Heroes of Hellas 3: Athens

The beautiful city of Athens has been destroyed by massive fireballs raining down from the heavens. The sacred olive tree was damaged and, therefore, the goddess Athena has lost her powers. Gather gold for reconstructing the city's homes and buildings, find artifacts to nullify the ongoing attacks from above, and eventually defeat "the destructor" responsible for it all.

Heroes of Hellas 3: Athens is a "match 3" tile matching game with hidden object and jigsaw puzzles mixed in. While keeping the basics the same, this game takes elements from each of its predecessors and adds some new design features as well as new graphics, animations, music and explosive sound effects.

Remove groups of adjacent, same-color tiles by selecting them in a chain fashion. Those explode allowing more to drop down from above. When five or more tiles are removed at once, a gold coin appears at the end of the selection. The gold coins as well as other items such as bombs and directional lightning bolts must be matched with at least one colored tile. Special items must drop off the bottom of the board to be "collected."

There are 90 main levels and the objectives for each are displayed when it begins. The levels are varied and layered, some with as many as four or five hidden areas that must be unlocked by matching "winged" tiles or finding keys. Stone monoliths often hide keys, gems and treasure and can be broken by forming matches touching them, or exploded with a bomb or lightning. Other impediments include ropes, chains, as well as hell stones, shadowy black rocks and unbreakable monoliths.

The Greek gods and goddesses can aid in the tile-matching levels by rearranging the board or destroying a group of specific objects or tiles. In fact, some levels cannot be solved without their help. They are introduced gradually and unlocked by solving hidden object games resulting in a full locket. When unlocked, a brief history of the character is displayed in the Heroes screen. To charge their powers, match colored tiles specific to him/her. For a god's power to be fully effective, wait until their power bar is full. The game selects which gods appear to help in any one level with a maximum of three gods at a time.

There are three basic level types while following the story: Classic*: Normal tile-matching and removal with the gathering of gold as the primary objective. As the game progresses, additional objectives are added such as collecting gems, treasure chests, phoenix feathers or specific colored tiles.

• Artifact Search: Same as the above but the only goal is retrieving pieces of artifacts to fight off enemy attacks. (No points for coins or gold.) This is followed by a jigsaw puzzle to reconstruct the artifact.
• Treasure Hunter: Remove as many treasure chests as possible within a one-minute time limit.

The rebuilding of Athens is similar to the previous game and is dependent upon the amount of accumulated gold. Each building has three design choices and different prices, and more building types become available as the game advances. The number of citizens is not a factor in this game, however the population does grow as the city is restored. The city screen itself is interactive, like before, with various actions performed with a mouse-click like lighting a fire or raising a flag in addition to comments from the populace.

The most prominent new features in Heroes of Hellas 3: Athens include:* No difficulty settings

• Choice between timed or relaxed modes
• New gods and goddesses not present in previous games
• Gems, treasure chests and pots of gold randomly appear inside the city screen itself and can be collected.
• More elaborately designed hidden object and jigsaw puzzles
• Awards have three levels of attainment, and new award types have been added
• Highlighted paths possible for bombs and lightning bolts (click and hold on them to highlight)
• Teleporters which move items and tiles from one section of the board to another
• 30 bonus levels for palace building with two play modes: Classic and Puzzle (only one solution)