Yes there are random closings on the game. I've experienced that too.

Game is not good keeps crashing to desktop! I guess what you can expect for free! Think if the maker wanted you to buy his products would givaway game that works to try!!

I usually love these breakout-style games but I wasn't impressed with this one. I thought the game-play was too slow, there were too few and far between "extras" (but maybe you get more if you make it past level 3?), and I crashed after level 3 like a lot of the other people here.

I loved the gaem. I had played this game on line at another website and was so happy when it cme offered. The only pronlem I had was once installed it kept telling me there was something missing and to close the program. Never got it going. So if you figure it out, maybe you can offer it again, I would love to retry.

tried to download after unzipping and tried and tried... never had so much trouble.... I finally gave up... wouldn't know if it was a good game or not!!!

In reply to 89, no I had not heard that. Hey ho, wouldnt be the first time. If that happens then I will get the new windows, whatever that may be.

But for now, Vista is the latest version.

I downloaded late in the day, so got the later installation. The program doesn't crash at level 3, but it did crash a couple of times at different places in the program.

Same thing, too, that Dobbytheelf saw...3 times the game would continue on a level with nothing left to shoot. Twice it eventually went on after a minute or so, but last time it just kept going.

So, still buggy, guys. It's a fun game though, and I liked the graphics and motion of the boxes.

And, hey, for all you self-centered little snots out there...Just because YOU downloaded same game in December doesn't mean everyone here has, and YOUR taste in games is not everyone else's. GOTD isn't _nearly_ as repetitive as your snarky comments.

#83 - you may never read this, but make sure your internet cache is not set ridiculously high, like 1780 Megs. Set it down around 200-300 Megs (or less) and clear your cache. See if you can download files now.

#89 - "And please remember us Vista users…we are the future after all"

You must not have heard where Microsoft has stated Vista is the new Windows ME - they are slated to dump it as soon as the new version *can* be released (they are really jumping to move off Vista...)

There has already been a push from Dell and other companies to keep WinXP alive and well, there is just too much incompatibility with Vista right now. :(

I have Vista, and this seems to work fine with the patch, apart from the ball carrying on if one of the missiles destroys the last block.

That is rather annoying I must admit.

But a pretty game with fair graphics I think, thanks for letting us have it folks.

And please remember us Vista users...we are the future after all :-)

Still crashing, now uninstalled.

After trying to download patch and playing again, you guessed it another crash victim. Now uninstalled.

hi, i cannot seem to download this file, ive tried using firefox and internet explorer. All explorer does is give a warning about active x which i allowed but still wont download game, please help as this happens with all the games of this site.

i m getting nothing in the screen when i click on the real ball game icon. i have already done the work that is suggested by #39. help me

I couldn't remove this one from my hard drive fast enough. What a horrible game! In almost every way it's inferior to other "breakout" style games. The bonus items aren't as good. The levels are the same boring thing over and over again... oh yay, an occasional teleporter. Maybe I missed it, but I did not see a save game feature either. There are so many great breakout themed games available for $20 or less that you really have to make something special to get people to part with their money... so when you can't even keep people's interest with a free copy (and I LOVE breakout games), you're in trouble.

First off.. I feel your pain CJ (Comment 42). I also lost out on both of those games that sounded like they were good ones. I pay the cable co for high speed wireless dsl and thought that those should have been no problem for me. Yet, on both occasions I had to click on the download and the mirror sites several times with 10-15 minute waits JUST TO GeT TO THE DOWNLOAD PAGE. Then the one from two days ago (Zombie Smashers 2) wouldn't download. Out of 15 attempts to download only 6 ended with it downloading the zip file. 5 of those were blank zip files my comp said and the last one I gave up on when the installer said that it was missing files. So, I just gave up.

Yesterdays game, really sounded like a diamond in the rough, but it made my attempts with Zombie Smashers 2 look like the perfect day in comparison. I dont understand it because I downloaded the GotD fine just before these two. Yet, the GGotD wouldnt come through.

Todays GGotD just sounds like trouble from the get go. I dont think I will waste my time, energy, and HD space on this one. Thanks anyway GGotD.. and see ya when the new days start here.

ibwebb

BTW..anyone interested in what this 'SkinClock' is go here - http://skinclock.en.softonic.com/

Not sure why they are trying to sneak that in or push it on us, but I know I dont what that either.

I found that when the level does not stop (when the blocks are all gone), it only seems to happen when a rocket gets the last block instead of the ball. I can't get past level 14 because of this. Too bad it doesn't work well, it is a great time waster.
Perhaps ArcadeBird will fix this and re-release to Game GAOTD sometime in the future? And leave out the autoload of "skinclock" please? I feel like we are all beta testers with this game!

still problems with it crashing think i am going to just delete this game too much problems thanks any way and hope you get the bugs fixed

I thought this would overwrite my copy I bought from Realore, which was also given away in December. There are some subtle differences in that giveaway and his one from Arcade Bird. The intro screen is different. The start up image is mch nicer in this latest version, as is the fact that you cans ave your progress to the last completed level, whereas with Realores version you can only save your progress after each 10 levels. However the major diiference and in my opinion the most important is the difficulty settings. Realore has a fourth and more challenging difficulty level called nightmare, in which the ball is nearly twice as fast as the hard setting.

I'm suprised at the differences. I ont be keeping this version, although I do give it a 7 out of 10 for playability. the graphics are dated now compared to the more recent 3D gmes such as Magic Ball 3 Roboball and Shattera amongst others, but there are still some differences, so arkanoid fans should collect tis one if they haven't already. I seem to remember there were problems for a lot of the community downloading Real Ball the first time it was given away.

Thanks

the game looks like a good time killer but its just not my style so ill pass on this one. but thanks anyway GGOTD

oh and by the way, tank commander wasnt all that great to wait 4 hrs to download :(

it looks like a good time killer and what not but its just not my style

This could be a wonderful game but not as it is right now. It really needs some work. It does not keep track of lives correctly. The game ends for no reason. A number of times there is no ball when a level starts. At one point a ball was stuck up in the right hand corner and the level would not end. I really hope they work out the problems and allow us to play the "finished" version. Pity because it really is a nice game.

Thanks.

Really liked the games but it crashes all the time. I get to play for about five minutes and that's it.....as for the patch................wellll I need someone to hold my hand and point me in the right direction :)

Oh to be a computer whizz kid!

Addendum:
Hey, there are suddenly more comments since i posted earlier, with hours difference.
I have the same problem with levels 11 and 15 as the others and besides that, my desktop won't restore even though I changed the resolution in the game to the same settings as my desktop. You really need to patch things up a lot ArcadeBird.

Please, Giveaway, set up a page for alpha/beta testers for this kind of programmes.

As I said in an earlier post which didn't get published you are leaving a market open for a real trustworthy site that does protect it's customers and other suppliers of good software.

I like breakout games a lot, but this ain't worth the trouble. Pity!

How about if ArcadeBird answers the questions posed by #15 and #16 - Why does ArcadeBird feel they need to autoload some application with this game install?

Thanks

Game activated & installed w/o any problems. Setup has options for icons & start menu. Game has options for music & fx sound level, screen size, etc.. The help menu describes good & bad bonuses. Gameplay in "normal" mode was smooth & I didn't encounter any problems mentioned above. That may be because I ran the link from #39 above after I first activated & d/l set-up before I tried the game.
I agree the game is much like others of this genre. I may be bias, since I enjoy these games & have played many. This game has a different "feel" that I cannot put my finger on. I encourage you give it a try & I give it my "thumbs-up"

Hi ArcadeBird, the file I downloaded is Real-Ball(2).zip. Does that mean that we don't need to download the patch anymore?

Wasn't going to download this after reading about all the problems, but saw that there was a patch already available for download, so gave it a try. It allowed me to input my name, and played through both round 1 (game play was sooooo slow though...) and round 2 just fine, except that I reached the end of round two with nothing else to hit except those two little brackety things which did nothing when the balls hit them, and the round STILL didn't end. Then when I got out to the abort screen the game froze up, and then booted me out.

So even after a patch, this thing has got some major issues.

Essentially the same as a lot of other breakout type games, except those work properly. ;-)

Very beautiful game,

but there are a few error contained.

Sometimes all boxes away from the playing field, the program
thinks however there ar boxes available and i has only
one chance - terminate which play.

Sometimes the play breaks off in the middle in
the play with an error message. Also here i has only the chance - play to terminate!

Desirably this play would be to be found again in a new version
sometime here!

Yours sincerely Heiko

(GERMANY)

My English is very bad !

Thank you.

Maybe its not bug, but when the enemy rocket destroyes the last box, game is becoming nonterminating.

I had the same problem as many others. The first time I got to level 3, the game crashed. I reinstalled, getting an error message from activate.exe that the giveaway has expired, but I tried re-installing it anyway. The second time I played, I got the powerup that gives three balls, and two of them got stuck in the corner, much like what happened to Floppy Hamster. Because of this, I'm uninstalling. It's just a waste of hard drive space.

I could not get the game started. Is this just a win98 issue? I installed the patch and everything.

Hmmmm... Nice relaxing Arkanoid/Breakout type game. Downloaded OK, reminds me of Christmas with all the packages and the anumation of the falling blocks is good.
However, I got to level 38, obliterated all the blocks but the game just wanted to keep on playing, no blocks to blast, just the ball hurtling around the screen faster and faster until I missed it and lost my final life :-(
It's a keeper for me but I do hope the writers come up with a patch to iron out all the bugs.

Man what is with all these subpar games that don't install properly, crash easily, and deceitfully load trojans and other malicious software into your system? I'm really getting sick and tired of it. It is quite evident that GGOTD does not screen or test the software OR the companies that offer these "giveaways". It is completely unacceptable that we are still being offered products that contain mal-ware.

You guys need to start doing your job, or close this website down.

Yes, this is like another break out game, but this one was fun.
My only problem is that there are a lot of bugs that need to be fixed.
It froze on the llth stage and ball kept going and would not move until I stopped game and restart with a whole new score to proceed. Would not recognize some of the bonus's. and slow at moving to next screen.

Thanks for the patch, ArcadeBird. But I now can't get out of Round 2. The last two red bumpers at the top; one on each side don't break up no matter how many times they are hit! If you can fix this it would be a great game!

If you are using the "crashing" version, you can abort the game at the end of every level to keep your progress. (It's inefficient, but gets the job done.) It's better to use the patch instead, which was just posted.

I liked the game until it quit working. On level 7 of the first tier I cleared the blocks and it wouldnt advance to the next level. Fix the bugs and it's a pretty good game.

I can't edit/input a player name, and the game crashes at about level 6. Also it tried to install something into the autostart (see comments #15, #16). Basically, I liked the game but with these drawbacks, it's a thumb down. Sorry.

I thought i wasn't gonna give it a go. But i came back to see the comments. Then i saw the update. I think i'm gonna try it now that it's supposed to be fixed. Thanks Flopsy Hamster for having alarmed ArcadeBird and giving us a really detailed(too many balls though- how'd u juggle wid em??) report.

The patch helped the crashing problem for me. Now I have problems with the rockets. Seems that sometimes (not always) when the rockets get the last target for you, the game doesn't recognize that the round is cleared and you have no choice but to exit the round via 'suicide' -- letting all your remaining lives go. Getting better, but still not there. Will check in later today for another patch if one becomes available.

Hey it's back!
Hope they have fixed crash problem.

level 10 resulted in the death of the game

Game ran fine, great interface, very fun, HOWEVER, nothing on screen at end of level 10...just three balls with nothing to hit...let them die and still took me back to level 10 with NO targets...was fun while it lasted though.

..i ment comment nr 39

Nice game, GOTD ! But...only after installing the bug-fixer left by nr.36 !!!

Tip for the makers : Let the player "see" how many lives/balls he has left. I lost a ball in level 34,could continue playing, finished level 34, and then the set up for level 35 started, so far so good...but without a ball on the bat ! What was i to do ? I had to abort the game. Strange.