Free Games for You

A list of free games to keep you occupied until Christmas

The month of December always lightens the bank account, and many PC gamers may feel withdrawal symptoms as they wait for the month-end present harvest. In an effort to stave away the gaming blues, we’ve rounded up a list of free games.

Synaesthete (https://typo3.digipen.edu/index.php?id=986)

Synaesthete puts you in control of Zaikman, who has to navigate the game world – the collective unconscious – and zap monsters using his affinity with the musical soundtrack and a number of power-ups. The game features original compositions of music ranging from ambient trance to regular trance. The entire game world is a visualisation which pulses and animates to the beat of the music.

FreeCiv (http://freeciv.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page)

One for the strategy buffs, FreeCiv is pretty much a recreation of the original Sid Meier classics, Civilization 1 and 2. The game is open source, and is constantly being tweaked, refined, and updated. There are numerous player created rule sets that can be used, and up to 30 players are supported over TCP/IP.

UFO: Alien Invasion (http://ufoai.sourceforge.net/?page=Home)

The year is 2084 and of course, the human race must defend itself against a terrifying alien enemy. Inspired by the X-COM, UFO: AI is a squad based tactical strategy game. The game has two main modes of gameplay, a base management and research mode, and a tactical combat mode. The game was developed on the Quake 2 engine and has some snazzy 3D graphics. The game supports up to 6 players over TCP/IP.

Scorched 3D (http://www.scorched3d.co.uk/)

This is the modernisation of a classic DOS game - Scorched Earth. That game was so classic, it was yelling at those darn Worms to get off its scorched lawn. Scorched 3D is a turn-based artillery combat game in which players must manage their ammunition, weaponry and economy during a battle of wits and skill in which there can only be one victor. The game supports multiplayer over TCP/IP, with a number of Internet servers up and running.

Nifflas' Games (http://nifflas.ni2.se/index.php?main=02Knytt)

Not a game, but a game developer, with three really cool 2D side-scrolling platform games available to play - Knytt, Knytt Stories, and Within a Deep Forest. All the games feature colourful and detailed pixelart, clever animations and intriguing storylines. Definitely worth checking out.

Alien Arena  (http://icculus.org/alienarena/rpa/)

One for the FPS fans, this is a retro Sci-Fi deathmatch arena game that feels like the lovechild of Quake 3 and Unreal Tournament. The game also boasts some pretty impressive visuals considering it is an open source project. There is a single player campaign, but the multiplayer is the real attraction. Unfortunately there are no dedicated South African servers, but it could make for a refreshing change at LANs.

Secret Maryo Chronicles (http://www.secretmaryo.org/)

A platform game that runs and jumps, barely avoids some sort of copyright infringement, and defeats an assortment of enemies . Developed in the spirit of another popular platform game, Secret Maryo should satiate a craving for retro platform action, with a modern flavour. The game comes with a full featured level editor for those who feel the need to fiddle.

Planeshift (http://www.planeshift.it/)

This is a truly free MMORPG. This means that there will never be any surprise premium content, or gameplay limitations. All the servers and bandwidth needs are sponsored. The developers are going for a strong emphasis on the role playing element of the game, encouraging players to really 'act out' their decided character traits. The game is currently in the open public testing phase, so it will undoubtedly be a bit buggy. But it is still worth checking out for the MMORPG lovers on a budget.

Source: MyBroadband.co.za

MARIO

Mario has been all time favorite game for many people. We have seen this game in number of forms and avatars. Checkout free Mega Mario computer game in which you help Mario free his brother Luigi. It has usual color splash with exciting background music.

This version has little more blood red splash while you kill crawling creatures or get killed (this option can be turned OFF). It has number of levels to keep you hooked for long time while you find your way and collect coins. Download Mega Mario game (Windows & Linux), it is a portable game, just download and start playing (no install!)

Source: ToThePC

Play Chess Against Computer

Yea Chess is a chess versus computer. It has a simple interface and powerful and quick artificial intelligence. You can adjust the skill of the computer and save games. Download Here

Double Vision Software

Its a freeware means a completely FREE software that lets you watch video and surf the web in a transparent browser. "Go Double Vision" and you can click through the browser to your open applications and work seemlessly. Download

RealPlayer Gold 11

The RealPlayer is the first product that integrates Real's revolutionary new Harmony technology. RealPlayer enables consumers to buy and download music that plays on more than 100 portable devices, including the Apple iPod. RealPlayer is the only digital-media player you need for finding and downloading new music, playing and managing audio and video clips, and taking your digital entertainment with you. RealPlayer offers a streamlined interface that allows you to keep your media library close at hand. Keep all your digital-media clips organized in one place; save CD tracks with one click; pause and rewind live streams; transfer music to CDs and portable devices effortlessly; and enjoy clear, smooth video playback and multichannel, surround-sound support. Helix Powered RealPlayer is the all-in-one digital media player that lets you find anything and play everything. This popular streaming-media player offers improved video controls and access to 3200 radio stations.

RealPlayer also includes an option during setup to install the Real Toolbar for Internet Explorer. With RealPlayer you get an improved graphic equalizer and media services, including a radio tuner and an artist and music guide. Meanwhile, the Take 5 news service can offer you daily sports updates. A contextual video search helps you find interviews with your favorite artists. The RealPlayer music store lets you buy music files. Finally, you can use the software to transfer files to CDs and portable devices.
Features of RealPlayer :
• Best video & audio quality ever
• Plays CDs, DVDs and all major file types.
• Integrated Music Store
• Harmony™ Technology – download music to 100+ secure portable devices
• Download selected songs for only 49¢ in RealPlayer
• Online Radio: Over 3200 stations worldwide & 60 ad-free stations for endless listening.
• Expanded Controls: Optimize sound with the 10-Band Graphic Equalizer and get the sharpest picture with advanced video controls.
• Advanced CD Burning: Rip, mix & burn CDs like a pro - fast! Encode MP3s at up to 320kbps.
• Play Everything: RealOne Player plays all major media formats including Quicktime MPEG-4, Windows Media, DVDs, & more.
• Easy, Fun & Intuitive: Browse the web, organize audio & video files, create playlists, & more!

Download Here

MyFolder Free Version

 

Click on a folder with the right button of the mouse and change the folder icon by My Folder. By clicking right button of the mouse on the folder; you can reach all the galleries those defined submenu under Horizon Myfolder Menu. Appearance of the any icons listed can be changed. Changing shape and color of the folders makes easier and faster Windows. Appearance of the folders is up to your choice by My Folder. Customize your computer by My Folder. Resetting and getting back to original icon is possible. Adding new icon and changing the look of the folders are possible. Folder icons can be stored as many as wanted under My Folder gallery section. You can create particular icon library and control the icons by My Folder. Icons defined in My Folder library can be transferred to the galleries in gallery section. My Folder provides adding folders with dll. exe. and icl. extensions to the library. Icon in library can be sent to gallery and used there.
Gallaries in My Folder. Colors.Levels, Project Galleries. Easy to use, Accelerates the process. Folder organizing is quicker.

My Folder Free Galleries
    * Colors
    * Event
    * Level
    * Priority
    * Project

Download it Here

Stellarium – a Free Planetarium for your computer

Stellarium is a free open source planetarium for your computer. It shows a realistic sky in 3D, just like what you see with the naked eye, binoculars or a telescope.
It is being used in planetarium projectors. Just set your coordinates and go.

Features:

SKY:

• default catalogue of over 600,000 stars
• extra catalogues with more than 210 million stars
• asterisms and illustrations of the constellations
• constellations for eleven different cultures
• images of nebulae (full Messier catalogue)
• realistic Milky Way
• very realistic atmosphere, sunrise and sunset
• the planets and their satellites

Interface:

• a powerful zoom
• time control
• multilingual interface
• fisheye projection for planetarium domes
• spheric mirror projection for your own low-cost dome
• all new graphical interface and extensive keyboard control
• telescope control

Visualisation:

• equatorial and azimuthal grids
• star twinkling
• shooting stars
• eclipse simulation
• skinnable landscapes, now with spheric panorama projection

Customisability:

• add your own deep sky objects, landscapes, constellation images, scripts...

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Autologon for Windows v2.10

Autologon enables you to easily configure Windows’ built-in autologon mechanism. Instead of waiting for a user to enter their name and password, Windows uses the credentials you enter with Autologon, which are encrypted in the Registry, to log on the specified user automatically.

Autologon is easy enough to use. Just run autolog.exe, fill in the dialog, and hit Enable. To turn off auto-logon, hit Disable. If the DefaultPassword is NULL, autologon will only occur once and then be disabled. Also, if the shift key is held down before the system performs an autologon, the autologon will be disabled for that logon. You can also pass the username, domain and password as command-line arguments: autologon user domain password.

Runs on:

• Client: Windows XP and higher.
• Server: Windows Server 2003 and higher.

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Desktops v1.0 – Create upto Four Virtual Desktops

Introduction

Desktops allows you to organize your applications on up to four virtual desktops. Read email on one, browse the web on the second, and do work in your productivity software on the third, without the clutter of the windows you’re not using. After you configure hotkeys for switching desktops, you can create and switch desktops either by clicking on the tray icon to open a desktop preview and switching window, or by using the hotkeys.

Using Desktops

Unlike other virtual desktop utilities that implement their desktops by showing the windows that are active on a desktop and hiding the rest, Sysinternals Desktops uses a Windows desktop object for each desktop. Application windows are bound to a desktop object when they are created, so Windows maintains the connection between windows and desktops and knows which ones to show when you switch a desktop. That making Sysinternals Desktops very lightweight and free from bugs that the other approach is prone to where their view of active windows becomes inconsistent with the visible windows.

Desktops reliance on Windows desktop objects means that it cannot provide some of the functionality of other virtual desktop utilities, however. For example, Windows doesn't provide a way to move a window from one desktop object to another, and because a separate Explorer process must run on each desktop to provide a taskbar and start menu, most tray applications are only visible on the first desktop. Further, there is no way to delete a desktop object, so Desktops does not provide a way to close a desktop, because that would result in orphaned windows and processes. The recommended way to exit Desktops is therefore to logoff.

Runs on:

• Client: Windows XP and higher.
• Server: Windows Server 2003 and higher

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Windows Addon : Shell Objects Editor

This program is an editor for shell objects. You can create new shell objects and delete them when you don't need or want them any longer. For safety reasons, it is not possible to delete shell objects that were not created with this editor by default. You have to switch to "expert mode" to delete other shell objects.

What is a shell object?
The "My Documents" folder is a shell object. It is a special shell object, a shell folder. Shell folders are not real folders on your hard disk, they only refer to real folders. They are a kind of "hard links", a special type of shortcuts.
Ok, you can use shortcuts to hard disks or you can use shortcuts to directories on your desktop to access places on your hard disk you often need to access. But you can't browse them that easy, shell folders are much easier to use.
The screenshot shows some shell folders on a Windows XP system. You can browse through their subdirectories on the left side of the view, or you can double-click on the right side. They behave in the exact same way as the "My Documents" folder. With the shell object editor, you can create as many of those shell folders as you want, although we recommend only choosing the folders you use most.
But there are more shell objects. The Internet Explorer, that resides on your desktop by default, is a shell object, too. It is not a shortcut because it has not the typical shortcut arrow. The Internet Explorer is a delete-able shell object, but you can create shell objects that are impossible to delete. This may sound like nonsense to you, but it is useful in some rare cases and such objects can be created with this editor.

Installation
Download the installer and run it. A program group will be created and optionally an icon in your control panel.
When you run the program, a list will appear that is initially empty. It will contain all the shell objects that you create with this editor later. Click the "Create" button to start the wizard which will guide you through the creation process.
If you select one or more shell objects in the list, clicking the delete button will be remove the shell objects immediately. Shell objects that were created by other programs, by the system or by yourself (using the registry editor) do not show up here for safety reasons. This way you can't trash your system by just clicking the wrong item.
However, if you right-click in the list and select "expert mode", all existing shell objects will appear in the list and you are then able to delete some of them - even the control panel or things like that. You have been warned.

Attention
Note that this program uses some undocumented registry entries to do what it does. You are completely on your own with whatever the results may be. We tried the program on different computers and it works and does no harm, but we don't guarantee anything. We are in no way responsible for the results.

So the annoying desktop icons cannot bother you any more. If you were also missing the “My Documents” icon on the desktop of Windows Vista you can tweak the settings and have it the way you want it to be.

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Google Maps for your Nokia S60 phone

Download Google Maps for mobile to your Nokia phone, and never carry a paper map again. Google Maps on your phone makes it easy to:

• Determine your current location with or without GPS
• Get driving and transit directions
• Get phone numbers and addresses for local businesses

My Location (beta)

My Location shows your current location on the map, even if your Nokia phone does not have GPS.

Interactive maps

Google Maps for your Nokia feels just like Google Maps on the desktop. Pan and zoom the map, and view satellite imagery, and even switch into Street View for a closer look.

Business listings

Search Google Maps for local businesses and points of interest. View store hours and reviews, then dial a business in one click. Thanks to My Location, you can find nearby businesses without even having to enter your current location.

Directions

Google Maps offers turn-by-turn driving directions - and thanks to My Location, you don't even have to enter your starting point. You can also get walking directions and find public transit routes in more than 100 cities around the world.

Traffic

Real-time traffic data helps you find the fastest route to your destination.

New! Street View

View street level imagery of addresses, businesses, and turns in directions in major cities throughout the United States, Australia, Japan, and parts of Europe.

Favorites

Save your favorite places so that you can easily return to them on the map.

The latest version of Google Maps 3.0 is out

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Recover your Deleted Files!!!

Recuva (pronounced "recover") is a freeware Windows utility to restore files that have been accidentally deleted from your computer. This includes files emptied from the Recycle bin as well as images and other files that have been deleted by user error from digital camera memory cards or MP3 players. It will even bring back files that have been deleted by bugs, crashes and viruses!

This is a very good software. Many of my important data files are recovered using this software.

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Yahoo Messenger, Google Talk, MSN, Skype, AIM, Jabber and more - Nimbuzz

Nimbuzz is a FREE all-in-one solution for Internet-enabled mobile phones that allows you to take your IM buddies with you -- wherever you go.

Nimbuzz works with all the major messengers, including: Skype, MSN, Google Talk, Yahoo, AIM, Jabber and more (ICQ coming soon).

Nimbuzz on your mobile will let you:

Free Chat, Group Chat and Chatrooms
Free Mobile VoIP calling (coming soon!)
Free File, Photo and Ringtone sharing
Free Voice Messaging
Free Text Messaging (within Nimbuzz)
Free Phonebook Backup and Restore
Free "Buzz" notifications (to get your buddies online!)
Local-cost Mobile Calling worldwide
No phone credits to purchase
No credit cards required

BurnAware Free - Freeware for Burning CD/DVD/Blueray

BurnAware is the ultimate disc burning software. BurnAware Free is ideal for users with basic disc burning needs as backup, creating data, audio, video discs and burning disc images. Free, easy to set up and maintain, it enables you to save your files to disc quickly, provides more flexible interface to help you complete your burning tasks much faster.

Since the day I found it on the Internet I gave up using the other CD/DVD Burning software and have shifted to this. It works perfectly on Windows Vista also.

Features

• Create data, bootable and multisession CD/DVD/Blu-ray Discs
• Create Audio CDs and MP3 CD/DVD/Blu-ray Discs
• Create DVD-Video
• Record boot disc images
• Create and record disc images
• Supports all current hardware interfaces (IDE/SCSI/USB/1394/SATA)
• Supports UDF/ISO9660/Joliet Bridged file systems (any combination)
• On-the-fly writing for all image types (no staging to hard drive first)
• Auto-verification of written files
• Supports CD-Text and unicode characters
• Supports Windows NT/2000/XP/Vista/7 (32 and 64 Bit), no drivers required

Benefits

• 100% Free for personal, home use
• Does NOT contain any spyware, adware, banners etc.
• Does NOT require .Net framework or service packs
• Based on the most stable and fast disc recording SDK
• Windows 7 support

GOM Media Player

The moment I opened GOM Player, I realized that's how a media player should look. Ok, maybe the colors and icons aren't great, but nobody's perfect and you can always change the skin.

GOM Player, the most popular media player in South Korea, is free, has a simple interface and includes many advanced features. The player includes many codecs (DivX, XviD, MP4, AC3), so you don't have to download them. It's also possible to watch incomplete AVI files or play media files while you download them.

There are options that improve the quality of videos (the player is optimized for TV OUT), boost sound.

It's not better than VLC or MPlayer, which are open source and cross-platform, but it's easier to use.

Source: Google-System Blog

Use Auto-Complete Anywhere in Windows!!!

LetMeType is a small Windows tool that extends the concept of autocomplete at the operating system's level. The application runs in the background, monitoring everything you type in any input box and creating a database of frequent words and 2-grams. When you start typing a word, LetMeType displays a list of the most probable words that start with the letters you've just typed and you can select one of the options.

The program lets you select different values for the length of the words, and for the minimum probability of a suggestion. This works well especially for long or complicated words.

The interface is not very user-friendly, but program has been open sourced and you can improve it. It would be nice to combine this with Google Suggest and to make it less annoying by only making suggestions when the user requests it or when the next letters/words are obvious.

Source: Google-System Blog

Be online on Yahoo, MSN, Google Talk from your mobile...

Fring™ is a mobile internet service & community that enables you to access & interact with your social networks on-the-go, make free calls and live chat with all your fring, Skype®, MSN® Messenger, Google Talk™, ICQ, SIP, Twitter, Yahoo!™ and AIM®* friends using your handset’s internet connection.

Fring 3.35 is a new version of the popular free to download, free to use mobile phone application, packed with additional features which enable anyone with a compatible handset to talk, chat, and interact with other fring users from their mobile phones. The new feature-rich fring is de-bugged,improved & enriched mainly thanks to your bug alerts, requests and suggestions.

Stability of the just released Symbian client is significantly Improved with significantly less interruption, logout's, etc. The voice quality is improved as well, it adds ability to enable speaker... .. .

Here is the full change log:
- Improved stability – with significantly less interruption, logouts, etc
- Made voice quality even better all round
- Added speaker phone for Symbian 9.2
- Enabled file transfer from Yahoo! & Skype

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Controlling Two or More Computers with one Keyboard and Mouse *

If you're one of the many users who has two (or more) computers on your desk, you might get tired of switching between the keyboard and mouse on different systems. Synergy is the software for you.

Synergy lets you easily share a single mouse and keyboard between multiple computers with different operating systems, each with its own display, without special hardware. It's intended for users with multiple computers on their desk since each system uses its own monitor(s).

This is how i am using it in my office setup.

Using the same mouse and keyboard for both of these computers.

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* Requires the computers to be connected via LAN.

Desi Destruction 2 - Dj Mantra (MegaMix)

DJ MANTRA - DESI DESTRUCTION 2
-------------------------------------------
1. MUJH PE TO JADOO [Race]
2. PEHLI NAZAR MEIN (REMIX) [Race]
3. ISHQ SUBHAAN ALLAH [Mere Baap Pehle Aap]
4. PARTY IN BOMBAY [Mentor Kolektiv Ft. Hard Kaur]
5. PLAY IT STRAIGHT [Serani]
6. SONIYE VE SONIYE [Kismat Konnection]
7. BOR BOR [Surjit Bindrakhia]
8. APNI TO JAISE TAISE (REMIX) [Laawaris]
9. TUMSE MILKE DIL KA [Main Hoon Na]
10. YOU’RE MY LOVE [Partner]
11. GOD TUSSI GREAT HO (REMIX) [God Tussi Great Ho]
12. MAARI TEETRI [De Taali]
13. DEKHTA HAI TO KYA [Krazzy 4]
14. THODA SA GUM HO (REMIX) [Thodi Life Thoda Magic]
15. DIL DANCE MAARE (REMIX) [Tashan]
16. LAMBI JUDAI (REMIX) [Jannat]
17. WORK THAT BODY [Robert Clivilles feat. C & C Music Factory]
18. LAZY LAMHE (REMIX) [Thoda Pyaar Thoda Magic]
19. BACHNA AE HASEENO [Bachna Ae Haseeno]
20. RISE UP [Yves Larock vs Ian Oliver]
21. BAKHUDA TUMHI HO [Kismat Konnection]

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Make Stunning Photo Albums

Jalbum is a free gallery software that creates personalized web albums of your digital pictures.

Easy to use User Interface

Explorer-like user interface. The order of the buttons left side reflect the workflow. You can easily manage your images, rotate, comment and arrange as you want. 

32 Languages

Jalbum most likely speaks your language — it comes with 32!

Skins — endless customization

Skins define the gallery look and functionality. Jalbum has 13 skins built-in with another 120 skins available for download.

Add images with drag & drop

Adding your images to Jalbum is simple: just drag and drop!

Add comments

Use the Comments button to add comments (which may even contain HTML formatting).

Apply filters

Apply filters to your images, like Tint filter, Border, Grayscale, Watermark, Fixed shape, Logotype, Text, Blur, Sharpen, Zoom

Other Filetypes

Jalbum supports various types of files*, not just JPG images, and many skins also support movies and audio.  * (avi mpg mpeg mpe mp4 mov wmv asf asx wvx 3gp divx xvid qt mp3 wma ram rm swf flv tiff psd zip arj sit rar xml pdf doc xls ppt mdb djvu djv odt ods odp odg odb)

Make album

When you are happy with the choice of skin, comments and other settings, simply hit the Make album button. Jalbum builds your album and prepares it for the web. Check the result with the Preview button.

Share straight from your computer

If you don't want to publish your album to the web, Jalbum has a built-in web server. Simply use the Sharing tool, which will make your album visible to others straight from your PC without the need to upload.

Publish to the web

Publishing your album to the web is easy; use your free Jalbum account or any other provider.

Your personal page: yourname.jalbum.net

With Jalbum's free account you get a unique url: yourname.jalbum.net. Jalbum will create your account and upload your albums to your new web album page.

Upload the album

At the click of a button, Jalbum will upload your albums! The Smart upload option will only upload changed files.

Manage your albums

You can manage your albums — add new, delete, password protect — straight from Jalbum.

Your uploaded album

Voilá... Your album is up and running.

 

Download Now

Create PDF files from almost any application in Windows

The Bullzip PDF Printer works as a Microsoft Windows printer and allows you to write PDF documents from virtually any Microsoft Windows application. It is FREE for personal and commercial use up to 10 users. It does not contain any advertising or popups.

Features

• Print to PDF from almost any Windows program.
• Runs on Microsoft Windows 2000/XP/XP x64/2003/2003 x64/Vista/Vista x64/2008/Windows 7 (beta build 7000).
• Supports 64-bit operating systems.
• Direct output to the same file each time or prompt for destination.
• Control if the printer should ask if you want to see the resulting PDF document.
• Control output and prompts programmatically.
• Setup can run unattended.
• Graphical user interface.
• Password protect PDF documents.
• 128/40 bit encryption.
• Quality settings (screen, printer, ebook, prepress).
• Set document properties.
• Watermark text, size, rotation, and transparency.
• Superimpose/background documents.
• Appending/prepending documents.
• User interface control.
• Command line interface to all settings.
• COM/ActiveX interface for programmatic control.
• Support for Citrix MetaFrame
• Support for Windows Terminal Server
• Multiple output types supported: BMP, JPEG, PCX, PDF, PNG, and TIFF.

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