The Last Stand: Dead Zone

The Last Stand: Dead Zone is the latest edition to The Last Stand series of epic zombie games. The games  are a product of renowned game designer ConArtist. The latest, Dead Zone uses some features from Union City and is the most daring and boldest of the series. Currently in its Beta version and only available through Facebook, The Last Stand: Dead Zone is a fun, challenging and a real time waster if you let it. And I mean that in a good way.
TLS and TLS2 were third-person shooter zombie games and featured a shoot 'em up to defend your camp. The third, Union City, was an adventure-travel through the mean streets, looking for survivors, weapons and food. 

The Last Stand: Dead Zone - City Map. Yes, my character's name is StubbornFool Com.

There are a couple drawbacks to the game, I will get to that later. Overall it is a blast. The idea in The Last Stand: Dead Zone is to grow your compound. DZ is a mix of role playing, logic, and adventure and is as much different, as it is more advanced than its predecessors. Instead of running and escaping you are building a home, scavenging for tools and food for survival. You characters will build, gather scraps to build a home and compound and new society all the while shooting and pummelling zombies.

What the programmers need to do is to take this out of real time and speed up game play. There are some free options to to speed up play by up to five minutes. Otherwise you can pay real cash.

TLS: Dead Zone - Mission

The length of certain missions prevents you from playing continuously throughout the day. You will need to take at least fifteen minute breaks as the game progresses, and up to two hours, as your team returns from their more advanced missions. This too can be sped up if you are willing to spend some real cash. Options are there for community play, whether attacking or helping other players. Otherwise you are smashing AI driven zombies and invading homes set up by the system.

And now the negatives. It's has the potential to be a money grab. Real time needlessly extends the game. The concept of a real time game is to ensure the gamer comes back. It extends playtime over days and even months. It also frustrates those amongst us who want to see a conclusion to their game. I finally gave up on Mafia Wars after realizing there was no end in sight. Just as you are approaching the finish line, it would be moved back 100 metres and your sprint would become a marathon.

You can play for free, pay as little a a couple of bucks (dollars, pounds or Euros, hey it's Facebook, all money is taken equally) in real money to buy fuel which will help you complete your tasks. Again, let me restate, you can play for free without any setbacks.

If you have an older computer or a slow video  card you may experience slow play. Make sure that your video card is supported at Stage3D unsupported chipsets. Just like any game with a good following, you can check out the Wiki here. Walkthroughs are available. And as it is a Facebook game, you won't have much luck finding game cheats. The Last Stand: Dead Zone is violent, creative and fun for any zombie enthusiast and the adventure - RPG gamer. If you like Mafia Wars or The Walking Dead, The Last Stand: Dead Zone can be considered a combination of the two.

The Walking Dead Game

It started with the graphic novels, then on to the TV series. The folks over at AMC have created a pretty cool interactive website, included are some themed Walking Dead games. Under AMC Originals click the link to the The Walking Dead page. On it you have the option of The Survival Test, Trivia Tests Comic Book quizzes or The Atlanta Run. Atlanta Run is well crafted but simple RPG. I originally embedded the game into this post but my browser kept crashing. So here is the direct link to the game. Look for season two of The Walking Dead to start sometime in October 2011 on AMC. As of today no official announcement has been made.

Road of the Dead - A Zombie Killing Game

The undead have taken over the city, and you must escape. No, no, sit down. It's a game. In Road of the Dead, you the driver must run over the zombies, and crush the soldiers that are trying to prevent your escape. Fulfil that double fantasy of yours of driving on the open road and destroying the walking dead. Who doesn't like a road trip? I call shotgun!

You must protect your vehicle and yourself. Avoid the vehicles blocking the road while sparing the lives of the civilians. Your progress gets saved at various checkpoints. You keep driving for as long as your car is intact and you aren't shot up by the soldiers or helicopter.

The customizable controls are not the easiest and in their default setting will cause carpel tunnel syndrome. Just go the options menu and change the settings, so that your steering is on one side of the keyboard and your honking and shooting, and punching is on the other side.

Look at the hideous zombie. Oh wait. That's Steve Buscemi.

Grow RPG - Game of the Week

Grow RPG is a great game. It has such a simple playing concept but will manage to keep you enthralled. I have to admit I have not been able to solve this one yet. Grow RPG is one of many games in a series created by the brilliant On, a Japanese programmer and game designer who runs the site eyemaze.com. Last week I featured another of On's creations, Tontie.

The concept behind Grow RPG, and most of the other games on the site, the player must drag or click the pieces in the correct order to complete the puzzle.

The animations are charming and intriguing as, depending on the order you select the pieces a different little series unfolds.

Simply drag your pieces into the centre of the Grow sphere and watch what happens. Try different orders until you maximize each piece. You have eighty moves in Grow RPG.

It's a Numbers Game

A simple numbers game , you may even call Chain Factor a mathematical Tetris. A Connect Four with more numbers?

While at first glance the board may appear intimidating, the concept is simple.

Eliminate the tiles based on their number.

A row of three tiles will wipe out tiles with the number three. A row of four will eliminate the Four tiles, etc.

The goal, remove as many tiles as possible and get the highest score.

Start off in Basic mode to learn the game. Later, try Power Mode. The Power feature allows you to use three different Power Ups which will help in clearing the board. The game's simple concept reveals a greater complexity at this level.

Survival Mode allows one Power Up and is considerably more difficult. Have fun!

Game of the Week PAC-XON !

Take two classic games. Mix them together and what do you get? You get Pac-Xon.

Pac-Xon is a clever mash up of Pac Man and Xonix (or Qix). Consider this a less repetitive version of Pac Man with a few more bells and whistles.

The idea of this game, and the original Qix, is to claim sections of the board until you have possession of 80%. You do this by building boxes, all the while avoiding the evil ghosts.

The game starts off easy enough but at each level more and more ghosts are thrown at you. Don’t forget to grab the fruit and power ups for some surprises.

This is a throw back game so don’t look for state-of-the-art graphics. It is basic and based on these two archetypal 80s games.The game board is controlled by your arrow keys.

Sunday Game of the Week - Soccer Balls

Just in time for the World Cup Finals. The goal of of the game Soccer Balls is to get a red card. 

Did your team lose? Was your country unfairly eliminated? Should the World Cup have instant replay? Do you want to take it out on the referees?

Make the referee angry by hitting him in the head with a soccer ball. Choose your team jersey, be it the Dutch or Spain, England, USA or Germany, etc. (hmm. why isn't there a Canadian jersey?)

Sunday Game Of The Week - Sonny

Sonny is my pick for game of the week. This could very well be the game of the decade. Sonny is an interactive epic RPG. Hosted at Armor Games, the cool graphics and great characters helped make Sonny one of the classics. It is also one of the most popular web games in recent years. In Sonny, you get thrown into the battle immediately as a reanimated corpse, gaining allies, weapons and strength and move through this linear story line, all the while guided by some basic scripted dialogue.

The author, Jakrin Juanbanich, better known as Krin, has put out several other terrific games but Sonny is my favourite. The game takes you through turned based battles against humans and humanoids of ever increasing power. Sonny is popular, already over 7 million gameplays on Armor Games, so popular it garnered a sequel. Sonny II has had 14 million hits. I consider the original far superior to the sequel. It's not new, but if you haven't discovered it yet, it's time to play Sonny.

Game of The Week - Super Text Twist

If you enjoy word games you will like this little time waster. Along the lines of Scramble this game requires you to spell out words from the available letters. Beat the clock by completing the list or find the six letter word to move on. The higher you go the more difficult it gets. Super Text Twist is a super word game.

click here -- Super Text Twist

Text Twist