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

Unfortunately I've not had enough time to write a full review of today's game. I had an emergency meeting with my legal team today (for those of you who remember, a few years ago I was in the process of suing my builder after he ripped me off for over £45K - well, the statute of limitations runs out mid July and I've been told if certain issues that support our case haven't been solved by mid May, it's unlikely that the case will go to court unless we are willing to risk another £60K in legal fees being thrown away), so I'm not really best placed spending hours playing and reviewing games at the moment.

However, I will say, from my limited amount of game play time, that I think this is a game worth checking out. Despite it's morbid subject matter, it has a kind of charm (at least from my point of view as I love hand drawn and unusual games). I'll definitely been keeping my copy for a rainy day, when I'm in a better mood to play games. I may even purchase the game via Steam when i have some spare cash. :).

Pestis

In Brief

An atmospheric medieval simulation

Introduction:

Pestis is set in the middle ages during the great plague. You are a novice plague doctor, who has been sent to a local village to stamp out the plague. Before you leave you attend the academy and receive specific training in the art of potion making and ways to heal the populace. Your wish is firstly to heal the village you are to be sent to and secondly to impress your mentor and thus increase your status among the plague doctor fraternity.

Whiterabbit-uk 9th April 2019

Installation:

Pestis downloads to a 23.3 MB zip file that unzips to two files, (a set-up executable and a read me). The game installs to the following path by default, but can be changed if you wish. The installed game is approximately 23.6 MB in size.

C:\Program Files (x86)\Pestis

Five shortcuts are installed to the desktop, four of which can be safely deleted . If you want the games shortcut to be installed to the desktop, make sure the appropriate checkbox is checked. Even if this is left unchecked you will still get the four internet shortcuts installed to the desktop; (i.e. Falco Space - Online Game!, FalconLine Online Games Website, FalcoGo WebGL Games! and Free Games Downloads!). Also, if you don't like icons installed to the quick launch task bar, make sure the appropriate checkbox is unchecked when the 'additional task's window appears (after the Select Start Menu Folder window).

The Game:

The game includes a tutorial called 'The Academy', where written instructions tell you to use the WASD keys to move around. You are to kill the rats by walking up to them and pressing the E key. You are also warned to avoid any secretions from the dead animals.

The indicators along the top of the screen from left to right include a health meter, and four counters for scoring points for various actions. I've not had the time to figure out what all four of the counters indicate yet as I keep dying before I can finish a level. When you kill a rat you score 25 points which are added to the last counter that looks like a rat. Just below the health meter are the numbers for the three plants (Green, Red & Blue) and on the far right is the number of lives you have.

The aim is to find the different colored plants so that you can make up the four types of potions. To collect these plants, walk up to them and press the action key (E); There are four useful potions you can create using combinations of these three plants Fire for putting down rat holes and on corpses, health potions, potions from the plague victims and protection potions for yourself. You can kill rats by walking up close to them and pressing the E button, however you must avoid the clouds of secretions given off by both the rats and the infected people. If you are hit by any of these clouds you will be infected yourself and your health will gradually decline until you are dead, or by collecting enough of the three potion types to create the necessary potions to protect and/or cure yourself as well as cure the infected people that you'll find wandering around.

Whiterabbit-uk 9th April 2019

Controls:

WASD = Movement
E = Action
1 = Green potion
2 = Red potion
3= Blue potion
Q = cancel potions
Enter = Choose/Pause
Esc = Pause
Fire potion = 6 x Red potions (used for rat holes and corpses)
Health potion = 3xRed & 3xGreen potions (for self)
Potion from plague = 3xGreen & 3xBlue potions (for self)
Protect potion = 6xBlue potion (for self)

The game can also be played using a controller

Conclusion:

Quite a simple game, with hand drawn graphics. My only gripe with this game is the movement of your protagonist. It feels like there's a problem because movement feels like its in fits and starts. i.e. when you press any movement key (WASD) you don't always start to move immediately and when you do, you'll come to a stop frequently. This makes it hard to navigate the map effectively. Still, with practice I'm sure such issue will not detract from the game. Despite the movement issue I still think this game is worth downloading.

Other Reviews and Videos of Pestis:

You can read other comments about Pestis (mainly positive) HERE

Also, you can see a couple of game play videos of Pestis HERE & HERE.

Suggestions:

After you've had an opportunity to play today's giveaway please take a few moments to give some positive or negative feedback; 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. If you wish to post a review or comment about the game later, you can access the comments section by going to the game giveaways 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 the appropriate page for you to post your comment or review. Alternatively, you can google the name of the game and include Gamegiveawayoftheday in the search. This should give you a list of links to whenever this game was given away.

If you miss today's game giveaway you can always get the game via Steam HERE for £1.69/$1.99/€1.59/₽ 61

Problems getting the game to work:

If you're having problems installing or activating or getting Pestisto work please visit the FAQ's Thread HERE and read through the communities comments because sometimes fixes have already been posted, for example, a common issue seen since the Themida wrapper was introduced three years ago is that some community members installation of the game are blocked by their security because Themida code has been known to hide malware, (usually an error message is flagged for example 'The executable is corrupted' even though in reality it is not); so as a precaution some anti malware programs will block and even delete the suspect installation files even though the files (i.e. the setup, read me and setup.gcd files are actually totally free from malware. This issue can be solved either by rebooting your computer in safe mode with networking or a quicker method is to temporarily turn off your security software to allow the installation. You could also try white-listing the setup.gcd file. In the almost 12 years this game giveaway site has been operating there has 'never' been a game given away that was infected with malware.

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

I'd like to take this opportunity to thank the developer Diedemor Studio Games and the distributor Falcoware Games for giving away Pestis 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:

If Pestis doesn't doesn't interest you, but you still hanker for something new to play, you'll find details of some game deals whether they be sale items, heavily discuounted (up to 95%) indie bundles or games being given away for free HERE (I've not updated the thread in a while, but most of the links still take you to the latest deals).

The rest of the information that used to be posted in the game review can be found in the forums HERE. Finally, check out Delenns threads for details of other free games and offers; she often updates with the latest deals from Indie Gala, the Humble Store and others HERE; plus other community members sometimes post details of free games elsewhere in the game discussion forums HERE, (current deals are usually on the first page of the game discussion forums).

The free game over at Epic Games is now The Witness; a single-player game in an open world with dozens of locations to explore and over 500 puzzles; (sells for £29.99/$39.99/€36.99/₽699). From the 18th of April Transistor (sells for £15.46/$19.99/€16.79/₽435) is available free HERE; a sci-fi-themed action RPG where you discover the world of transistors; from the creators of Bastion. Indie Gala have removed some of the games that were available last week and added new ones to their free games list, (at least 20 free games are available via their recently added showcase section) that includes adventure, RPG, Simulation, strategy and casual games (most recent first) i.e. Survivalist (a huge open-world Role Playing Game), Galactic Missile Defense - ( an endless/leaderboard-based shooter and tower defense game, where you must protect Earth from the invading Martians), Super Destronaut - (A retro space invaders clone), Siluman Project - (An RPG Maker game where the purpose of the game is to defeat monster girls bosses and reach the ending based on what action do you do), Five Nations - (A futuristic real-time strategy game that follows the events of a mind-bending opera of space about the survival of humanity), False ReBirth - (Another RPG Maker game - A psychological, story-focused game about the last remaining human), GOR - Gorilla Office Rampage - (Top down action game - play as a monkey and you smash stuff), Home is where Chip is - (Casual simulation), Age of Fear: The Free World - (introduction to the series' tried-and-true gameplay, focusing on non-linear exploration and combat in an Open World style), Die Legende von Saya: Befehl aus der Dunkelheit - (aka The Legend of Saya: Command from the Dark) - (Action adventure RPG), What Never Was, The Last Humans: Awakening, Childhood, Dunwell, Safe Not Safe, Hi Hotel, Bugs Must Die, Cuadradito y Circulito, Hellino, Hovership Havoc and Wake Up , or you can find them all HERE. Finally, there are some excellent bargains on sale via Steam HERE.