Hi again, Many thanks Stephen for explaining how to uninstall, shows how I cling to my Games and don't bother to 'get rid' of them nowadays:)..,not to know that Giveaways have no uninstall.exe. Old habit from RealArcade times I guess, where installation Files and Games on top of it were sometimes taking too much space. If You're going on Your holls soon - have a really good time and a break from it all somewhere nice:)!

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

Thanks Fran. I know what you mean re keeping games. I have a spanned rive totalling 4 TB (that's 4 thousand gigabytes) totally full together with another £ TB drive almost full of games. :) I hate deleting games. :)

I enjoyed playing this game. It cant compete against Plants vs. Zombies though. But i will keep playing it once in awhile and it has its thumbs up well deserved.

Hi Stephen,

Both yesterday's and today's games seem interesting to me, but with my husband feeling lousy, I haven't been asking him me to help with the downloads, so I'll be looking for them to be given away again in the future. I don't think I've come across a game like this, but from your review and the linked videos, I think I might enjoy it, at least for a bit. I guess I would describe it as a mix of strategy and time management, figuring out how to defend the emeralds. Thanks to GGOTD and Alawar for this offering, and to you for your good work reviewing. Hope you have a smashing holiday.

Cara in NC

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

Thanks Cara. It's very simple to install. all you do is unpack the zip file once it's downloaded then click on the orang set up file. It automatically installs the game. Then go to where it's installed to (C://Games) and right click on the executable (easily found as there are only a few folders and files in the main folder) from the drop down menu select send to, and from that drop down menu select Desktop (create Shortcut). That's it. :)

A more difficult version of Plants vs Zombies, not bad at all but gets too difficult for lesure/fun too quickly for me. A game that looks nice and runs smoothly, but..

I can't control my mouse in the game, there's such a delay. I couldn't click where I wanted to click, and I couldn't quit the game. Keyboard and mouse were out of control! What's with the navigation system? Made me wonder if I needed to be drinking to play this game?

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

Have you tried Game Booster, which is free and available from Razer. That free's up a good chunk of memory. The problems you describe does appear to indicate a lack of memory *tohugh I may be wrong). Running Game Booster may enable you to run the game witohut the mouse problems. Other fixes include updating your graphics drivers, going into compatibility mode and changing some of the attributes etc. Check the FAQ's section over in the Game Discussion forums (in the sticky section). I think I've linked to it in my review as well). Sorry I can#t be of more help.

The description that it is similar to Plants vs Zombies is accurate. I was hoping for a standard tower defense type game but I enjoy PvZ so I am sure I will enjoy it.
If you have played PvZ you will know how to play this.
Install was smooth. Sound seemed a bit louder than normal. Seems a bit stretched on my 1366x768 monitor.

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

Have you seen the trailers for the new P&Z? A first/third person viewpoint, not dissimilar to Sanctum 2. Looking forwards to that release. buying it via Origin

it installed and ran well on W7
Looks like a light hearted fun game.
Thanks GOTD

The Origin deal for The Sims 2 must be over, it appears that they have removed it from their site. A search for The Sims 2 only displays 2 Sims 3 points with a 2, ie 200, 2000, etc.. No mention of Sims 2 at all.

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

Hi

Did you follow the link provided in the forums?
i.e.

http://help.ea.com/en/article/how-to-get-the-sims-2-ultimate-collection/

This gives you a redemption code. It doesn't show on the main site when you click on free stuff. you have to go via the link provided above.


Peggle is still available for free as are the following games:

FIFA World
Star Wars: The Old Republic
Command & Conquer: Tiberium Alliances
Need for Speed: world
Battlefield Heroes
Battlefield Play for Free

It's worth keeping on eye open in the Origin store as they have been givving away some excellent games over the last fre months (for example Dead Space and Battlefield 3

Whiterabbit: Thanks for the review, I wouldn't have downloaded it if it weren't for your comparisons to Plants versus Zombies. One of my favourites but I've always felt it was a bit too easy.

Thanks to GOTD for the game, too!

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

I hope the London trip was successful. :)

i really like this game, and I kept it for another time. But I don't have a mouse, and doing this type of thing with a finger on a laptop pad is too slow. (that's why I usually stay away from time management games)

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

I have loads of spare mice, and would send you one if postage wasn't so expenive now. You can pick up a cheap but functional mouse from Amazon or Ebay. It would improve game play on many games. :)

Hi Whiterabbit

Just to let anyone who is interested in the GTR Evolution DLC download from Bundle Stars, you don't have to already own the base Race 07, as it's also part of the giveaway.

John

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

Thanks John, already have the whole package, so didn't realize the main game was included. Makes sense though.

Despite it's age, Race 07 is still a superb game.

Alright! Another new game to play! LOVE THIS WEEKEND! :)
Thank you GGOTD and Alawar Entertainment!!!!!

Stephen, I hope you have a GREAT vacation!

Well I got to test it on a computer with a bigger screen and higher resolution and apparently I spoke too soon -oops

It stores its settings in the registry under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\NGSLtd

and creates a folder in
Userprofile\AppData\NGSLtd

Still had no issues trasnfering it to another PC though so I guess its not portable but it is pre-registered

Really good game, probably the best tower game I've ever played. But it does get hard really quick.

Todays game is built with Unity and might require dotnet2
(-unconfirmed...something checked to see if I had NET2.0 installed,
could have been the setup.exe IDK.)

also opens on WindowsXP fine but if you have a screen resolution less than 1024x768 it is not supported and will close.

Once extracted the game is portable and doesnt seem to leave any settings/files on the host OS.

I went to the Origin website for The Sims 2 Ultimate Collection, but it says "nothing found"...please HELP...I love The Sims!!!

Towers of Oz is a very cute(and fun!) tower defense game. It installed perfectly on a windows 8.1 laptop. In a way Towers of Oz reminds of Plants versus Zombies but this one is way nicer. Seriously cool, thank you for this download!

The sound accompanying the splash screen is so annoying and loud that I almost deleted the game without playing it.

As Stephen noted there isn't a tutorial, nor any help whatsoever. This makes it a little annoying when you miss the instruction about the arrow keys moving the view so that you can see what is happening.

That even though you've collected enough mana you can't immediately build a structure is unpleasant.

The click to select and place mechanism is very rough on both of the machines upon which I tried to play.

All in all I found this game unpleasant to play.

I thought Towers of Oz looked appealing - I really like the screen shots in the review - and I'm always happy to see an offering from Alawar, but I was surprised and disappointed by this game. It turned out to be what I consider to be poor software. It was a massive resource hog, and veered between skipping between screens unexpectedly, extreme sluggishness and then total lack of response - whereupon I was forced to use another program to terminate it. Thanks anyway for the giveaway - and thumbs up to the graphic artists.

Hi, sorry to be a nuisance:(, as I do appreciate interest in this Game by Others (I too generally like Alawar Games and have quite a few), but I basically downloaded it for my husband, and as it happens he started the Game and pretty much soon lost interest..I know for sure I won't play it either (even though I like it's cute graphics, but the whole 'concept' is not really my cup of tea, sorry) ---

AND! Here comes my Question: how on earth do I go about Uninstalling this Game since there is NO TRACES of it in any of Uninstallers I have. I tried (simply) Windows looking both for 'Towers of Oz' and just in case Alawar T of O - nothing, run 'iObit' - nothing, run 'Soft Organizer' - nothing, run 'Advanced Uninstaller PRO 11' - nothing. Installed Game again (in location on F Drive where most of my Games are, over an earlier today installation) - this time using Soft Organizer's tracking Programs, and finally installed it also on Drive C in Program Files(x86) using again Soft Organizer with tracking Option.. This time Soft Organizer is showing 2 Entries of tracked 'Programs' (naturally that Game!?), over 100 Registry instances, and few in 'Folders' - BUT none of them after closer look bares Name 'Towers of Oz', 'Towers of Oz.exe', Alawar, or even word game.., so before I do some 'damage' and remove anything - I need Advice here. Sorry again if this is boring, but the whole thing is a complete mystery to me. Is this Game 'portable', is it a matter of simply deleting it's Folder(s) on both Drives, or indeed what?? I'm stuck. Have a nice Sunday, my afternoon is slighty wasted already..:)

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

Hi Fran, sorry for the very late moderation. Been out for most of the day, shopping for the vacation, then slept for several hours. Most giveaways come with no uninstaller. Basically you go to where the game is installed (C://Games) and delete the games folder. Very few entries are placed in the registry so little or no impact there.

Since I have bought many Alawar games and like them all, I decided to install this and had no problems doing so on my Win7/64 system. It just doesn't seem up to Alawar's usual quality for some reason though, and I just can't put my finger on why...maybe it's the not really loveable characters?, the quality of the graphics?...or maybe I just need a better graphics card to appreciate the 3-D effect? I initially had lag with the game's custom cursor (default), but after unchecking in options it works fine now. I've played through to the third level and am not sure if I'll keep this, since I already have Plants vs Zombies which has better graphics and more humorous characters (IMO). I would never pay $9.99 for it, which is what I paid for PvsZ on a CD-rom. Thanks for the trial Alawar and GGOTD, and look forward to more of your games.

How does one find Sims2 on Origin? I only see Sims3 and 4.

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

You can get the game by following the link below:


http://help.ea.com/en/article/how-to-get-the-sims-2-ultimate-collection/

You do need an Origin account and be signed in to get the game. There's a redemption code that you need to input that you'll find when you follow the link.

@Whiterabbit: Thank´s for the instruction but the screenshots show me enough: Not my genre and the badest Alawar-Game I´ve ever seen...
"Mana fountains" - sorry, I spent my time not for such childish toys.

Just to mention it, is someone is interested. You can get The Sims 2 Ultimate Collection free on Origin till July 31 by using the product code I-LOVE-THE-SIMS.

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

Mentioned in my review above. :)

Sorry - I don´t know what´s to do - deinstall...

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

Watch some of the videos I've posted in my review. This game is well worth persevering with. It could have been better with a decent tutorial, bit the game is quite simple. Basically you have to build up defenses agains the oncoming hoards of enemy soldiers by building mana fountains which ar eused as currency, then, with the proceeds from those, buy defenses such as towers that shoot fire balls, walls to stop the soldiers temporarily , bombs and other defenses. The first thing you have to do each time you start a new level is to create a mana fountain. Usually I create two of these beofre creating defenses. Then wjhen the first soldier starts to attack, I build a tower. Once you get more than one lane it gets harder, but not rushing into building defenses on any particular lane until it's absolutely necessary will help you to win the game.

Towers of Oz:


In Brief:

A tower defense game similar to Plants and Zombies.








Installation:

Today’s game giveaway is Season Match a match three game

The giveaway downloads to a 77.8 MB zip file that unpacks to a read me and dual activation and set up module. To new game giveaway visitors that means just install the game and it should automatically register because the activation module is wrapped in with the set up file. The game installs to

C:\Games\TowersOfOz_game

The installed game is 85.7 Mb in size. The game works on Win 7 and Win 8 platforms. I no longer use Vista or XP so can't confirm whether it works on those operating systems.

There is no shortcut installed to the desktop or the Stat menu programs list, so, make a note of where you install the game so that you can create a shortcut yourself.








If you get any problems once the giveaway is over, or late in the day (there's no moderation usually for the last five or six hours until the last half hour or so of the giveaway) please also post your comments over in the forums.




Introduction:

Help Timothy gain his footing in the wondrous 3D world of Oz and then guide him as he battles wooden soldiers, saber-toothed tigers and giant frogs in intense tactical battles. Unlock new attacks, use strategy to eliminate foes and defend your towers to the last brick! With simple point-and-click gameplay, eye-popping graphics and a storyline that will have you in stitches, Tower of Oz offers hours of fun for the whole family!
blockquote>



Reference accessed HERE 26th July 2014










The Game:

Todays game is a tower defense game similar in mechanics to Plants & Zombies, except instead of Plants and Zombies we have towers and soldiers. . As you progress thruogh the levels you are introduced to new defenses such as bombs, lightning, double shooters, blocking walls etc, but there are also negative atticking forces, with upgrades such as the drummer, who gives the attacking forces more strenght, so they are harder to destroy. There is no tutorial as such, but the simple instructions given at the beginning are enough to get you started. This is a tactical game. you need to create your defenses sensibly or you will be over run. Mana is important as this is your currency for purchasing the other defenses. Don't place your defenses randomly, for example, only place towers and other defenses in the various lanes once you see an attacking soldier in that lane. Build up as many mana fountains as you can in between creating defenses. I found two rows of mana fountains sufficient once you got past level 6.









Unfortunately I don't have time to write up a full review of this game. I would have liked to have explored the game further becasue Plants and Zombies was an excellent game, but I have to get ready for my vacation. Needs must, I have clothing to buy and essentials to find (still not unpacked a lot of stuff due to building woes previously mentioned a few months ago)





System Specifications:

Operating System: Windows XP/Windows Vista/Windows 7/Windows 8
CPU: 2.5 GHz
System RAM: 2048 MB
DirectX: 9.0
Hard Drive: 92 MB












Images & Video:

I've posted around 45 images to one of my photobucket accounts, which you can see HERE. I've also posted a few video's of game play HERE and HERE, HERE and HERE and HERE and HERE

Conclusion:

I loved Plants & Zombies (P&Z), so have so far enjoyed playing this game. I do think it's a little harder than P&Z, as the game progresses faster, with your enemy soldiers moving much faster than the zombies in P&Z; that said, with a little practice, you should overcome the initial difficulties. This promises to be an interesting and challenging alternative to the more sedate Plants and Zombies game.

I highly recommend downloading this game. It's challenging but a lot of fun to play. Don't be put off by the lack of a decent tutorial. Once you've picked up the gist of how to play the game, I’m sure you'll love it. Watching the videos should give you an idea of the rules for this game.

My advice is create a couple of mana fountains first, then only buy the defenses for the lanes that require defenses, i.e. wait until a soldier starts moving towards the crystals in a particular lane before you start to add any sort of defense. Once past level 5 or 6, by the end of the level you should have at least one row, if not two rows of mana fountains. The more of these you have, the quicker you can purchase new defenses; of course that is determined by the cool down for each defense as it takes up to a minute to be able to create new towers, lightning, bombs and walls etc. As you progress, more defenses become available, as mentioned above, I’ve been unable to progress beyond level 7 at this time, so can’t tell you what other defenses there will be, but if the game follows in the footsteps of P&Z, they promise to be interesting.

I’ll be back moderating and reviewing on the 16th August. In the meantime, I hope everyone is having a great summer. :)










Scoring:

Game play - 8
Graphics - 7
Audio - 7
Re-playability - 8
Originality – 7

Total = 37 out of 50 or 7.4 out of 10

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Games, Games, and yet more Games plus Download, Installation & Game play 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.






This weekends Steam deals are 75% off the Dead Island Franchise (brilliant zombie game, with an open world feel), 50% off Broken Age, 75% off Ace Combat Assault Horizon - Enhanced Edition, 80% off Ace of spades (Minecraft inspired shooter), 80% off Trine 2: Complete Story, 80% off Trine complete, 81% off Two worlds II: Velvet Edition (if you like third/first person RPG's, you'll love this game, especially the price at only £3.60), 75% off Flatout: Ultimate Carnage (if you have Flatout 2, this is just an upgrade of that game with improved graphics and 12 cars to race agains instead of 8), 65% off Train Simulator 2014 (the most expensive dlc set of any game I've seen - over £2000 worth of dlc available, but the base game is still well worth getting if you like train sims - IMO it's the best one), 75% off Frozenbyte Collection, 75% off Flatout Complete pack, 50% off 100% Orange Juice, 80% off Toki Tori, 50% off Worms Armageddon, 66% off Gas Guzzlers Extreme, 60% off Warhammer 40 000: Kill Team, 50% off Samuri Gunn, 50% off Daedalic Adventure Bundle, 90% off Puzzler world 2, 50% off FortressCraft Evolved, 50% off Selnam Defence, 75% off Strike suit Zero: Directors Cut, 90% off Shadowgrounds and Shadowgrounds : Survivor, 80% off Solar 2, 75% off Sword of the Stars complete Collection, 66% off Darkout as well as loads more. There are over 100 reductions this week. The latest 48 hour deal is Rise of Nations with 33% off (only released last month).










You'll also find some excellent deals over on the following Game sites, some of which have summer sales on.

GreenManGaming
Gamersgate Summer Sale
GOG
Desura
Gamestop
GameFly

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 Steamwork 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. I've updated the Indie Game bundle thread to include all the latest bundles. you'll find that thread HERE. I've

The latest IndieGameStand game is Monsters, a 2D action shooter inspired by the classic arcade game Robotron 2084. If it gets Greenlit you will get a Steam key. .
The latest Daily Indie game is Revenge: Rhobar's Myth, an open world game of magic and exploration. You can get two keys if you pay more than $1.09 (at the time of writing); (one for a friend or family member perhaps?). You'll find that deal HERE. They also have a mini bundle of several games that’ll cost a minimum of $0.99 HERE

Most of the bundles retail for around $5 give or take a few dollars, but you can pay as little as a dollar for some. Oh yeah, before I forget, if you already own Race 07 on Steam, you can get the dlc GTR Evolution for free via PC Gamer in conjunction with bundle Stars. also, if you have the Origin client installed, you can get The Complete Sims 2 for free this week.















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 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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