Your first curation - an illustrated guide
- This is a legacy article; see Curation Tutorial.
The curation informations overhaul is in order.
This guide is not very good resource, it will be replaced with better ones.
Even though, it's still usable.
|-|0W 7o CuR473 s1mPl3 Flash Games L1k3 4 Pr0
by Choror
\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\ Do you want to be l33t curator and uncover secrets of Flashpoint and internet games?
\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\ With this easy guide you'll be getting you first curation in no time
\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\ THE GUIDE IS ILLUSTATED - YOU CAN BOTH READ AND WATCH INSTRUCTIONS NOW
1. Prepare yourself to spend up to 2 hours if everything goes wrong - normally 30' is sufficient, and experienced curator needs no more than 5' to curate simple game (citation needed)
- cURLsDownloader <--- Also included in the Utilities folder of Flashpoint Core, you'll probably want to use it
- HAR Extractor <--- sometimes it's better than cURLsDownloader
You could read and have those sites open at all time when curating
Tutorials
- https://bluemaxima.org/flashpoint/datahub/Genres
- https://bluemaxima.org/flashpoint/datahub/Curation_Format
- https://bluemaxima.org/flashpoint/datahub/Instructions_for_Curating
Game Lists
- https://bluemaxima.org/flashpoint/datahub/Game_Master_List
- https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1t0MbYMGm4dq4d5hA1l6MKuVYGyw9XU8UOPHjy2ceHX8
2. Find the game you want to curate. (((Protip: You want to curate single-file .swf Flash game.))) Then use Inspect tool on game screen after it loads. (Ctrl+Shift+C in Firefox and Chrome). It's in developer tools menu.
3. Open cURLsDownloader through cURLsDownload.bat, then copy the link to game to it.
Press enter. Game will be downloaded to cURLsDownloader v5.3\Downloads
Media:downloading your game.png
4. Copy downloaded folder to Flashpoint Core 3.1\Server\htdocs
5. Open Flashpoint Core and add the game (Fill in Title, Launch Command and set Application Path to FPSoftware\Flash\flashplayer_32_sa.exe)
Media:Making your game work in flashpoint.png
6. Play the game for a bit to make sure it works. a) Make screenshot of logo b) Make screenshot of gameplay
screenshot of logo has to be named logo.png
screenshot of gameplay has to be named ss.png
Media:Cropping the screenshot.png
7. Make metadata file
Copy blank meta from https://bluemaxima.org/flashpoint/datahub/Curation_Format to notepad
Fill in what you can - (Title, and Launch Command are ABSOLUTELY MANDATORY)
You have to fill in (Play Mode, Extreme, Genre and Source)
If game has credits or something similar add (Developer) too
If game is part of series fill in (Series) too
(Publisher) is not very important field
Notes are up to you to decide. If there's something people playing the game shoud know write it there.
Author Notes... IDK do what you want or write message to Flashpoint staff working on your curation here if you feel need to.
metadata file has to be named meta.txt
Media:Filling the metadata.png
8. Make game folder and fill it with everything you made a) Make folder "Name_Of_The_Game" ex. "Uphill Rush" and folder "content" in it b) Put folder with game in "content" folder c) Put meta.txt, ss.png and logo.png in "Name_Of_The_Game"
Media:Creating the catalog with your game.png
\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\ YOU DON'T NEED ILLUSTRATIONS NOW - THE HARD PART IS OVER - GLORY AWAITS
9. Make .zip or .7z archive from "Name_Of_The_Game" folder
10. Post it to #curator-lounge on Flashpoint discord server
Write something about it being your first curation and wait for curator to check the archive
If there are any mistakes you'll fix them together
If everything is OK you'll get Trial Curator role and permission to upload directly to curation channels
Remember to ask for edit priviledges for request sheets
Before curating game check both request sheet and game masterlist
CONGRATULATIONS YOU'RE TRIAL CURATOR NOW - You're already better than n00bz badly filling game requests instead of archiving them themselves