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

I'm retiring for the night, I'll continue to moderate in the morning before the giveaway ends. If you do have problems installing the game, please do read the comments just in case someone has posted a fix. Alternatively check out the FAQ's thread HERE. More often than not it's the security software that is blocking the installation due to the Themida code that is used to wrap the giveaway. Try temporarily turning off your security install then turn your security back on or alternatively try rebooting in safe mode with networking. Failing those clean out your internet cache reboot then try again. Other issues can be fixed by going into compatibility mode and making sure you have admin rights plus changing your operating system via compatibility or if it's graphical checking one of the check- boxes in compatibility mode.

tomorrow we have another MPC game then on Monday a Steam key (several thousand keys so it will probably be an instant giveaway until all the keys have been given away.

Thank you to all who have posted feedback; Good night

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

The size of the download is 661MB, so if you have a slow internet connection it may take longer than usual to download this game. The best time to download is early in the day or late in the giveaway, when not as many community members are downloading. The more members that are downloading at any one time, the slower the download will be due to the bandwidth of the giveaway servers. 639MB of the installed game (659MB) are flash movies. This game has a lot of animated scenes that add to the overall atmosphere of the game, for example the real looking flames in the forge..

Please only post comments about today's game giveaway; other comments either inappropriate, or comments with only one or a few words; for example vg, good, thank you, TY, bad, rubbish, this game is ~%!£*? etc , or if the comment has nothing to do with today's game or is complaining (send your complaints to the giveaway team via the contact form that I've linked to below), they may be deleted at the moderator or administrators discretion; however, a little light banter among community members/friends and with the moderator to keep this a friendly place to visit is acceptable and welcomed. All comments not specifically about today's game giveaway will be judged by the moderator and if deemed inappropriate, will be deleted and usually with no explanation. Please see the moderation policy HERE for details about posting comments. If you are having problems installing the game check the FAQ's thread HERE and read through the communities comments because sometimes fixes have already been posted; and if for any reason you want to contact the giveaway team, for example, you have a game to offer the community, or are unable to download the latest game or other issues that the FAQ's thread or these comments don't cover or solve you can do so HERE

Legacy Tales: Mercy of the Gallows

In Brief

An adventure Hidden Object game with excellent graphics

Suggestions:

After you've had an opportunity to play today's giveaway please take a few moments to give some positive or negative feedback about the game; for example, what you liked or disliked about the game, or how it could be improved. If you don't like the genre at all, please explain why and if any, what improvements would change your mind? If you don't have time to post a comment today, please do so at your convenience, thank you. To access the comments once the giveaway is over, open up the game giveaway to its home page then scroll to the bottom of the page where it says Archives and select the date the giveaway was live (giveaway days are in bold type). This will open up the appropriate page for you to post your comment or review.

There are thousands of subscribers to the game giveaway of the day every weekend which makes this an ideal forum for giving developers new or fresh ideas as to what their consumers (i.e you) would like to see in a game. For example, you could suggest extra content such as better or more original mini games, or a level editor that you would like to see that would make it more appealing to you. Maybe you think the graphics are a little dated and are in need of re skinning, or maybe you've just had enough of the genre and want to see something different or something with more originality? Giving such feedback instead of saying nothing or just saying this game is rubbish or good may bring more developers to the site, which could mean more and better games. Would 'you' give away thousands of copies of a game (or extra content for a game) away to a community that complains all the time instead of giving useful feedback? It only needs a few moments of your time.

This site could be transformed if only the community would be more forthcoming in their opinions of the games they are getting for free instead of complaining about the way this site has changed, for example, they don't like MPC games, they hate HOG's, have had enough of Match Three and Time Management games, or they want to see the latest version of Call of Duty or some other big name AAA game given away or that they don't like Steam games. If something isn't for you then please move on to the next giveaway, or check out the forums HERE, HERE and HERE, where a few members of the community post details of various free games and free game sites as well as links to various indie bundle sites etc; you never know, you may find something that really interests you.

If you miss today's game giveaway you can always get the game via MyPlayCity 24/7 HERE

Installation:

Legacy Tales: Mercy of the Gallows downloads to a 661 MB zip file that unzips to three files, (a setup.gcd security wrapper, the set up file and a read me). Those with multiple hard drives are able to save games on any drive they wish. The newly installed game is 659 MB in size. The game installs to the following path by default, but can be changed by the user if you prefer:

C:\Program Files (x86)\MyPlayCity.com\Legacy Tales - Mercy of the Gallows

Four shortcuts are installed to the desktop. three of which can be safely deleted (Play Online Games, MyPlayCity Games and shortcuts to a free online game which vary each week). Also, if you don't like icons installed to the quick launch task bar, make sure you uncheck the box when the additional tasks window appears (after the Select Start Menu Folder window)

Introduction:

Reveal the dark mystery of the past and find out what has happened to the van der Decken family in the game Legacy Tales: Mercy of the Gallows! Are you fond of mysterious stories about cruel pirates and their brave persecutors? Welcome to the ravishing hidden object game Legacy Tales: Mercy of the Gallows! Strange things happen over time and you appear in the 18th century to play the role of a famous detective. You appear not far from the mansion of William van der Decken, so start your investigation right now! You find a part of a broken golden heart-shaped amulet – do your best to find another part of it to throw light upon the mystery! William van der Decken has always been famous for his uncompromising struggle against pirates: he became a real terror of pirates and nothing could frighten him. William van der Decken seemed to be a man without weak sides except only one – he loved his pretty wife Isabelle to distraction. She tried to support him in all his deeds except only one thing. Being a kind girl, she was against executions and even rumored to feed the imprisoned pirates. But soon the girl disappeared and nobody saw her again. Her desperate husband did his best to find her but soon he was found dead dressed as a pirate with a hook instead his hand. What has happened to the van der Decken family? Cope with all the puzzles and get to the roots of things in the game Legacy Tales: Mercy of the Gallows! You’ll plunge into the sinister atmosphere of the dark mansion with lots of secret chambers. Be attentive not to miss a thing – all trifles are of vital importance! Solve various puzzles to get to new rooms and collect coins to unlock pirate chests with helpful things for your inventory inside. Use hints if you are stuck: breathtaking secrets are waiting for you! Explore numerous sinister locations as Captain’s study, cemetery, secret chambers, Isabelle’s room and even Batavia, William’s ship. Follow the ghost of Isabelle and complete the hidden object scenes and various mini-games! Discover the truth about Captain William van der Decken in the amazing hidden object game Legacy Tales: Mercy of the Gallows and reveal the mystery about Isabelle’s disappearance!

Reference accessed HERE. 25th Aug 2017

If you have a problem installing or activating or getting Legacy Tales: Mercy of the Gallows to work please visit the problems section, which I've now incorporated into the FAQ's thread, and which you can find HERE

The Game:

Review 1:

Legacy Tales: Mercy of the Gallows sees players trying to solve the long-held mystery surrounding Captain William van der Decken, a famous military man that worked to free the world from pirates, until he was found dead on the Dutch coast in full pirate regalia, including a hook for a hand. His wife Isabelle had vanished some time prior, increasing the mystery. Unfortunately, the story is pretty sparse after the introduction, as we’re only given brief glimpses into the lives of the van der Deckens via short journal entries or paintings scattered about the family’s abandoned castle.

Over time, the game slows down more and more. It lacks traditional cut-scenes, but the narration during dialogue sequences (including a few interactions with ghosts) is excellent. These are few and far in between, however, and you’re simply left to progress by wandering around an abandoned seaside village, and searching through the castle. Hidden object scenes are lacking at the beginning of the game, but increase in frequency and in difficulty over time.

These hidden object scenes are mostly those that ask you to find items on text lists, with a few offering further interactivity in the form of doors or containers that must be opened or moved before finding a key item. There’s also a brief inclusion of silhouette hunts, which challenge players to find items based on shadows, rather than names. It’s a shame that there aren’t more of these kinds of scenes, as the text scenes are artificially inflated for length by asking players to find multiples of a specific object (seven feathers or five horseshoes, as examples).

Outside of hidden object scenes, there’s a great map system that allows for fast travel, as well as providing players with a constant inventory of locations that still contain a task to complete. Coins add another element to the game, with coins being found in bulk in most locations. These too are marked on the map, as coins are perhaps the most important item in the entire game.

While the game initially presents coins as though they might be a voluntary collection system, it’s actually mandatory that players collect them in order to unlock treasure chests throughout the game. These chests contain key items that you must retrieve before moving further on, so it’s unfortunate that many coins are so hard to find.

Legacy Tales: Mercy of the Gallows is an instantly striking hidden object puzzle game that has everything it takes to pull players in. Great voice acting in the initial cut-scenes speaks of a lifelong romance that actually wasn’t: as the wife of a noble captain vanishes, and the captain is found dead on the coast of the ocean. While the game starts off with a bang, it quickly fizzles into a slow moving and ultimately disappointing experience.

While Legacy Tales: Mercy of the Gallows comes with two difficulty options, even the easier of the two comes with a slowly filling hint recharge meter and lack of a permanent in-game cursor. This prevents you from seeing when you’re hovering over a key item, so you can walk all around a building never finding the item that’s been right in front of you the entire time.

Puzzles are handled well in Legacy Tales, even though the majority are those we’ve seen time and time again (jigsaw puzzles, tile rotation/swapping puzzles, and so on). The graphics throughout are especially good here, as the closer an object is to the player, the more detail it has been given. Some legitimately look lifelike, but that sort of appreciation quickly diminishes when you’re left with slow object animations and lagging transitions.

If there’s one word to describe Legacy Tales: Mercy of the Gallows, it’s “slow.” From the slowly recharging hint and skip meters and the unnecessarily lengthy hidden object scenes, to the slow unraveling of the game’s story and secrets, this is one experience that had a ton of potential and did a lot of things right (the map and fast travel system, as examples), but has even more flaws.

Edited reference accessed HERE. Originally posted by Brandy Shaul
on 16th May 2013 . Re-posted by Whiterabbit-uk 25th Aug 2017.

Review 2:

The very first thing I noticed when playing Legacy Tales: Mercy of the Gallows was the soothing, realistic sound of waves gently lapping, as if I were standing on a windy dock. That and the background music do a great job of setting the perfect tone for this pirate adventure.

The graphics in Legacy Tales: Mercy of the Gallows are strikingly detailed and beautiful. Unlike other games of the genre, however, the screens took awhile to load. I thought maybe it was my computer but changing the settings or restarting didn't seem to resolve these issues, so the slowness appears to be game-based.

The main characters, William van der Decken and his wife Isabele, lived long ago and are the subject of local folklore. The sea captain and his wife lived in a fairy-tale-like castle located, of course, on a dock. This Captain was a crusader against pirates who wreaked havoc on the townspeople and their fishing boats. The Captain and his wife, were heroes and well loved by the people of the village. Isabelle, the Captain's wife, was always at his side. Legend has it that she slowly took ill, and was seen less and less by the townspeople, until one day, it seemed she disappeared. After her disappearance, the Captain suffered horribly and fell into a deep depression. Finally, he went off on a quest to find her himself and was never heard from again.

Years later, his rotting corpse was found washed up on a beach. He was dressed like a pirate and had a hook in place of his hand. Of course, nobody ever discovered what really happened to the Captain or if his identity was a sham. That is your job to find out! By the time you enter the scene, the castle and ship are in disarray and full of ghosts who are trying to tell you something. Who are you to believe?

If you like the paranormal and the morbid, you will enjoy this game. There are skeletons in cages where their original owners died of hunger and thirst, and rumor has it that Isabelle used to take pity on them and give them water to make their slow deaths more bearable.

The castle has been abandoned for generations, yet, when you, the first live person to enter the grounds since before living memory, look up, you see lights on in the upstairs windows. There are also moving pink and blue lights in many scenes that signal eerie activity, especially in the graveyard!

Edited reference accessed HERE. Originally posted by Beth Taylor on 22nd May 2013. Re-posted by Whiterabbit-uk 25th Aug 2017.

Other Reviews and Videos of Legacy Tales: Mercy of the Gallows:

You can see community reviews of Legacy Tales: Mercy of the Gallows HERE and a walkthrough HERE, and you can see some videos of game play (most are of the Collector’s Edition, but the basic game play is still appropriate) HERE, HERE, HERE, HERE and HERE. You can see a slide show of almost 80 images HERE. Some of which may contain spoilers

Conclusion:

Legacy Tales: Mercy of the Gallows is a nice looking hidden object game with excellent voice acting. The story line is rather lacking but the hidden object scenes should appeal to most HOG lovers; they’re not too challenging, nor overbearing. The map is a useful addition to the game, and the puzzles are original. Overall Legacy Tales: Mercy of the Gallows is a decent HOG worth a 7.5 out of 10 from me (I'm not a HOG lover, but have enjoyed playing this one).

I'd like to take this opportunity to thank MyPlayCity for giving away Legacy Tales: Mercy of the Gallows and also to the game giveaway team, as always, for securing other ways to get free games.

Useful Information not related to today's game giveaway:

The problems section that used to be posted here in the Game review is now included in the Game Discussion FAQ's thread; which you can find HERE.

I've updated the games section that used to be posted with the review. The thread is now called 'Weekly round up of game deals', formerly the games section of the weekly reviews. You can find the new thread (which I've posted in the sticky section of the game discussion forums to make it easier to find if you are perusing the game discussion forums) HERE.

The rest of the information that used to be posted here can be found in the forums HERE. Finally, check out Delenns for details of other free games and offers HERE