New Software To Be Reviewed Review

Heroes of Hellas 2: Olympia is a tile-matching game from Alawar, and I enjoyed every moment of the gameplay! The game is set up in such a way that you can go through suspenseful moments at times, while doing simple puzzle-solving.

The story behind the game is that you have been designated to build a new city at Olympia, where all the good people in the world will slowly come and settle. You also have to fight against the Evil Demon who has taken over the rest of Hellas. To build your city, you need resources like gold coins, semiprecious stones, and get help from heroes and gods of ancient times. That's where the tile-matching comes in.

To clear the tiles off the board, you have to click a tile that has similar adjacent tiles, and you move your mouse over these to make chains of 3 or more. When you do that, more tiles will fall from the top filling up the empty space. Having 5 or more in a single chain gives you gold coins, useful for city-building. Sometimes you have to recover semiprecious stones, or pieces of ancient heroes' amulets. Putting the pieces together gives you access to a picture puzzle, where you must find missing pieces of 4 items. In fact, it's progressive, meaning you have to complete one item first and then use it to find a piece from the next item. Solving this puzzle summons the hero or god from the past, and they help you in tile-matching in various ways. When you pass through levels, you get new tiles to match, and that keeps the game appealing.

There are powerups, such as lightning bolts, which match up with any tile, and will release powerful arrows in vertical, horizontal or diagonal directions to destroy tiles in their paths. The hourglass will add time to your clock. As you level up, the games become more and more challenging. There can be monoliths covering the tiles, and they can only be freed by having an adjacent tile go in a chain. Some tiles will be roped to their positions and one way to free them up is to get matching tiles in adjacent locations. Gods will also come to your aid with their special powers, although they will need recharging time!

The short-term goals are varied. Some of the puzzles are time-constrained, and some are won by collecting a designated number of tiles or semiprecious stones. The most suspenseful games are those where you have to solve the puzzle within a given number of moves.

I was expecting the city-building to be strategic. But unfortunately, there's nothing much to do there, except using your points to build facilities that affect the food supply, security or the culture of the settlement.

The narration and the music are very good. Graphics and animations are extremely clear and colorful. There are 90 levels, and 8 minigames. Overall, I will give Heroes of Hellas 2: Olympia five stars for keeping it cool!