vbProArcade Beta 2

vbProArcade Beta 2

1/5/03: Beta 2 released
9/12/02: Beta 1.03 zip updated to include safe mode fix
9/3/02: Beta 1.03 released -- small bug fixes, see below
9/1/02: Beta 1 of vbProArcade has been posted. Please see below for installation instructions.


Background Information

vbProArcade is a fully-customizable Flash arcade add-on for vBulletin, complete with game-by-game scoreboards, forum integration, a "champions" system, statistics, and more.

This is an extensive hack that is still in BETA form, and I don't recommend installing it if you are not willing to work through potential issues and future updates/upgrades! I am working on making the installation instructions as easy as possible, but it will probably be some time before it is perfect.

Watch this post for updates as they happen, and check out screenshots from the list below. If you would like to see the hack in action, you may visit my Shadows of Namek forums. You will need to register to play, but you can view the scoreboards and the arcade itself as a guest.


Credits

This hack materialized thanks to work and help from a number of people and forums. Here they are:

• Original vbTetris Hack by Erwin Loh
• Original vbTetris Leaderboard Hack by John Warwick (john.eovie)
• One of my users, Simon Steel, for work on Flash coding/recoding
• The users of one of my forums, Shadows of Namek, for their extensive testing of the system
• And The Kryptonian for pre-release and release candidate installation testing.

Games

So far, there are FIVE GAMES that work correctly with this hack. They are:

Breakout
Pacman
Snake
Space Invaders
Tetris

All five .SWF files are included in the release archive.

There is now a Flash Games Development Thread for the purpose of modifying existing games to work with vbProArcade, or for creating new games to be compatible with vbProArcade. If you have a game that you wish to see modified but don't know how, post the .FLA source in that thread and hopefully somebody can assist you.


Installation Instructions

Download the file attached to this post, unzip it and familiarize yourself with the contents BEFORE doing anything.

There are TWO separate files worth reading, the Documentation and the Installation Instructions. I recommend that you read both BEFORE doing anything else.

Once you have done this, the instructions to be followed are contained in vbproarcade-install.txt. Follow them as precisely as possible. If you encounter an error somewhere, it is likely that you missed a step or made a small error. Please double-check your work BEFORE posting about problems here.

And it cannot be said enough: read that file before you do anything, and if you are unsure of something, please post your question(s) before attempting to install the hack.


Problems and Fixes/Workarounds (as of 1/5)

• None

Known Bugs/Limitations

Here is the list of stuff that I know does not work. I will be working towards correcting these bugs BEFORE adding new features for the next release.

• Netscape will allow you to play the games but not record scores
• If a user uses the "Back" button to go to the game screen, and does not refresh before playing, the score will result in a Security Violation. This is by design.

Screen Shots for Beta 2

Here is the list of posts from this thread that contain screen shots for the new version. Check them out!

• Main Arcade Screen: https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthrea...106#post292106
• Game Screen: https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthrea...107#post292107
• Game Over Screen: https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthrea...109#post292109
• Scoreboard: https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthrea...110#post292110
• Top Score Board: https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthrea...111#post292111
• Admin Modify Game: https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthrea...112#post292112
• Who's Online Display: https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthrea...113#post292113
• User Detail Screen: https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthrea...811#post337811
• Admin Score Editor: https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthrea...736#post338736
• Champ System in Postbit: https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthrea...745#post338745
• Modify Games in Admin CP (contracted): https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthrea...858#post389858
• Modify Games in Admin CP (expanded): https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthrea...859#post389859

Upcoming Features

This is the stuff that is in progress for future release:

• Complete Admin Panel Scoreboard Editor
• Additional integration with vB
• Even better Who's Online screen

Some have emailed or PM'd me asking if I would accept donations for my work on this hack, and yes, I certainly will, and any and all support is greatly appreciated. With over 2,000 lines of original PHP code, in addition to HTML and Flash work, I have spent a great deal of time developing and debugging the source for this, and it is a great feeling to have people like it so much that they want to give something back.

All donations received go directly back into supporting my websites and my design activities. You may click here to donate via Paypal. Note that donations are by no means required, and not donating does not mean you won't get support for the hack.

Last but not least, thanks for checking this out!

[mewgood]

Originally posted by futureal
In other vbProArcade news, I got inspired tonight to make the navigation bar ($navbar) easier to use.

The end result is that there is now a hierarchal navbar much like standard vBulletin.

All pages have:

Your Forum > Arcade

Sub pages have:

Your Forum > Arcade > Game Title
Your Forum > Arcade > Game Title Scoreboard
Your Forum > Arcade > Game Title Top Score Board
etc.

And with Beta 2, there will be sub-sub-pages, such as:

Your Forum > Arcade > Game Title Scoreboard > User Name's Scores for Game Title

But the best part about this system is that it uses the vBulletin navigation system, which means the template code has been reduced to simply "$navbar" and it will incorporate any changes you make the following templates:

navbar
nav_joiner
nav_linkoff
nav_linkon

This should make life easier from an Admin point of view.

These changes WILL be in Beta 2.

I hope you will include a txt file which is for upgrade and for ppl who have installed beta 1, so we don't need to uninstall and re install it again..

[eckels2]

ok futureal, i PMmed you my security settings...

as for "Do you have anything odd in terms of a net connection, like a robust firewall, internet connection sharing or anything of that sort?"

No, no and.. no.

I've got a cable modem. nothing shared. just me

Cacheing options are as follows:
Every time you start Internet Explorer

250mb.

*** results of beta pacman test ***

http://www.afterblur.com/vb/proarcad...heKiller=26170

That was the url i got after i played... Sent me to the Pacman scoreboard afterwards. No comment submission screen.

[eckels2]

Update... did a clean install of flash (i figured out how to uninstall it)... didn't work

Man, how frustrating is all of this. lol...

But in the end i guess this could solve the problem for all the helpless users.

[futureal]

I looked everything over, and my only suggestion is to try changing your cache settings to "Automatic," restarting the browser, and giving it another shot.

Other than that, everything seems to match my system perfectly.

[futureal]

Originally posted by mewgood
I hope you will include a txt file which is for upgrade and for ppl who have installed beta 1, so we don't need to uninstall and re install it again..

I have a conversion script that will covert the database tables to be compatible with the new ones, but that will be it.

It will be up to users to make sure that the necessary code changes are made. Most of the changes are in the pro*.php files which can just be replaced, but there are others.

Also, the best option will be to remove the old templates and re-add the new (Beta 2) templates, since nearly every one has changed (with a few removed and a bunch added).

I will make it as painless as possible BUT it may be somewhat complicated.

[eckels2]

Still didn't work.

This is maddening...

[futureal]

Yea... I've got to say, I'm out of ideas. I tried setting my browser up just like yours, and it worked fine. I am behind a firewall and everything too, and it works OK for me...

[eckels2]

/me bangs his head against the desk.

dammit.

Can the way that the flash games transmit the data be changed to a different method? Is that possible, is what i mean. If it is, i'll screw with it myself, i'd just need the fla's for the games...

[sk187]

This is an amazing hack and it seems to work perfect for most of my 700 users but vbulletin has been emailing me about sql errors.

Like this

Database error in vBulletin 2.2.6:

Invalid SQL: SELECT sessionhash,userid,host,useragent,styleid FROM session WHERE lastactivity>1032214124 AND sessionhash='de0056fe406cbbd965a806bbd71f3dde' AND (host='198.81.26.175' OR (althash='' AND althash<>'')) AND useragent='Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; AOL 7.0; Window'
mysql error: Unknown column 'althash' in 'where clause'

mysql error number: 1054

and

Database error in vBulletin 2.2.7:

Invalid SQL: SELECT max(score) as maxscore FROM arcade WHERE game='pacman' AND username='TL's De La Hoya'
mysql error: You have an error in your SQL syntax near 's De La Hoya'' at line 1

mysql error number: 1064

Sorry if this question has been asked ive only read 15 of the 27 pages of this thread so far.

Any help is appreciated - great hack

[Link14716]

1st Error:

What vB Version are you using?

2nd Error:

I know what the problem is, it is the ' in the username. So, futureal.....?