Readme

BlueMaxima's Flashpoint 
Version 7.0 - "Eight Thousand Hours"

========================================
Contents
========================================

1. Requirements
2. Notices
3. Usage
4. Infinity
5. Troubleshooting
6. Other Notes
7. Contact

========================================
Requirements
========================================

* A computer running Windows 7 or higher, as thoroughly updated as possible.
 * You may need the following redistributables (.NET 4.7 and Visual C++ 2015 x86). If Flashpoint does not work, try installing them.
 * https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=48145
 * https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=55170
* As much hard drive space as you need to extract the files. You need to be able to read and write to the directory you extract Flashpoint to.
 * Infinity versions of Flashpoint will need more space to download games and upgrades. Keep five gigabytes free to be on the safe side.
* An exclusion zone for your antivirus and firewall to extract Flashpoint into.
 * This is only a requirement for some antivirus software, but it's better to have everything let it through, just to be safe.

========================================
Notices
========================================

Many webgames have sitelocks which prevent the games from being played outside of the website they were created for. To circumvent this, we employ our custom Flashpoint Redirector. Whenever a game requests files from the internet, Redirector serves the file from your computer instead, allowing the games to be played even when the websites they were on go down. 

In order to accomplish this on a technical level, Flashpoint will run a server on your PC which only you are able to access. This server is NOT public - it is not accessible by anyone else over the internet, it is not used to track/collect data, and it does not compromise your security or privacy in any way. Only you - on your PC - will be able to access the server. The reason Flashpoint runs a server is to pose the illusion, to the webgames, that they are connecting to a real website.

Furthermore, Redirector needs to alter your system proxy settings. It does this so the webgames can connect to the previously mentioned server. If you are already connected to an internet proxy, we recommend backing up your proxy settings. If you do not consent to Flashpoint running a server and changing proxy settings on your PC, please do not use Flashpoint. The source code to Flashpoint Redirector is included with the software.

========================================
Usage
========================================

To boot Flashpoint, use the shortcut next to this file. (It's named "Start Flashpoint".) If it doesn't work, try going into the Launcher folder, and opening FlashpointLauncher.exe. It will open our launcher. The first time you run Flashpoint, you may be asked to let Apache or PHP through your Windows firewall; you will also need to do this for your personal antivirus. This will also open a small window with the title "Flashpoint Redirector" by default (if you haven't switched to Fiddler, see below). This window is required for Flashpoint to work, so don't close it. If you close it, you will need to restart Flashpoint to get it back.

You'll be on the "Home" page when you first boot Flashpoint. The Home page has a small random selection of games, and some quick links and filters. There are a series of tabs at the top of the page, that you can click to interact with (Home / Arcade / Theatre / Logs / Config / About / Curate). Infinity users will find two upgrade buttons (see the Infinity section of this readme).

To play a game or animation, click on the Arcade or Theatre tabs at the top of the launcher. You'll be presented with a list of games or animations; double-clicking any one of them will start it. Single-clicking any game/animation will change the right sidebar to show details about it; its developer, where it was sourced, a logo and screenshot, and other details. You can use the search bar next to the page links to search for games/animations: click the box, type a name, and press Enter to search. The boxes next to the search bar can be used to sort the list as well.

You can also use some extra search commands:
* !*term*: Searches for games from the platform (Flash, Shockwave, etc.) *term*.
* @*term*: Searches for games developed by *term*.
* #*term*: Searches for games that have the genre *term*.

The bar on the left shows a list of playlists; these are made by both the Flashpoint staff and other contributors (including some names like Tony, Tasselfoot and Molleindustria). No playlists are included in Theatre by default. You can click on one and it will show the playlist's selection of games in the middle. You can play a game the same way as normal by double-clicking, or you can click "All Games" at the top of the playlist list to go back to the full list. Details on who made the playlists are included in the list. (You can also hide both the playlist and details sidebars via the buttons in the top right corner of the window.)

You can make your own playlists. 
* Click "Add Playlist" at the bottom of the list of playlists. You need Edit mode on (see below) to do this. 
* To add a game to a playlist, click and drag it from the All Games view to your playlist. 
* You can edit the logo, title, author and description of the playlist by clicking the Edit button when you have clicked to see what games are in the playlist
 * You will need to click "Save" to make those changes 'stick'.
 * If you're editing text, press "Enter" once you've finished editing that field. 
* Playlists cannot be sorted, they are sorted based on the order games are added. 
* You can delete games from a playlist by clicking on a game in a playlist, then clicking the 'stop sign' in the right sidebar's top right corner twice. 
* You can delete a playlist by clicking the Delete button on a focused playlist twice. (It's in the sidebar with the name, author and description.)
* You can share a playlist by going into the Data/Playlists folder and copying the file that has the same name as the grey ID number of the playlist in the launcher. You can rename the file without breaking it. If someone else drops that file into their Data / Playlists folder, it will work in their copy of Flashpoint.

The Logs tab contains information related to running Flashpoint; you don't need to worry about this tab if Flashpoint is working. The config menu has multiple options that are covered below. Some will require you to click the "Save & Restart" button to apply changes.

* Show Extreme Games will hide games with sexual content or over the top violence, for a more child friendly library.
 * If you want to hide both the games and this option, you can edit the file "config.json" with any text editor to change the "false" next to "disableExtremeGames" to "true", saving the file afterwards.
* Enable Editing will turn on the ability to change metadata, add and edit playlists, and add new games to the launcher. You should not need to have this switch on normally.
* Flashpoint Path determines where Flashpoint looks for the lists of games to display in the launcher. By default this is the same directory Flashpoint is in, so you shouldn't need to change it.
* Redirector determines what software is used to send Flashpoint web traffic to the software. By default we use our own Redirector, but if it isn't working for some reason, you can try changing to Fiddler here (which redirects traffic more heavily).
* Use Custom Title Bar controls whether Flashpoint Launcher uses the standard Windows title bar.
* Show Developer Tab shows another link that has a few utilities for helping with Flashpoint development. You shouldn't ever need to turn this on in 99% of circumstances.

The About page contains a list of notable contributors to Flashpoint and some links related to the project / launcher, with details available on mouseover.

To close Flashpoint, simply close Flashpoint Launcher. The Redirector will close with it, your settings should be restored, and it should be fine to go back to your regular internet business.

========================================
Infinity
========================================

If you are running the Infinity version of Flashpoint, this applies to you.

Instead of having every file in the full version of Flashpoint, the Infinity version has the bare basics in the way of software to get you going, and games will be downloaded when you start them. When you launch a game, it will download the files, and then leave copies of them inside your copy of Infinity (so that you will not need to download them again). Note that certain games are "multi-asset", which means that they download files as they need them; if you play a game only a certain amount of the way online, then go offline and find you can't finish the game, that may be the reason.

To save on space, the default state of Infinity only comes with support for Adobe Flash games. You can upgrade your copy of Infinity to support tech other than Adobe Flash (the "Other Technologies" pack), and add high quality logos and screenshots (the "Logos & Screenshots" pack), via the two buttons on the home tab. These will download and extract the upgrades into Infinity's folder, and if you restart Flashpoint, you'll be able to see the changes in action. If you go into a playlist and see "Game not found", that is because you don't have the Other Technologies pack.

Not every game is available in the Infinity distribution due to incompatibilities with how we make Infinity work; these games will not show up in the launcher by default. The same also applies to extras included in the Ultimate version, which have been left out of the Infinity version to save space.

When you launch a game and Infinity is downloading a file, you can watch the Logs tab to see the progress of the file (if the game does not show the progress itself). If a game fails to load the first time, you should try closing the game and restarting it. If a game fails to load more than three times, you may need to go into the "Server" then "htdocs" folder and delete every file and folder in that folder (this will delete all the game files you've downloaded so far). If that doesn't work, you may have found a broken game, which can happen; contact us (see Contact) and we can try and fix it for the next version.

========================================
Troubleshooting
========================================

Follow the below steps in order if Flashpoint is having any problems.

Make sure that all your antivirus software and firewalls have exclusions for any software in the Flashpoint folder. You may need to re-extract Flashpoint, as some antivirus software is known to render new Flashpoint installs as not working if exclusions are not applied. This goes double for Avast, AVG, Avira, and BitDefender; they're known for rendering Flashpoint completely non-working. You'll have to disable the antivirus altogether, extract Flashpoint, then add an exception for the folder you just made, then re-enable the antivirus. If you have Avast or AVG and need more detailed instructions, you can find them here: 
https://bluemaxima.org/flashpoint/datahub/Troubleshooting_Antivirus_Interference

You need to extract Flashpoint from the zip, it won't run properly if you don't. If you have extracted it already, try re-extracting Flashpoint using 7-zip (if you used a different program). WinRAR is known for not properly extracting Flashpoint Ultimate, and sometimes even Flashpoint Infinity. We're not sure why either.

In your Flashpoint folder, open the Launcher folder. Then right-click FlashpointLauncher.exe and choose "Run as administrator".

Restart your computer. (No, seriously.)

If you have Flashpoint in a path with non-alphanumeric characters in the name at any point, move it to a folder that doesn't and try again. Same goes for network storage (we have seen this work in some cases, but we don't support it).

Make sure all proxies and VPNs are off before you attempt to start Flashpoint. Flashpoint may interfere with them and vice versa.

Change the "Redirector" option in the Config window to "Fiddler", and save and restart.

Ensure you have the two redistributables listed in the Requirements installed. Yes, it needs to specifically be the x86 version of Visual C++ 2015, even if you're on a 64-bit machine.

Make sure no applications are using ports 8888 or 22500. We need both those ports for Flashpoint.

If none of these work, you may be one of the rare cases that can't run the platform due to a combination of software or settings on your computer that we can't counter. If you're technically savvy enough, you might try installing a virtual machine and using Flashpoint in that; we've never seen Flashpoint fail in a fresh VMware install.

If Flashpoint crashes and causes issues with your internet connection, you can run the batch file named "Reset.bat" included inside the "Launcher" folder to cycle the internet changes made by Flashpoint without opening it.

========================================
Other Notes
========================================

Flashpoint does not keep your Flash save data inside your Flashpoint install; they go where they have always been stored, in your user profile. We've included two batch files, 'Saves Manager - Backup' and 'Saves Manager - Restore' which will grab copies of all your Flash-based save data and put it back where it needs to go, respectively, if you need to switch computers.

Any game that needs a little bit of extra effort will launch with a message prompt in the middle of your screen. Most other tidbits about games will end up in the "notes" section of the right sidebar.

Any games that have "(Hacked)" on the end of their name are games we've decompiled and recompiled with changed code in order to run properly in the collection. We can't guarantee these games are playable from start to finish, although we have made our best attempts to do so.

We cannot guarantee that this collection is safe from viruses. With that said, we have been working with these files for a long time, and we do our utmost to check every single game added to the collection.

========================================
Contact
========================================

Our Discord server is where we maintain Flashpoint. The best way to contact us, whether to troubleshoot a problem, ask about the project, or simply thank us, will be through there: https://discord.gg/S9uJ794

If Discord absolutely isn't an option, you can also use the following email address to contact us: flashpoint (at) bluemaxima (dot) org