Caveman Craig 7.4Mb
If you can take license over the fact that dinosaurs were not around at anywhere near the same time as humans, Caveman Craig is a very entertaining gather resources, and fight and kill dinosaurs game, while adding to your tribe and training them appropriately.
There is an extended ‘newer version’ Special edition at under $5, but this review will only however concentrate on the free version. The game has only had a brief mention before in the forum as one of the replies in the ‘Free Games Story’ post from two years ago HERE.
Caveman Craig has been rightly described as spectacular, and is delightfully fun. It has entertaining gameplay and cartoony graphics. The only thing that jars a bit early on in the game is the amount of time it takes to prepare food, needed to trade for new tribespeople. As the leader of this tribe of cavemen, Craig the caveman is a hunter, gatherer, food preparer, and new tribespeople trainer all rolled into one. Once you have trained a workforce of hunters, gatherers and preparers, you can let the gatherers and preparers sort out the berries and the dinosaur carcasses, while your hunters join you in hunting, and defending against marauding larger dinosaurs. As these larger dinosaurs can kill your workers and you, even in your cave, defending against these is a very important task. Each worker has to be trained individually, unlike games where you add already trained workers. Do note that you need to train preparers to prepare meat and berries. Same with gatherers too. You and your hunters (once trained!) throw rocks to kill dangerous dinosaurs, food dinos and enemy tribesmen.
So, controlling a tribe of cavemen that can learn different skills, it’s your goal to build your tribe from the ground up into being the most powerful tribe around. Fending off dinosaur and rival tribe attacks, gathering enough food, and hunting down fierce beasts are the order of the day, and you must teach your simpleton comrades to do these things too. As the game progresses, Craig and his tribe meet more and more obstacles such as carnivores, opposing cavemen tribes, and ultimately, the Tyrannosaurus Rex. As your tribe grows, you will receive reward bonuses, larger threats, and as a result the game becomes more tense and fast-paced. When you hear a feral roar in the distance, it’s time to be thoroughly alarmed and prepare to defend yourselves! The game utilizes a combination of survival and real-time strategy elements. Survive as long as you can and make your tribe more and more powerful! This is made more difficult in that Craig and the hunters aim is not that good and the rocks are thrown with varying trajectories, which all adds to the mayhem when a large dinosaur arrives on the scene! Just remember (manual saves) to save your game before you get killed!
It would be really great if you could pile up boulders as a defence, or make wooden stake barricades or lead dinosaurs off cliffs, or there were mammoths to fight or train, but we’ll have to see what’s included when, hopefully very soon, they get round to releasing Caveman Craig 2; which we are assured they are working on! (latest progress reports January 2011)! CC2 will be a commercial release though, I imagine. Hopefully there might be a free demo for CC2 when it arrives.
There’s a full tutorial with the free game, and you’re ‘soon’ ready to play on your own. It could do with a few extra skills and some more side diversions, but it’s otherwise awesome. We have a long fantasy of man living ‘alongside’ dinosaurs; . . . and you can live out this fantasy with Caveman Craig, to your heart’s content! There’s a minigame included too which is unlocked when you have grown your tribe sufficiently. The game has a good measure of humor, for instance training your hunters that rocks thrown at them hurt, or the brain signs above workers who are learning!
The game does need a modestly fast computer (1 - 2GHz), preferably 2Gb RAM and a 64Mb graphics card to run smoothly. Very Recommended game commendation!
Home Page HERE
Video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXQKcJu1kZI
Mac Version (Beta) HERE
