Wednesday 23 January 2013

Freeware Goodies: Tower of Heaven.

Sometimes there's some good that comes out of freeware. Something original, something brilliant, something challenging and more importantly, something that makes you wonder why you haven't purchased the damn game!


That game ladies and gentlemen, is a game called Tower of Heaven! (Tengoku no Tou)



As you can see in these screen shot, they possess that green tone a certain portable game system I really liked used to have ;) That's one of the many reasons why I like the game. But there's more than just aesthetic style to this wonder of freeware entertainment. The games' story is simple, there's a little green man going to attempt to climb the tower of heaven. The voice of god doesn't like this, but he set up challenges for our little green friend. These are done by 5 laws, these laws you collect in the game actually make the game harder, but make you think about how else to solve each room in the Tower of Heaven and ascend to the top.


  • Law 1, Thou shalt not touch golden blocks.
  • Law 2, Thou shalt not touch blocks or walls from the side.
  • Law 3, Thou shalt not walk left.
  • Law 4, Thou shalt not touch living things.
  • Law 5, Thou shalt no longer check the laws.

These crazy rules makes the later levels of Tower of Heaven a real pain, but the beauty to Tower of Heaven's game play is that it tries not to be a "I Wanna be the Guy" or "I Wanna be the Booshy" with over the top difficulty. These are puzzles and platforming that are achievable and incredibly rewarding.


Pretty much the platforming does look a bit like IWBTG, but I can say that I've beaten this game many times, and it is possible to beat! It's not made to be impossible, it's made to challenge you! You just have to figure out how to reach the next door with the laws given to you.


The music is damn good too! Composed by the artist, Flashy Goodness, the music has an upbeat 8 Bit style that somehow works very well with this game. In fact Flashy Goodness has worked on a few other freeware titles too such as Super Smash Land and Grid Defender 2. Flashy's music has been used in games that require actual money to purchase them, such as the iOS game, Bean's Quest, and in the upcoming KickStarter funded PC and Mac game, Sealark: An Oceanic Adventure.

The game itself is short, but it's incredibly rewarding when you beat the game, and it has an ending that I would say even beats the endings in most "Triple A titles". There's just something chilling and scary about the god in the game, and there's an element of upward struggle, but this game is like the digital equivalent of climbing Mt. Everest. Once you beat the game, you let out a big sigh, and you feel good about beating the game, a good job on the challenge front.

In my opinion, this game needs more recognition. Even though it's a cult game in some hardcore eyes. But it really is worthy of everyone to play it at least once just to know what the big fuss is about. There are a few ways you can play the game, you can head over to the coder's website, askiisoft.com , where you can download the Windows executable; or if you're a Mac or Linux user, you can head over to Newsgrounds and play the flash version of the game.

Tengoku no Tou...

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