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The morning was cool and still as a thick fog crept over the battle fields.  The only sounds that could be heard was the distant sounds of clinking armor, and of cook fires being put out by kicking sand or water buckets.  “Prepare the firing line.” said Cunningham to his Bow-master.  Bow-master Rowan was also his Arch-Duke Cunningham’s Sergeant-at-Arms.  Rowan walked silently to the archers at the ready.  The fog was starting to lift as Rowan dropped his arm with his thumb pointing downward.  The line of archers dipped their arrows in small braziers which held a curiously blue flame.  Rowan raised his hand as the archers raised their bows, with their blue-flamed arrows, and then just as the fog lifted he dropped his arm!  There was still no sound except for the sound of hundreds of arrows being loosed into the air.

The glowing-blue bringers of death ripped into the opposing line, but instead of merely wounding or killing the men, the glowing barbs started to burn through them melting armor flesh and bone as though it were nothing.  Searing holes into them.  Soon the whole ground was littered with holes that looked as though no grass or flowers ever grew there or would ever grow again.  The opposing men were screaming as they were literally dissolved into nothing.  Lord Halsey looked up in horror as his men were being decimated everywhere.  He had only a few Legions left alive and they were dwindling.  He couldn’t possibly hope to take back his castle from the evil Cunningham.  Halsey’s Second-in-Command Richard Sharp ran up to Halsey.  “Sir, we can’t hope to defeat the Blue Flamed Death.  Shall I bring out the catapults?”

Lord Halsey knew the time had come.  They had exhausted every last avenue they could, and had to resort to the ultimate weapon.  The engineers had only completed it a few days ago, and it had been kept secret from the rest of the men until they could test it.  Only now it was too late to test.  It was now or never.  “Bring out the catapults you say?  Nay, nay, I say, bring out the TREBUCHET!”

Just what is a trebuchet?  Wiktionary defines it as a “medieval siege engine consisting of a large pivoting arm heavily weighted on one end.  Considered to be the technological successor to the catapult.”  It was the next step up, because of the weighted bucket at the bottom it could throw projectiles harder and faster than a catapult ever could.  What does this have to do with today’s browser-based game.  The game is called “Crush the Castle!” by Armor Games.  In the game you use a trebuchet to fling stones, and bombs to crush castles and the people inside them.  There are 18 castles in this game and each one is fairly unique.  The game is a physics-based, strategy/puzzle game.  Well I’m still in the dark as to what strategy could consist of.  I mean puzzles can have strategies behind them.  I guess it’s not like a war game, and more like a puzzle.  However, with puzzles there’s usually a finite number of solutions.  This is just trying to find the right point to release your stones or bombs, that’s why I would classify it also as strategy.  If you feel I’m in error please discuss it in the comments section of this post.

Crush the castle is very simple to play.  It’s just point and click.  In fact it’s so simple it’s almost pretty much just click.  See to start the trebuchet you click anywhere on the screen.  To release your projectiles you simply click again.  But beware, release too soon and  your projectiles don’t go anywhere, do it too late, and they simply roll on the ground, or also don’t go anywhere.  You must release them at the right time in order to arc to the point you want it to go.  It will take you a few tries to get the hang of it, but you will.  Along the way you’ll get a new kind of ammunition.  Starting with a regular sized stone, then a three-stone collection, then medium stone, then three medium stones, finally the large ones, and then there’s single bomb and triple bomb.  I managed to play through all the levels in an hour, your mileage may vary.  You actually get 5 shots or else you have to restart the level.  It’s just so darn fun, even if it is short and simple.  The current castle (level) is shown on the bottom, along with people killed out of the level, your inventory (type of ammo), and a reset button.  OH yeah I almost forgot there’s a level editor so you can build your own castles and save them and see if you can beat them.

Graphics are adequate, not great, not terrible.  Being physics based it means pieces and people tumble about when hit.  The sounds are nice an ambient, like the outside.  When you hit the castle it makes some funky sounds when the wall pieces hit each other.  But the real joy is the screams of the people you kill.  It even gets a little violent with blood and stuff.  Of course this is comic violence and is not really gory or anything.  It’s just fun.  It is hilarious though :-)  There is no music except for a little fan fare when you win.  Well there is opening music on the main menu, which is really good but that’s about it.

Final analysis:  You’ll just plain have fun with this simple little game.  It’s not very long and it’s not meant to be, just a little peaceful time full of misfortune and mayhem, ahem, that is for the people in the castle.

Name: Crush the Castle

Developer: Armor Games

Price: Free (flash)

Where you can play it: Here

Tags: addicting, Armor Games, Browser based (flash/java), Casual, free, Freeware, fun, game, games, independent, Indie, physics based, point'n'click, Puzzle, review, reviews, strategy

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 7th, 2009 at 11:30 pm and is filed under Browser based (flash/java), Casual, Freeware, physics based, Puzzle, Simulation, strategy. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.