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JKGalaxies released (sort of)

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JKGalaxies now publicly available

Those who have been following the mod will know that JKGalaxies suffered some issues, but it has now been released. The mod, whose authors we interviewed a while ago makes a huge amount of changes, and fundamentally changes JKA gameplay. I had a short look at it myself, and have to say I quite liked it.

 

That said, a number of things went wrong with the release. Personally, I attribute most of them to a rushed release and a lack of proper planning, but I'm liable to be stabbed for that.

 

Issue #1: Having a server

The first issue that nearly delayed JKGalaxies' launch was the lack of a server. It turns out, on the day JKGalaxies was supposed to launch, they still did not have a server. After discussing it extensively with them, I offered JKG my personal server temporarily, which was previously used for Hydroball and breaking stuff. This is a temporary solution until JKG manages to get their own server up and running, and MUG might slightly hate me for it, but hey, it means JKG gets to release on schedule.

 

Issue #2: TerranGaming

With that sorted, JKG was released, and their launcher was momentarily available on our site. Then JKG's webserver fell over. The issue? Well, apparently, JKGalaxies is hosted as a part of TerranGaming's website here, and their shoddy webhosting allows a maximum of 5 simultaneous users online. Any more than 5 users online, and the webserver falls over. Nobody did any stress testing, so it was only found out about when people were en masse trying to download the JKG files from TerranGaming's site using the launcher.

 

Issue #3: PHP scripts

I offered to mirror JKGalaxies' files on JKHub, as we are a lot better equipped to handle large amounts of traffic. Unfortunately, none of the JKG team knows PHP, and were unable to modify JKG's scripts to work under our web infrastructure. As an alternative, in order to be able to release today, JKGalaxies was released as a zip file here.

 

Conclusion

I do think that, with proper testing and preparations, this could've been avoided. I offered to host JKGalaxies several times, and even if they didn't want that, some simple stress testing would've determined this could happen. Despite these perhaps harsh words, I do think the mod they made seems quite awesome. The quality of JKGalaxies is not affected by a badly organised launch, and if you want, you should totally check the mod out.

By Caelum, in Community News,

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minilogoguy18

I'll have to check it out.

 

While I'm here though, WTF happened to Mystic Forces/Terran Gaming? They were a good clan with a fun JA server and now it's a total garbage site with just a ton of ads with no mention of JA anywhere.

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Szico VII

I just tried using the launcher. After a painfully slow download....it got to 98% and then gave me an unknown error (presumably because the connection to the download server had been lost)

 

It needs a resume function.

 

Im a try one more time whilst map is compiling.

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eezstreet

It's Okay, I understand that you want to protect your files and that more than fine with me, however you misunderstood what i was saying my problem wasn't the extraction, those protected files don't really load in the game, i mean i got the UI working fine, but the Animations not, most of the maps that were with the mod also didn't get read into the game, etc.

Try linking the launcher with your game install by using the "install" option on the launcher as if you were installing. Fixes some of the issues including animations and crashes.

I am not sure what kind of method you used to protect the files, but i am pretty sure it's not right, that's just my personal opinion though, and i mean absolutely no offense with it.

I'm not offended at all. The PK3 protection was in fact very much controversial whenever it was first announced if I remember right.

Edit : Well, if it's no problem can you add me on MSN so that perhaps you might be able to tell me a way to fix my problem?

Sorry. I can't really do MSN that much or much instant messaging with all the mess that's going on. You can hit me up through PM and I can probably fix it though.

I'll have to check it out.

 

While I'm here though, WTF happened to Mystic Forces/Terran Gaming? They were a good clan with a fun JA server and now it's a total garbage site with just a ton of ads with no mention of JA anywhere.

I am also frustrated with them (believe me, there's a lot more issues between us and TG than what appears)

I just tried using the launcher. After a painfully slow download....it got to 98% and then gave me an unknown error (presumably because the connection to the download server had been lost)

 

It needs a resume function.

 

Im a try one more time whilst map is compiling.

The launcher uses a souped up install method custom made by BobaFett that is called Delta Packing. It ensures that no file is ever downloaded more than needs to be necessary. It also allows you to do all kinds of fancy things with updates (removes/adds only certain files, so you don't have to download a whole new PK3 for one measley texture or something). It also wraps a second layer of protection around the PK3.

 

Launcher is basically full of win in design. Except that it singlehandedly caused TerranGaming's Apache server to crash (JKG is popular apparently)

It's entirely likely that an update was issued whenever you were downloading @@Szico VII. I do apologize for a lot of the issues that you personally are having with the launcher. When we migrate hosts, or TerranGaming wises up and gets a better server, or we get less traffic, there will definitely be a lot less issues.

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therfiles

Lol was Terran pissed with you guys?

 

Good call with the protected assets...thats the right choice for a mod of this scale.

 

Also, here is the fix that work for me. If you can't get it to update, rename your JKG folder to someting else, like "jkg2". Hit uninstall from the launcher. It will uninstall quickly, as it looks for the jkg folder and there is no such folder. Then, rename the JKG2 folder back to jkg and install. All the new files/missing files should be updated/ dloaded.

 

Problem probably fixed, but who knows. Also, silverfang said if you get a VM_CREATE error, end the process using ctrl alt delete.

 

Not my place, ofc, just though people might like some infos.

 

The game itself is magnificent. It's cool to finally be part of a mod from the launch (joined community after a lot of the big mods had way since been established.

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minilogoguy18

^Protected assets?

 

Did someone figure out how to keep people from digging through pk3 files? I tried this once but it didn't work cause I didn't some someone totally defiling something by slapping clan logos on it and re-releasing it the next day.

eezstreet likes this
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eezstreet

@@minilogoguy18: Oh, they can dig however they like, but as soon as WinZip goes to extract, it'll explode pretty hardcore. Also, JKG files will cause base JA to completely freeze (or just downright crash).

 

Also thanks @@therfiles, this does solve some issues and I have recommended this to others.

 

 

 

If anyone is interested in contributing third party content or hosting a serverside, let me know. If you seem trustworthy, I can give you access to the serverside (we're very careful because the serverside installation is pretty technical and also because the serverside exposes scripts and other things)

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eezstreet

As a side note, if people with shader issues could post shader warnings from their console (My guess: such and so has a light map but no light map stage), that would be instrumental in solving the shader issues. Another map is working on getting pushed out too.

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eezstreet

Yeah, I figured as much. Looks like one shader is broken in such a way that the entire shader system has been broken because of it (u_u)

I've gotten this before. It's just a tedious matter of trial and error to find out which shader is the culprit.

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Szico VII

Well, as much as you think this launcher may be 'win' it crashed again on second attempt, this time at 89%. "Unknown error" whilst downloading jkg_taris.pk3

 

Dont know if I cba to try again :/

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therfiles

It would also be cool If there was an ingame announcement that a new update was released. I was playing once, and update occured while I was playing, and the game bascially broke. It took me some time to figure out a new update had been released. Would this be possible?

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Szico VII

Also how the frick do you actually join a server? Before it had it listed on the news page. Now, no idea :/

 

It really has to be much more obvious so people can actually join!

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Silverfang

@@Szico VII /connect 188.165.212.209:29110

 

@Anyone having animations.pk3 issues you have to run the launcher to update after installing the zip no matter what.

 

 

 

Bug fixes for inventory/shop and such are on their way. apparently this is already patched

therfiles likes this
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