Pager Upgrade: No Splash Screens/Game Manager in Feature Requests

ID:280089
 
Feb 7 2012, 7:37 pm (Edited on Mar 27 2012, 1:36 pm)
Applies to:BYOND Pager
Status: Open
Issue hasn't been assigned a status value.
The removal of a feature is usually a negative, but since the current splash screens aren't customizable and are functionally limited, this shouldn't be too big of a deal.

Instead of having a single blue splash-screen pop up when a player attempts to join a game, the pager would be brought up, and would display that game in a common tab (possibly even a modified version of the current game's tab). The game would then begin its download process, and would display such process next to its name, or in some other intuitive layout.

Once the download is complete, BYOND will alert you with a popup bubble, which you can click to launch the game, or launch the game from your games section of the pager. When connecting to a game, I suppose the standard blue splash screen could still be used, unless something more intuitive can be suggested/implemented?

* Steam provides an excellent example for game distribution mediums.
#1 Feb 7 2012, 7:41 pm
The only issue would being distributing the games outside of Byond.

If you were to do this, they would need pager. I think it should detect if they have pager installed and if so it will do that, but if they don't have it installed, it will just do the splash screen.
#2 Feb 7 2012, 7:43 pm
I'm not saying get rid of the pager. I'm saying get rid of the blue splash screens that the pager brings up when you attempt to download a game.
#3 Feb 7 2012, 7:45 pm
In response to Falacy (#2)
I'm not saying that. I'm saying that when you distribute to a EXE to run the executable for people without the pager installed, it should have the blue splash screen (or possibly a customizable one).

Also if you attempt to download a game, you can try to download another and it downloads in the background (hence the bottom right of pager and bottom right of "Options and Messages" on common rips)
#4 Feb 7 2012, 7:47 pm
In response to Iobject (#3)
Iobject wrote:
I'm not saying that. I'm saying that when you distribute to a EXE to run the executable for people without the pager installed, it should have the blue splash screen (or possibly a customizable one).

No splash screen or pager should be necessary with standalone executable, especially not a splash screen, since running games locally doesn't display one. A standalone exe should just launch directly into the game.
#5 Feb 7 2012, 7:48 pm
In response to Falacy (#4)
It does for me. It tells me "Connecting to Gamename.dmb" even clicking on the executable or EXE
#6 Feb 7 2012, 7:49 pm
Iobject wrote:
It does for me. It tells me "Connecting to Gamename.dmb" even clicking on the executable or EXE

Hrm, well that seems to be an issue that should be changed/fixed, not implemented into an improved system. If I run a local .dmb file, it doesn't show any BYOND related propaganda, just launched the game immediately.
#7 Feb 7 2012, 7:50 pm
In response to Falacy (#6)
I think it's because you have a faster computer. My windows XP would have that on for like 2 minutes. My windows 7 does it for a few seconds.
#8 Feb 7 2012, 7:52 pm
In response to Iobject (#7)
Iobject wrote:
I think it's because you have a faster computer. My windows XP would have that on for like 2 minutes. My windows 7 does it for a few seconds.

If I launch a game through the pager, then I get the awkward BYOND splash screen. However, if I manually run the .dmb file from the game's folder, no splash screen appears. I would assume that a process similar to directly launching a .dmb would occur if you had your game setup as an .exe, if not, that could hopefully be fixed.
#9 Feb 7 2012, 7:53 pm
In response to Falacy (#8)
However this isn't the case.

I still agree with your statement, I'm just pointing out a couple of flaws.