be my "go to" game, but I will play it when trying to relax. It is great to see another genre here. I do think the game is missing some elements that would make it a game people would purchase. Such as better controls for strength of the shot, and ways to line the shot up better. Also, I do enjoy the pool games that give me an idea as to where the shot should go. But, the game does load quickly, and I will play it when I need a quick game to fill in some time.

Thank you for the game.

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Thank you for your feedback Cheyenne

Hi Amanda. FWIW [& if it's of any interest] re: "I know the game is meant for a smartphone, but I can’t imagine it being much better there.", there's already a bit more challenge just to play games on a cell/tablet, so you won't find too many cell/tablet games at all that come close to what you'd expect on a PC/laptop or console. Often when they port a PC/console game over to Android for example, they cut out quite a bit, or rewrite the game entirely.

What this dev does OTOH is use a game engine that's supposed to run on several platforms, so they write something that can be played given the hardware & physical limitations of a tablet or cell, then compile a Windows version.

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Thank you for your feedback Mike. :)

American Billiards installed additional crapware on my computer. Software Informer. I was not warned and I was not asked for permission. This is very unprofessional behavior. They must have bribed you well. Goodbye.

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

software Informer is not installed unless you allow it too. (see image below). Once the game is installed and activated a window pops up asking if you want software informer. It's actually quite a useful program I've seen a whole range of reviews about this free software, some good some bad, it all depends on the opinions of the person writing the review. Basically Software Informer is a safe utility that has been designed specifically for those users who care to keep their applications up to date. It informs you about new versions of the software you use.

You said ' I was not warned and I was not asked for permission' It's clear from the window that appears once the game has been activated that you are given a choice as to whether or not to install Software Informer. You can only install Software Informer if you click on the button that says 'Install Software Informer', so you must have been warned and, by the act of clicking on the button you've given permission.

If you don't want the program installed Instead of clicking install Software Informer you should have clicked the button clearly labelled 'Close'. Doing that would have prevented you installing Software Informer.


I did the same when the program was first instroduced to us about 5 years ago. I didn't particularily want the program installed at the time because I was using a similar program, but continued to use it until my next format (I usually format a couple of times a year to remove all of the giveaways I don't use. Those giveaways I've found really useful I tend purchase). I've never installed it since and haven't had cause the accidentaly click on the wrong button.

The program is removable.

p.s. the reg key in the image is from a previous giveaway and invalid now. :)

"Failed to Launch the program" message. No fixes in FAQ thread. This IS a comment on the software. I read all the above and there are similar comments.

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

Check your event log immediately after getting the failed to launch message. You may find error messages that will give a clue as to why its not installing.

The FAQ's thread over in the game discussion forums is a Work in Progress. I spend a lot of time moderating and writing reviews, and only update the FAQ's thread infrequently.

Okay, it might be an older version of the game, but I did enjoy it for the few games that I played with it so far. As a couple of others have said, I, too, missed a few things in the game.

I wish it would take a little more time and show you what the computer player is trying to do before it shoots. That might be a good instructional moment for you. I also wish it would keep track of your score and the number of games you won. This winning, or losing, and being dumped into the start menu again is poor. Perhaps, adding a difficulty or skill level for more advanced layers would come in handy. Of course, I may have missed these items on the menu someplace that I don't find.

Other than that, I like the game. As you probably can surmise, my skill level is very low, which may explain why like the game so much.

Thank you for sharing the game with us.

Please keep us posted!

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


Sorry for the late reply; thank you for your feedback. I've just managed to get another game in and couldn't believe that I'd missed the power meter in the top right hand corner of the playing field. Seeing that has made it much easier to calculate the power of my shots and made the game that little bit more pleasurable to play. :)

Kaspersky protection must be paused (choose the option where it has to be resumed on demand), and then your system restarted.
http://support.kaspersky.com/7023

You should be able to run the unwrapping operation properly from there.
Once the software is ready for installation, protection can be immediately un-paused/resumed.

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


Sorry for the late reply, got a sleep over in progress so my computer was being used by my sons friend for the past several hours. All the other computers were also being used. For some reason, the only free computer wasn't able to access my giveaway admin account, so wasn't able to moderate till now.

Thanks for the feedback.

Please keep us posted!

Is this an upgrade to the American Billiards given away in September 2006? That one has a 2005 copyright date, which I believe predates Android.

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


Sorry for the late reply, no this is a different game. The one given away back in 2008 was a much better game with several different modes, and locations where you could play the game.

Downloaded/installed fine on Vista 64-bit

I deleted it once after a few minutes when I couldn't figure out how to hit the ball, but I got bored and gave it another chance. Figured it out.

I'm not fond of the controls. They work overall, it's just boring. Moving the view with left mouse and the cue position with right mouse is okay, but I didn't like having to move around to see what was happening when it wasn't my turn. I'd rather be able to stand back and see the whole table at once. The shooting function is basic with no flash.

The physics aren't quite right. The balls bounce off each other and the sides as expected, but they don't roll long enough or far enough. The shooting power doesn't feel accurate either. The cue ball really didn't move how I'd think it would. Any hit below full power barely moved, and a full power hit moved the cue ball quickly, but all the balls slowed down too quickly after. It wasn't natural feeling.

I'm not a pool player but as far as I know, one player takes stripes, the other solids. It seemed in this game that any ball counted as a point. Would have been good to know at the beginning of the game...

I didn't like how there was no indication that the computer player was taking its turn (unless you count that tiny diamond that went between Player 1 and Computer, lol). I would hit the ball, it would roll to a stop, then suddenly it would move again. It took three Computer turns before I realized that was the computer player playing.

Also, the computer didn't seem to be trying too hard. I'm not even sure it was aiming at a ball most of the time. I did spend most of the game thinking I was stripes and it was solids, so that might be part of it. And it did beat me, but I think that's more due to my lack of skill and the game's poor physics than to the computer's effort. :P

The graphics are simple and clean, I liked having a look around the room. The music sounds like the beginning of an 80s song, but I liked it well enough. The sound effects are pretty bland.

I know the game is meant for a smartphone, but I can't imagine it being much better there. My most helpful suggestion for the developers would be to play other pool games and use some of the tried-and-true features that makes those games playable and enjoyable.

I deleted it, I don't think it was made well. But it was nice to see a new and different game here, and nice to give it a try. It's what keeps me coming back every weekend. See you Sunday :)


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

Thanks for your feeddback Amanda

eh downloaded ok but such an old game Just not up to today's standards.

There needs to be some controls for sensitivity. I found the stick moved a little quickly and it was impossible to control the power.

The game also lacks the variety of games that other pool games have. It's one type of play only.

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With practise it is possible, but its still not perfect. What I like about this version (I have several pool games) is that you don't get any imaginary line showing you where to hit the ball for a perfect shot, which a lot of more expensive games always seem to include these days.

Not able to install the game after download.... I am getting this error message : "The archive is either in unknown format or damaged".
I checked the FAQs site and disabled my kaspersky. but, still getting the same message. Any help would be appreciated...

Sumit Bansal

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

Try using a different file archiver, if that fails, open up the event viewer directlky after trying to unpack and see if there is any error messages related to that game. You may be able to figure out what the problem is from error messages if any. If there is and you don't understand them, post th message here.

The game plays on my ancient WinXP-MCE machine. Keyboard input doesn't work, but the mouse does and that's all you need. Aiming and shooting accurately isn't easy - for me, but the AI isn't much better. The small size might make it a good simple alternate time-waster. Would be much improved by some feedback for winning, losing, or making a good shot. Not much incentive to "play again".

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

Thank you for your feedback Semo :)

My apologies for having made a very hasty assessment of American Billiard, and for having done so before I was properly awake. After reading the moderator's comment, I gave the game a second try and found that the developer had really improved the game in the preceding 2 hours. It works very well now, and is actually quite a bit of fun to play. American Billiard isn't a game to which one must devote large blocks of time, and so is perfect for use while one is taking breaks. Thank you, PlayJoWee and GAOTD.

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

No need to apologise. Glad you got it working properly. :) I agree, not a game to be played for long periods. I've pl;ayed it in three short periods so far, mainly as a break from other games and just one round each time.

This game is nothing but straight pool. No story or upgrades of any kind. Make sure you do not click on the shoot button by accident because it will count as a turn and the computer gets an extra shot. The AI is really bad most times the computer just shoots at the closest ball no matter how stupid the shot may seem. This might be okay to kill 5 or 10 minutes. I cannot see myself playing this a lot.

I decided to give this a try; downloaded and installed on my Win7Pro 64bit system; no problems at all and enjoyed playing as I beat the computer. Didn't take much to discover the controls; figured how to power shoot and it worked. Just takes some time but I think it is a cool game and will keep it. Thanks GAOD!

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Nice one' glad you like the game. It's always nice to see a different genre offered here.

This game might be fun, if it worked, even though it appears to be an old Windows 98 game. It doesn't work on Windows 7 32-bit. On Windows 7 32-bit, the game looks very nice and runs nicely, but most of the game controls don't work. I've tried using the defaults and I've tried making changes, but the game remains mostly unresponsive. It seems to be running in demo mode, and the computer keeps sinking balls and accumulating points and I don't get a chance to shoot. I think this is a very old game that was written for Windows 98 and it's been very badly updated. I'm glad that I can get rid of it by just deleting the game's folder.

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

Hi Walter, the game is an android port. I had no trouble playing the game after an initial slow start while I got used to the shoot controls. It runs on both Win 7 and Win 8.1. If it was a Win 98 game we are talking at least 14 years old or more. The graphics are basic, but they are not pixillated like a 98 game would be.

I forgot to mention that there is a power bar related to the shoot command that's located in the top left hand corner of the playing field. This makes making power shots or controlling the power of your shots much easier that just trying to guess from the position of the cue. I can't believe it took me several games to actually notice the bar. :)






American Billiards

For free this isn't bad, I've played better billiards and snooker games, but this has everything you need to play. It took me a few moments to work out what to do exactly because there isn't access to any instructions on how to play the game mechanics, which are actually quite fluid once you get used to the shoot command. I needed a little pratice as I kept shooting and getting really low power shots when I wanted high power and high power when i wanted low power shots. You need to make sure the cue is pulled back to maximum for a power shot, but it's not as simple as that and is where the game falls a little because the pull back mechanism is automatic. You have to time when to let go of the mouse button when shooting, which can be a little hit and miss. I'm sure with more practice it will become easier to carry out, but gfor now i'm playing abysmally. :)

The left mouse allows a 360 degree view of the table with the cue centered on the exact centre of the ball, it also allows you to move the cue up or down so that you can create long or short shots as required. The right mouse button allows you to move the cue point to any visible point on the ball and to shoot the ball place the mouse pointer in the shoot circle.

The game is an android port so the graphics are not brilliant, but thjey are fine for this type of game.

Gameplay: 7
Sound: 7
Replayability: 8
Graphics: 6

Score = 7 out of 10

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------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Problems:


If you have any problems installing or getting to work today's game please go HERE for help. I've posted all of the common problems and solutions in a FAQ thread, which you can find in the sticky section of the forums by following the above link.




If you are posting late in the day I would also suggest posting in the main giveaway forums, in the game discussion section because I cannot moderate 24hrs a day over the weekend. I've created a thread HERE for that purpose. If you've installed the game but it won’t work for some reason, it should still be registered, so someone may be able to help at another time. Unfortunately if your problem is actually installing it then once the giveaway period is over there’s nothing that can be done until the game is given away again (though that isn't guaranteed). Sometimes you can still register the game after the giveaway has ended so long as you managed to start the download before the giveaway ends. I've tested this and sometimes the grace period lasts for up to 2 hours, but more often than not 1 hour is the norm.

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Games, Games, and yet more Games plus Download, Installation & Game play Problems:




There are 287 games on sale over on Steam, ranging from 10% to 90% off. You can find a full list HERE.

You'll also find some excellent deals over on the following Game sites.

GreenManGaming
Gamersgate Summer Sale
GOG (DRM free games)
Desura
Gamestop
GameFly (soon to be sold off)


Free Game Sites:

Jenkat Games
MyPlayCity (over a 1000 games to choose from)
Gametop
FreeGamePick



To be honest there are too many game deals around too list them all. Just visit the sites I recommend above and I'm sure you'll find something that suits you for a very decent price. If like me you prefer Steamworks games, many of the above sites also sell steamwork games.

If that's not enough, check out the Game Discussion forums HERE for details of other games either free or on deals such as the Indie Game bundles (there's over 20 of them - If you purchased all of them you'd be paying around $80 for around a thousand dollars worth of games); or check out the four day sales at IndieGameStand. you'll find the indie bundles thread HERE. The thread is outdated, but all of the links will still take you to the latest bundles.

The latest IndieGameStand game is Chaos Ride, which has just been released on Steam for £5.25/$7.49 (that's with an initial 25% off, usual price will be £6.99/$9.99. you can get it for $1 (approx £0.75) and get a Steam and Desura key. If you pay over the average, which at the time of writing was $1.60 You get an android version. This bundle ends around 5am (GMT) Tue 3rd Feb. Annoyingly I purchased the game at full price two days ago, a couple of hours before it was added to the IGS site.


The latest Daily Indie game is called chernobyl Underground a FPS game - It is 2020. After the fall of Eurozone in 2014 and huge financial crisis, the Ukraine never finished the new sarcophagus for the Chernobyl Power Plant. With the old Dome constantly decaying, the radiation levels were increasing and very soon the zone was declared off limits to civilians - and closed. Shortly it became a shelter for escaping criminals, army deserters and all the society-unwanted scum.

Dangerous, inhabited by potential targets and officially closed, the Zone became an ideal testing ground for military and private contractors. Combat equipment, weapons and electronics - tested by small teams or even standalone mercs. The player is one of the mercenaries sent into the Zone. Since he is the first who may make it alive through the Plant interiors, his mission has been handsomely paid for by the Death TV - and they hope for a good show, paying extra for every kill - the more gruesome, the higher the bid.
You can get two keys if you pay more than the average of $1.26 (at the time of writing); one key to share with a friend or family member perhaps?. You'll find that deal HERE. They also have four bundles of several games that'll cost you less than $1.50 HERE each. The single game deal ends Midnight Tuesday 27th Jan and will be replaced with a new game called In Space

Most of the bundles retail for around $5 give or take a few dollars (apart from the Daily Indie bundles that only cost $1.49 for six games), but you can pay as little as a dollar for some.
The free game from Origin has chaned from Sim City 2000 to Theme Hospital. i.e.

========================================================

A Request for helpl>:

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