Kurz

I spent the morning trying to put my game up on Kongregate, but ran into a few problems. Fortunately no one else can see the game until I hit the 'publish' button, so there's time for me to do more tests later.

Anyway, the main problem I encountered was sound seemed either distorted or delayed when the game was played on Firefox (though it worked perfectly fine on Firefox on the laptop I exported the game from. On my second laptop the problem occurs, which shows it's always best to test on more than one device and browser, incase unnoticed problems like this occur). Also I can only get the desktop export (linking to the index file through dropbox) working, as the mobile version doesn't seem to accept the same filetype (so you may not have to worry about removing audio from the offline cache for Kongregate, since no one will be playing the game on their mobile anyway).

If I get the chance I'll do more tests next week, and let you know any helpful results (just bare in mind that the problems I encounter with my game my not be the same as problems that you encounter).

DrGreenThumbCAN

Thanks for the kind words. I'm not really expecting to make much money from the game (since its the first I've made, and I've been making it up as I go along) though I'm learning lots from putting it up at different sites, and trying to overcome the various problems I encounter.

harrio

When I spotted 'Harrioz Hoez' on the Leaderboard this morning, I had a feeling you might be stopping by! Well done, and best of luck working your way to the top. I have some catching up to do myself, as I deleted all my test scores but accidentally left one of them. Typically it was the match in which I scored a truly astounding zero points!

Blacksmith

Thank you for the very generous rating. Very kind of you to spread the word - it really helps (especially since Indiedb keep archiving all my news announcements for some reason, which means no one can see them). All the positive feedback I've been getting has helped push Board Horde to a more prominent place on Clays 'popular' list, earning me another cent! Since I have officially earned Fiddy Cent on clay, I believe this now entitles me to wear a backward cap and say 'yo!' at passers by.

In other news, I'm giving up on Kongregate for now (the sun is shining and I want a lolly, dammit!). I've tried uploading my game there, and although it worked perfectly on Chrome and Firefox on my laptop, I had the good sense to test it on another identical laptop and discovered the sound was garbled on Firefox and it would occasionally crash. After updating to the latest Firefox, the game worked better though there was a bit of audio delay. Also the Leaderboard statistics and Achievement notification failed to show up anywhere (though this might be because I was in preview mode). There doesn't seem to be a way to properly upload the game for mobile, either (the options there, but it doesn't accept the file format).

More experimentation will follow next weekend.

Thanks once more for all your help and support folks!

austin

Whilst you're floating around on the forum, firstly I just wanted to thank you for the marvellous work you've done with Clay.io. I've found it nice and easy to integrate, and its improved my game to no end.

The one problem I did encounter was none of the audio worked when the clay hosted game was viewed on an iOS device (such as ipad, or iPod touch). After a few days of banging my head against walls and shouting at strangers, I managed to discover what the problem is; when the project is exported from C2 as a Chrome file it only includes .ogg audio files, and none of the m4a audio files. As soon as I added the m4a files into the exported media file manually, the audio started working perfectly (though i don't know if this will cause issues if i was to export from clay to the Chrome store with the m4a audio files included).

It might be worth checking into this more, or making mention on the clay.io tutorial, as it could save other users with ios devices a lot of head scratching.

Anyway, keep up the jolly good work, and thanks for giving Board Horde such a nice rating.

-Dave

Kurz

Although clay.io is useful for things like online Hi-score boards, there are other benefits, such as the ability to put ads into your games (useful if you plan to make the game free), store analytical data (such as how many times people play the game, read the rules, mute the sound etc) and push your game with ease to other sites such as Facebook, Chrome and Mozilla store. It's quite easy to use, though can bring about a few error messages if you're not careful (these can be easily overcome after a bit of experimenting).

Kongregate is definitely a good site to get your game on, though there is always the danger that it will just get buried or ignored (Gamejolt is another game site worth keeping in mind, though I've only been able to get the desktop version of my game working there as touch controls don't seem to work for some reason). I'm hoping to put Board Horde up on Kongregate tomorrow if I get the chance (I was just waiting to finish my latest update, and get some bugs ironed out first) so I'll let you know any problems I encounter.

Anyway, good luck with everything. I'll be sure to lend a hand whenever possible.

-Dave

Hi folks,

I've just updated Board Horde, and added two new boards and two new game modes.

More importantly, I've finally managed to get audio working on Clay.io when using my ipad. After many hours of testing, I discovered the problem was the Clay.io tutorial asks you to export to Chrome rather than Html5, and for some reason when exported to Chrome the project doesn't export m4a audio files. The solution was to copy all the m4a files into the exported media folder manually (I'm not sure if this'll cause problems if I export the project to the actual chrome store, but at least its working for now).

Another iOS audio problem I encountered was whenever the page is refreshed on Safari or Chrome (no matter what game site I upload to) the audio would stop working on my ipad. The only way to prevent this was to remove all the m4a references from the 'Offline' document to be found in the export folder (even though Ashley advises against this as it will stop the game working offline on iOS, it seems a better alternative than no audio at all).

I still haven't managed to solve the Gamejolt touch not working problem, though I'm convinced it has something to do with their chat pop-up stealing the games focus. Annoyingly there doesn't seem to be a way to disable it. If I manage to solve the problem, I'll be sure to let folk know.

Anyway, please feel free to give the game a try or a rating, or some such. So far I've made 49 cents at Clay and 6 cents at Gamejolt. Fame and fortune beckons, I tells ya!

Okay, I've just solved the Clay.io audio problem.

Incase you're thinking of exporting your game to Clay.io, the reasons for a lack of sound on iOS devices is due to the Export to Chrome option in c2 only exporting .ogg audio files, and no m4a audio files. If you export to chrome then you also need to copy the m4a audio files manually into the media folder (it seems odd that no one has mentioned this before) My game now has audio on Clay! I just hope it works on Android devices too.

Kurz

Offline support is best explained by Ashley here:

https://www.scirra.com/tutorials/70/offline-games-in-construct-2

I don't know how many people actually play online games offline, so it may or may not be important, depending on where you're aiming to get your game published.

I've just tested your game again, and the audio is now working perfectly on both Chrome and Safari on the ipad3, no matter how many times I hit the refresh button. I have just uploaded the new version of my Board Horde game to Newgrounds using the same audio trick, and it seems to also be running fine. I'm still having troubles with Clay.io however, and can't get any sound to play on my ipad from the version of my game I've uploaded there, no matter what I do.

Oh well, back to experimenting!

Kurz

I've searched around on the forum, and audio not working on iOS devices (such as ipad, iPod etc) seems to be a common problem, as you can read about here: http://www.scirra.com/forum/audio-still-not-working-in-r119-on-ios_topic63619.html

I followed DavidA13 suggestion to remove all m4a sounds from the offline appcache (to be found in the export folder, under the file name 'offline') as my game was suffering exactly the same problem, and it now works fine on both safari and Chrome. As Ashley mentions, the downside of doing this is the game won't work offline (except on desktop devices, which use .ogg format sound, I believe) so you may need to decide what's most important to your game - sound working on iOS devices, or offline support for devices that use m4a sounds.

Currently I am only running my game from Dropbox, but I'll be uploading it to various game sites shortly. I'll let you know if the offline audio solution causes problems, or makes the game work better later (unfortunately I have no Android devices to test on, so I cannot check whether fixing things on one device causes problems on another)

Kurz

I just tested it again, and it now works perfectly on Chrome on my ipad 3 - music plays fine, and touch works fine (out of curiosity, what events did you remove to get it working? You never know, it might help clear up the problem I'm having on Gamejolt)

On Safari it works perfectly the first time, but when I close down the tab and open it a second time the game plays without any audio (an acceptable loss at this point). I haven't experienced the black screen at all. I will do more tests soon; at this point, I'd say you are heading in the right direction! Well done.

Kurz

Firstly, try not to panic. It's always possible that your game is working on other mobile devices, just not mine. I will also give it a go on the iPod touch when I get the chance.

Which version of Construct 2 are you using? Since I updated to beta v136 I also encountered a Touch Not Working problem on my own game. I assumed it was something to do with Gamejolt's chat system conflicting somehow, but its always possible there's a new bug that no ones aware of yet (though touch does work fine from my Dropbox account. Perhaps you could try uploading your game to Dropbox as well, and see if that makes a difference?)

On the plus side, what I saw of your game before the touch stopped working for me was very polished. The graphics and animation are looking very sharp, so well done there!

Anyway, I will keep on testing whenever I get the chance. I will also experiment with my own game, and share any useful findings

Kurz

Out of curiosity, have you updated the game at the same link since I last tested it? I'm now finding that the music is working perfectly on both Safari and Chrome on the ipad. Though the problem is none of the touch functions are working, and its not registering my touch if I press any of the buttons (so I'm stuck on the menu screen).

I can understand why you put the 'or time>5 seconds' event in there; I did something similar with my own preloader (though i gave it 30 seconds, which was perhaps too much) which helped me get past the black screen problems I was encountering on Chrome. I hope you manage to solve the problem, as its really frustrating when this sort of thing happens. Keep on experimenting, and I'll keep on testing any version you care to put up on my ipad.

Kurz

Good to see someone else revamping their newgrounds entry. Just tested it on my ipad 3 (on Safari) and it runs very smoothly, at 60 frames a second. I realise the music is a free track, but it sounded really distorted and echoey for some reason - I'll try the game out on Chrome at some point and see if I get the same problem.

As for your 'black screen only' problem that occasionally happens, I had the same problem with my Board Horde game. It seemed to be linked to preloading audio in the Preload screen (I currently have my preloader set to only preload the audio if the game is not on a mobile device, though that does mean I sometimes get no audio at all). Perhaps you're encountering a similar problem? Might be worth sharing a screenshot of your preloader events, in the hope that someone might be able to spot the problem.

Anyway, best of luck with the revamp! I will test it more soon (I liked the tutorial by the way. I now know how to actually play the game, though I was still quite hopeless)