Looks like a fun game! I'm going to have to play it some time.

Today, I went to the beachfront with my children. I found
a sea shell and gave it to my 4 year old daughter and said "You can hear the ocean if you put this to your ear." She placed the shell to her ear and screamed.
There was a hermit crab inside and it pinched her ear.

She never wants to go back! LoL I know this is totally off topic but I had to tell someone!

i gave this thumbs up. i don't know why all the hating on this game.

i downloaded it in one of the previous giveaways and have played it a few times. i've never gotten very far, though. no mad FPS skillz. the space invaders perspective is much easier imho. darwinia has another perspective on the theme that looks cool to someone who was enchanted by tron on the big screen. (that was right at the time when the big screens [in the u.s. anyway] were first downsized.)

whiterabbit, this is the first time i noticed in your screen shots that the score is at the top. for some reason that part of the screen is cut off on my display, regardless of the resolution setting in the game or on my monitor (even at 1024x768 with a1ctl).

also at the end when i lose and the screen says [something?] and "press enter," it takes forever to respond. i hit the enter key several times, space bar, esc key, and clicked. eventually, i got the "enter your name" screen. typing was responsive but again it seemed unresponsive when i hit enter. again with hitting all the keys and clicking trying to get a response. eventually it returned to the main menu. the last time i just alt-f4ed out of there. no need for high scores -- or any scores whatsoever, it turns out!

it's fun for some target practice and an adrenaline boost.

thanks to stars ashes, gaotd, and whiterabbit!

(system info: winxp home sp3 on my trusty acer aspire one d250, 2gb ram, 1.6ghz, 1024x600 resolution)


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

Thank you for your feedback Tinyearl. Darwinia was one of the first games I ever purchased on my Steam account.

In the Options menu, I'm getting an error every time I change the video settings and click Apply. It kicks me out to the desktop with a dialog box that says "Error. Initialising low res video settings." or something. Is there a work around? Core i5, GTX 670, Win 7 63, 8 GB RAM. Thanks!


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

Hi JSD, don't know why it does that. Same thing happens to me when I try to play some Battlefield 2 maps on a lower graphic setting. Have you tried updating your graphics drivers? I presume with you having a decent vid card you do as a matter of course. :) Try going into compatibility mode and uncheck some of the boxes for the graphics settings. also make sure you're playing as administrator.

Got this along time ago from gotd and srar ashes! Not
sure if changed from that version to this version! It
is a good game though! Free software and games from gotd!
The local store is giving one product away every week for
last month! The rabbit refers us to more free games!!! lol!!
Frre music, audio books, ebooks, etc, etc!! The web is changing us into computer hoarders??? Thanks gotd and star Ashes! A song
for you dudes - Wild Weekend by The Rabbit ft The Rivieras http://archive.org/download/TheRivieras-01-50/TheRivieras-WildWeekend.mp3 Got lots software from gotd hmmmm!!! Gives some back - 50 more songs for you dudes https://ia801505.us.archive.org/14/items/TheRivieras-01-50/


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

You are right about hoarding. I must have several terabytes of backed up programs and games. One game alone (Battlefield 2) accounts for over half a terabyte of mods and maps.

I've cut down on installing giveaways from the main site. There are only a few programs that I'd bother installing now as I have virtually everything I need to sort all my media. As for games. I have thousands, many of which have hardly been played. I wouldn't bother installing many of the game giveaways either, but I need to install them if only to be able to write a reasonable review. :)

Have it from a previous giveaway, though I didn't have time to try it until today. You can call it a "shmup fallen on its' face", i.e. instead of a 2D game where the enemies come at us from the top of the screen and we shoot'em up, we're getting a 3D game where the baddies come at us from in front of us and we shoot them horizontally (though still "up", huh?). The graphics is good, in particular for a game from 2005. The steering with a normal mouse (I don't have a gaming one as I always prefer a joystick) is hopelessly imprecise. Joystick control isn't as simple as could be inferred from Stephen's review. It is bizarre that the controller options aren't available from the first menu. You have to press the Esc key in game to have a choice between "Standard" misspelled as "Standart" (you can fire with a joystick, but move using mouse or keyboard) or "A,D and mouse" (you can fire, move left and right using joystick, but up and down only using keyboard - the mouse can only fire) controls. Will have to try mapping the joystick to the keyboard to see if I can use the joystick only. That said I really enjoyed trying out this game - and I have never been a huge fan of shmups or most space shooters. I think the ever decreasing rating is a result of the number of times the game was given away. I would love to have a "normal" controller menu, where I could choose joystick and it would work without fiddling - not that I expect the developers to care after 8 years since the last update. Still, thumbs up from me.


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

Thank you for your excellent feedback Joe. Sorry it took me so long to reply. Been a really busy day (again). Using a mouse with sensitivity controls enables you to adjust the sensitivity perfectly.

Hi, In the User Rating's can you include the number of voters not just the percentage.


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

I do. I always give the positive percentage and the number of total votes, for example:

It received a positive 85% of 149 votes the first time it was given away shortly after the game giveaway project started. 85% off 149 votes equals 128 votes out of 149 votes for the game(the percentage is always rounded off).

Battlezone, from abandonia you need to buy


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

Thanks for the update, it was free the last time I checked. Trouble is; retro games have had a resurgence i popularity over the last few years and places like GOG have managed to buy up the rights to a lot of these games, that used to be available as free downloads from all good abandoware sites. Most of Good Old Games's original stock (games pre 2000) were available for free until about 4 years ago when GOG first came on the scene.

Cest la vie

@Dean (#4) - If you're not using Google Chrome for browsing the web - start! It will be a transition (any change is) but you will find it faster & more reliable! http://chrome.google.com

I believe this was originally given away under the name Star Gunner. So I am curious if there has been any changes made since then?


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

This was never given away as Star Gunner here on the game giveaway, however it did have a name change when it was added to Gametops inventory of free games. (Strickly it's not a free game, Gametop give developers money for each download. Gametop and sites like them e.g. MyPlaycity etc rely on people visiting their sites for the free games. Every visitor earns them cash). The game was updated when Vista was released. you can read about the versions in my review. Gametop used to change the name of a lot of the games they gave away that were still being sold elsewhere.

Something is wrong with the link. It does not start download, just opens a blank page.


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


Hello Dean, just checked the link. works fine for me. Was able to download again with no problems. If you are using Firefox, you need to make sure Internet explorer isn't working offline. If you don't use I.E., and don't have a shortcut, you should find one within the windows folder. Or use the search function, type Internet explorer to get a link to open the browser, then click on File, from the drop down menu make sure the work Offline isn't checked.

Otherwise, try rebooting your router and/or modem. Let us know if these suggestions work or not; thank you.

p.s. if you continue to have problems throughout the giveaway, you can always resort to the free version from Gametop. Do remember to uncheck any checkboxes during installation, otherwise you'll find your home page changed and/or a new toolbar installed to your default browser. I've linked to the Gametop download above

Old game but works fine on windows 8 x64



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


Thanks Tim

Great game, I got it last year when it was offered.

Introduction:

Last Galaxy Heroes was originally given away back in Dec 06 and then again twice in 2008 (version 1.2.02). It’s a space shooter reminiscent of a 3D space invaders clone , though in reality its nothing like space invaders. It received a positive 85% of 149 votes the first time it was given away shortly after the game giveaway project started. Then 51% of 330 votes in January 2008 then again in November 2008 it received a positive 41% of 548 votes. It was also given away twice in 2011 where it received only a 54% positive vote out of 295 with 32 comments. Back in March 2011, then again in November 2011 where it received a positive 56% of 304 votes with 27 comments; finally it was given away once last year back in June 2012 where it received a positive 50% positive votes. The latest version is V1.3.01, which is the same version as the one given away last year. You can check out all the comments from last years giveaway HERE and from Nov 11 2011, March 11 2011, Nov 08, Jan 08 and Dec 06 giveaways


Developers Introduction:

Get ready for the galaxy mission! Hard times fell upon the galaxy and you are the only one to save it. The problem is that you have only one space tank to destroy the attacks of space shooters. The planets wait for you to save them!

Reference: Accessed HERE 28th Nov 08

Installation:



The downloaded zip file is 20.2Mb in size (the previous giveaway was much smaller) that unpacks to a read me and a wrapped setup file (the orange colored file with the key symbol), plus there's a setup file with security (setup.gcd) that's protected from being hacked (because the previous giveaway system was easily cracked). This file may cause some security software to alert the user to a possible malware attack, Any positive hits you may get (as one community member did with one of last weeks games) 'WILL' be false positives.

The game giveaway team check every game giveaway for malware using several well known anti -malware suites. There has never been a game giveaway infected with malware since the project started back in Dec 2006. The owners know that allowing such things would compromise their business, so they make sure all software given away via the gamegiveaway sites are thoroughly checked for all types of malware before allowing community members to download any files.


Some community members have been having problems installing games since the security software was added last year. It's been found that turning off your security temporarily or configuring it to accept the setup.cgd file usually sorts the problem out. Also try right clicking on the orange colored set up file and select Run as Administrator.

The game installs to C:\Games\LastGalaxyHero_game

The installed game is 18.3MB in size. There is no shortcut installed to either the desktop or start menu.
During the installation wizards progress you are given the opportunity to select your own installation path if you wish; (it's highly recommended, especially if you have a second HDD or a partitioned drive as it will help to keep your system running smoothly - the more you fill your root drive (usually the C: drive), the slower your computer will run – if you’ve got a decent sized hard drive of more than a few hundred Gigabytes it’s always a good idea to partition it into at least two drives so that you can keep the operating system and other essential applications separate from other programs and games.



There is no uninstaller included; so, if you decide the game isn't for you, remove the game by manually deleting the installed folder. It's self-contained which means there shouldn't be any entries in the registry and there are no files written to other areas of the computer. (I’ve checked the registry and found no registry entries related to the game) If you still wish to check the registry for yourself to see if there are any orphan entries you can use the registry editor by typing regedit in the run command (in XP) or typing in the search box (in Vista or Win 7) you will open up the registry editor. It's always a good idea to create a restore point before you make any changes to the registry just in case you mistakenly delete something you shouldn’t have. (I've been editing the registry for many years and to my knowledge have never caused a problem due to deleting registry keys). Once the registry editor is open, click on the computer icon that’s situated above the five registry hives ( HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT, HKEY_CURRENT_USER ....... etc.; then click on Edit, (which is situated in the toolbar along the top of the editor); from the drop down menu select Find or Find next then type in the key word/s, in this case Last Galaxy Hero, then click on Find next. If any registry keys associated with Last Galaxy Hero are found (right click on the entry in the left hand pane of the editor and select delete, or in some cases in the left hand pane (if in doubt, leave the key - you can always post a request for help over in the forums).




I’ve previously tested the game in Win XP 32 bit, Vista 64 bit, Win 7 64 bit and Win 8 64 bit and the game works well on all platforms with no installation issues (apart from the lack of a shortcut).

The Game:

Once installed you are presented with a hard to see main menu options and help menus, well that is if you are red – green colour blind. I can see it okay, but my son who inherited the condition from his maternal grandfather said he couldn’t see the menu very well. It doesn’t help that it’s superimposed over a screenshot of an in game image. That said the game is quite enjoyable; at least from my point of view; one of my favorite arcade genres is space shooters.

The main options menu allows you to change the screen resolution from 640 x 480, 800 x 600, 1024 x 768 and 1152 x 864 in 16 and 32 bit formats, as well as sliders for music and sound effects. The music is okay if turned low and the sound effects are what you would expect of such a game as this. (The music files are OGG; you can change them for music you like if you find the music annoying, but you must convert your preferred music to the OGG format as well using an audio converter (you can find a couple of decent ones in the giveaway freeware section). You can also select the difficulty from this window as well as choose to play the game in windowed mode. The second options menu is accessed while in game by using the Esc key, which brings up a menu that allows you to abort the mission and restart, exit the game or enter a second options menu that again allows you to change the music and sound effects volumes and also allows you to change the X and Y axis speeds of the mouse as well as select between two control modes. Both use a combination of Mouse and Keyboard, though with the standard control you can use both mouse and keyboard, though you have to use the arrow keys when using the keyboard. The second option called A D and Mouse utilizes the A and D keys as opposed to the arrow keys for left and right. Both modes have their advantages, which is probably personal to each of us.

The help menu is basic, but that’s all you need. It details the power ups you can collect and bonuses of which there is a limited number, these comprise of weapon upgrades (as you would expect from a space shooter) and armour improvements as well as bonus points of various sizes. Bonuses are gained when you destroy one of the 12 different enemies that you will find in this game. There’s a simple HUD (heads up display) that shows you your weapon and armour strength as well as the number of lives (repair droids) you have at the bottom of the screen (plus a few others detailed in the help menu) as well as the number of bonus points and your score, which are found at the top of the HUD. To progress to a new world you have to attain a specific number of bonus points; for example, to get to the second world you require 15000 bonus points and to get to the third world 20000 bonus points etc. (I’ll let you discover the rest); before you enter a new world though you have to fight one of the five bosses that you’ll meet on your journey to becoming the Last Galaxy Hero :lol: You must move your gun emplacement left or right to capture the bonuses and power ups, which remain where they are until you move directly beneath them. the danger here while you wait for the bonus to drop down to you is that you are vulnerable to alien weaponry. The enemies shoot back at you and only need to hit you a few times to destroy your emplacement unless you’ve collected plenty of armor bonuses. These are easily missed though as they move towards you from the lowest axis of the guns vertical movement, which you are usually pointing at the sky, so watch out for those bonuses. You start with 3 lives on all difficulty settings, but there are power ups in the form of repair droids that you can collect, which give you extra lives. You lose a life when your shields are reduced to zero, see the in game help pages, (which are accessible from the main menu when you first start the game up), for details of each power up and bonus'. There are three difficulty settings Easy, Medium and Suicide. Aliens shoots back at you faster on the higher difficulty settings. :lol:





The game is quite easy for the first few levels, but gets harder as you progress through the levels; that is, unless you are a seasoned 'galaxy hero', :lol: especially when playing it on the suicide mode.

The game controls include mouse, keyboard and joystick. You can use a combination of each one or individually, which makes the controls very versatile. There is an option to change the control keys, but this is very basic I’ve detailed the differences in the second paragraph of the ‘intro and game section’ above. There are 5 different worlds to explore (see the Googled images below to get an idea), and at the end of each world you encounter a boss. I've taken about 15+ screen captures from the November 2008 review and added another 25 captures from the last giveaway. Unfortunately my latest screen capture device pauses the game when i try to take a screen capture. (Should be a free screen capture device on BitsDuJour soon)..


If you miss today’s game, lose it to a format or decide you want it after the giveaway has finished, the good news is that it’s available for free 365.25 days a year over at Gametop, though it’s had a name change to Star Gunner. You can download it via the link below. For those who are not familiar with Gametop games, your browser is always opened when you shut the game down, though there’s no malware installed. Gametop have recently been adding a toolbar and or asking if you want your home page changed to Gametop, so ensure the appropriate boxes (if presented) are unchecked. I recently checked to see if there were any toolbars etc. and the file appears clean of any extras:

Download link for Gametop version:

You can download a free version of the game 24/7 from Gametop HERE

Video & Images:

You can see what the game looks like by checking out THIS you tube video or looking at THIS and THIS slideshow of in game images or THESE Googled images


System Requirements:


• CPU………………………………..........Pentium III 700

• Operating System…………….……Win98/2000/XP/Vista (The game was released in 2005 and was updated a few years ago for Vista, but it also works in Win 7. I'm in the process of reinstalling win 8 at the moment, so haven't checked whether it works on Win 8 yet. If someone could confirm whether or not it dopes, I'd appreciate it. Thank you.

• 3D emulation………………………....DirectX 8.0 or higher ….

• Computer memory…………………128 MB RAM

• Video Card memory………………..32 MB Video RAM

Conclusion:

This is a decent 3D space shooter on the lines of a three dimensional space invaders, where you have to destroy wave upon wave of oncoming space craft. Okay, it’s a little dated by today's standards so some may find it a little retro in its graphics and design when comparing it with many other games that have been released over the last few years, but the game play is solid.

I had loads of fun playing this the first time it was given away and was pleased to see it in the first re-run as I’d lost it to a format. It’s worth a good 6.5 out of 10 for its game play, which is very basic. Despite it being fun I did find it soon became a little stale if I tried to play it for longer periods due to the repetitive nature of the game. That said it's definitely good for some mindless fun when all you want to do is turn off for a while.

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Problems with the game?:

If you have any problems installing or playing today's game please go to the game discussion forums where you'll find a FAQ's section HERE. It may also be a good idea to post details of any problems you have over in the game discussion forums. You can find the thread HERE. I've included a return link to this comments section over in the game discussion thread. :)

If you see someones query and are able to answer them, would you please also post over in the thread i've linked to above because moderation is going to be very sporadic today and queries and answers may not appear for many hours.

Thank you in advance to anyone who takes the time to help. :)

One comment thatn seems to appear every time this game is given away is that some users find it hard to control the game using the mouse as it's overly sensitive, so it's hard to aim easily.
This can usually be overcome by adjusting the mouse sensitivity. Most recent mice will have sensitivity buttons that enable you to change the sensitivity on the fly, for example most razer mice have this feature. You can also use a joystick, which should be easier or the keyboard

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If today's game doesn't take your fancy then check out the game discussion forums and the free games synopsis. We’ve posted a couple of thousand free games over the last four years, many of which are excellent alternatives to their commercial cousins.

The deals over on Steam are 80% off the Red Faction franchise. you can get all the games in the series (Red Faction 1 & 2, Red Faction Guerilla and Red Faction Armageddon plus dlc for less than $10, Red Faction Guerilla has some of the best destructible environments in any video gamer I've ever played. I spent one weekend alone out of the hundreds of hours I've played the game repeatedly destroying a bridge (it was massive), trying different ways to get it to collapse. The game has excellent destruction physics, with virtually everything man made (in game) being destructible.

Also there are over a hundred games on sale this weekend on Steam alone. If you pre order The Bureau: XCOM Declassified (£26.99 with 10% off) you'll get a bonus mission, a free copy of Spec Ops: The Line, (an excellent third person shooter, with gorgeous environments plus the whole collection of X-Com games (6 games) including the latest X-Com: Enemy Unknown (doesn't include any of the dlc's)

Today's 24/48hr deals are 80% off the Two Worlds collection (Two worlds Epic Edition, Two worlds II, Two Worlds II - Pirates of the Flying Fortress and Two worlds II Castle Defence) and 66% off Fantasy: Kingdom Wars ( there's a massive free expansion that adds more towns, units, guilds, sieges as well as more stuff. I highly recommend the Two worlds collection.

For more deals check out the latest game available on IndieGameStand HERE
You can pay as much as you want but no less than $1. The present game is called DROD: Tendry's Tale; and, If you beat the average you'll also get a second DROD game and the music, plus a mystery game (not announced yet). The game has been added to Steams Greenlight project, so if it's Greenlit, you'll also get a Steam key. At the moment it's DRM free. This deal ends Tuesday morning 4am (GMT)


There's also quite a few decent deals over on Desura, Greenman Gaming as well as other game distributors such as Gamersgate and Gamefly. Finally, you'll also find a few indie bundles still live. You'll find details of all the bundles still available over in the first two pages of the Game discussion forums HERE These are the best way to get bargains as you can often get $100 plus worth of games for around $5 or less. (e.g. last November/December THQ sold their entire recent catalogue worth almost $500 for less than $6 and presently there's a Humble bundle Origin bundle - see below for details)

Check out the Bundle Stars deals for the best bundles around at the moment. There are at least 4 Bundle Stars packs still available, each with at least 9 or 10 games (all with Steam keys) for less than £4 for each bundle. Best of all, the latest Humble Bundle beats last years THQ bundle with several high profile games included in the Bundle (Battlefield 3, Medal of Honor, Dead Space 1 and 3, Burnout Paradise: The Ultimate Box, Mirror's Edge, Crysis 2: Maximum Edition and The Sims 3 + Starter Pack, that's literally hundreds of pounds (or dollars) worth of AAA games, many of which are still current for literally less than $5. Some of the games require Origin, others Steam. Some you get both Steam and Origin versions. This is an amazing deal, with First Person Shooters, First Person Horror, Racing (bikes and cars) and simulation as well as a beautifully rendered and executed parkour like game (Mirror's Edge) (Parkour is where a person runs and jumps etc over roof tops and other high places)


Other Free Space Oriented Games:

There are loads of other space themed shooters that you can get for free from Gametop, MyPlayCity and FreeGamePick, (there were 11 full version commercial games at Gametop the last time I looked) which are linked to via the free shoot ‘em ups thread posted over in the forums. Make sure you check out all the posts in the thread though because I’ve posted several in different posts, plus others have posted suitable games as well. I would beware of MyPlayCity because recently they have changed their policy with respect to including toolbars, even when you uncheck toolbar installation they still install them.

Most of the freebies from these free games sites are in my opinion more interesting to play than today’s giveaway, but if you like space invaders, it’s a great 3D version. One of my favorite free space games is Universal Combat, which was converted to freeware a few years ago by its developer. It’s a 3D space shooter/simulation of epic proportions which is well worth the download if you like space orientated games. You can find details and a link to the download page via the Space Shmup thread thread that I posted some years ago over in the forums:


I'd also check the Free Games Synopsis which has most of the games listed in the forums, though I've not updated it since before Christmas (week 100), so there are a lot of games not listed (we are on Week 162), but you can find these by sifting through the Game Discussion Forum and specifically looking for the free games project posts which always start with a Week number. There have been several excellent freeware space shooters posted recently since I last updated the synopsis. The list below isn't exhaustive. i've only selected those games that have been posted over the past several weeks. There are loads more hidden in the game discussion forums from week 100 to the present (week 162).

Mike Studyform suggested that the game was reminiscent of battlezone. You can download the full version of Battlezone HERE (used to be available for free until recently).


Here’s a nice selection of shmups and other vertical and horizontal shooters with a few top down shooters, all of which have previously been posted in the game discussion forums and all are free:

Dreadlock
Strange Adventures in Infinite Space
Darius Gaiden
Vacant Ark
War Machine Overload
wAive
Sim War 5
Haritama
Lunaria
Pheon
Earth Jets
Space Corps 3 Armageddon
Die Slave
Alien Deathmatch 2
Kerbal Space Program
Solace

If you have spare cash to spare you'll find loads of space oriented games available on the net. There seems to have been a resurgence of these games recently. Check out Steam and Desura for loads of commercial games of this type.


Please note that if you get any games from Gametop or MyPlayCity you need to watch out for toolbar installations and home page hijacks. Just un-check the check boxes. with MPC games you may need to do this every time you boot a game up unless you create a new shortcut from the installed executable.

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A Request for help:

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

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