Major Additions - Living Avatars

Introducing Living Avatars!

Today is a great day and I have something really cool that some of you are going to love! It's called Living Avatars, a new vBulletin addon that I've been working on for almost one year.

This program will allow your users to customize their avatars by using the mouse to drag and move items around (items such as clothing pieces, etc). In order to collect items, you need to spend points, the more you post on a forum the more points you get! Thus, Grow your Forum with Living Avatars!

Tour

Click here for the tour movie.



Here is how it works in detail:

1) Download and install Living Avatars to vBulletin (install instructions below).
2) Once installed, go to the Living Avatars admin panel and click 'forum integration'.
3) The user profiles of your members will now have an extra link:



4) Now, the more a user posts on your forum, the more points he or she will earn. If a user has posted 500 times, and then you install Living Avatars, then that user will start with 500 points.

5) Once users have a few points, they can then start spending their points to collect items:



6) Now that they have collected a few items, they can create their ultra cool avatar! Check it out:



I highlighted the canvas in red, in that box (the canvas) you can use your mouse to drag items around. It seriously works beautifully.

7) Now, press the 'Save Avatar' button and your avatar on vBulletin will be updated:



And that's it! Cool yeah?!

Ok, so on with the install instructions:

Installation Instructions
Installation is very simple, just follow these steps and you shouldn't have any problems (if so, then I'm sorry and I'll try and help you out asap!).

1) Download & Extract living_avatars.zip
2) FTP the living_avatars folder to your forum
Example: http://www.yoursite.com/forums/living_avatars/
3) Run Setup: forum/living_avatars/setup/
4) CHMOD the Living Avatars 'avatars' folder to 777 (this folder: /living_avatars/avatars/)
5) Delete the setup folder (/living_avatars/setup/)

Now that Living Avatars is installed, go to the admin panel of Living Avatars and click the 'Forum Integration' link, from there you can press one link which will update the vBulletin modifyavatar template to insert the Living Avatars link.

Upgrade Instructions

1) Download & Extract living_avatars.zip
2) FTP the living_avatars folder to your forum (overwriting previous Living Avatar files)
Example: http://www.yoursite.com/forums/living_avatars/
3) Run Setup: living_avatars/setup/
4) Delete the setup folder (/living_avatars/setup/)

Uninstall Instructions
1) If you enabled the forum integration link from the LA Admin Panel, then login to the LA Admin Panel and disable it.

2) Drop these tables:
la_admins
la_avatars
la_groups
la_items
la_items_purchased
la_packs
la_points_spent
la_positions
la_settings

3) Delete the living_avatars/ folder.

Why should I use Living Avatars?
"Grow your forum with Living Avatars" - Simply that! Not only is Living Avatars a lot of fun to use but it's also addicting. Users will want to post on your site in order to gain enough 'points' to purchase a certain item (ex: Sword of Doom!). Imagine having certain items that are rare & expensive, such as "Dracula's Cape" which can only be purchased 3 times and costs 50 points (aka posts)...get it?

Where can I download more Avatar Packs?
You can download free user created avatar packs here:
Avatar Packs

How can I create Avatar Packs?
Please read this tutorial if you are interested in creating avatar packs:
http://www.livingavatars.com/help/p2_articleid/2

LA 120 Released
+ New Frontend & Backend
+ New theme editor

LA 115 Released
+ Better vBulletin integration

LA 114 Released
+ Online/Offline feature now works correctly.
+ LA admins can be deleted from the admin panel.
+ Fixed a positioning bug in the canvas.
+ Fixed IPB and SMF userid/avatarid conflict.
+ Fixed PHPBB3 download.php file change.

LA 113 Released
+ SMF Support (1.1 -> 1.3)
+ Better Forum Link Integration.
+ Less Warning Messages.
+ 'Bring to Top' is now used.

LA 112 Released
+ Added IPB 2.3 Integration.

LA 111 Released
+ Added phpBB3 Integration.
+ Fixed Crop Tool.
+ Better LA link integration for phpBB2.
+ Fixed a bug that caused avatars not to show up in the forum.

LA 110 Released
Updates & Fixed Bugs
+ Database changes, redid a lot of the LA Grouping logic.
+ You can only reinstall LA if logged in as admin.
+ Fixed 'Items Misplacement Issue'.
+ Fixed mysql error when adding admin with high userid value.
+ Items & groups an be moved around & deleted.
+ Removed admin/forumlinks.php file.
+ Add/Remove Forum link added to settings page.
+ New layout for admin panel.
+ New groups can be added.

LA 102 Released
+ Avatar Packs can be upgraded.
+ Avatar Packs can be uninstalled.
+ Minor changes to the design layout of certain pages.
+ Fixed a points remaining calculation bug.
+ Fixed a mysql_connect() database warning for vB users.
+ Other small misc fixes.

LA 101 Released
+ Better error checking when saving avatars.
+ Update to work with the vBulletin File System.
+ Fixed some vBulletin & phpBB integration issues

Always Backup your Database before Upgrading
Living Avatars might have database changes during the upgrade. Please, take the extra time and backup the living avatars tables (the tables that are prefixed with 'la_' in your forum database) before upgrading to new versions. I always do as much as testing as possible before releasing updates but it's still better to be cautious.

[Valter]

This should include uninstall script.

After trying it on my test forum I dropped all tables from database and re-installed vBulletin.

This was easiest way to uninstall. Doing it manually is boring...

[Neo_Angelo]

this hack reminds me of that forum called Gaiaonline, where you got gold to spend on dressing up your avatars, a very nice add-on if i do say so myself, i might give this a try sometime soon.

[Calash]

Very nice hack

I am getting an Javascript error on my work computer when I am editing, The system is running IE6.0. My home system, and Firefox at work is fine though....it may just be a glitch with our version of Java...I will look into it more.


Looking forward to more avatar packs

[General BAM]

Originally Posted by ssslippy

The information it is using to try and connect to your database is wrong. This is very odd. What version of vbulletin are u using?

3.6.2

i see i am not the only one with this error

[Luky]

Originally Posted by Neo_Angelo

this hack reminds me of that forum called Gaiaonline, where you got gold to spend on dressing up your avatars, a very nice add-on if i do say so myself, i might give this a try sometime soon.

Yes it is kinda fun, Gaia isnt fun but.. Gaia is lame :P

Can someone please help me??? =/

[Taipa]

Looks awesome!

I'll hold off on installing it until there's a different way of users getting "points" besides post count. I don't need people spamming all over the place just to rack up more points to buy more avatar things (like happens on GaiaOnline).

But after that, it's definitely on my list of "must have" mods for a planned board of mine!!

[Yours Truly]

Would it be possible for bigger canvas's as well? Maybe for areas in a profile as apposed to just an avatar?

[kingvillain]

This is a fantastic piece of work!! I have installed it but as yet not opened it to the members as I am testing it on my 3.6.5 forums, it is working perfectly fine from what I see.

I also note how easy it is to "install" your own packs (even if creating the images is time consuming, not ur fault of course lol). The way this system works is only limited by the admins imagination, I have already created blank "canvas" bodies so the user can choose from a selection of facial expressions aswell as the usual accessories etc to add to them for even more customisation. I`m also doing scenery for the avators for members to purchase, there literally is tons that can be done for customising.

One question though, when you have installed a pack, is it possible to still add new images in the already installed directory`s? Is it as simple as uploading the new images into the already existing folders?

Many thanks

[Flame Claw]

Love this

[high]* Flame Claw clicks install[/high]

Great mod, thanks

[Snake]

Wow! Thanks a lot for this!