Over the last few days there have been many posts about Free Instant Play Alternatives. As soon as TGMG posted a topic in the GMC titled ‘Gmbed :- Browser Embed Games‘ it led to the topic to be filled with many replies praising him, the system and occasionally mentioning the odd bug.
The system did actually work, many test games were upload; SadBot and Hit the Ball are a couple.
This was all great, however the dream could end very soon, as Mark Overmars made an appearance with some shocking news.
I am sorry to say that what you are doing is actually illegal. You are not allowed to split the game executables and get the data out of it and download only that part. According to the license agreement you are not allowed to changed the game executables.
I am not commenting here on the project in general. Just on the fact that you are only downloading the data part of the games. That is not allowed.
He also explained that the YYG system can be made to embed games to website, however they chose not to.
B.t.w. it would be very easy for YYG to embed the games in the website. The reason we did not do that is that it would put restrictions on the size of the window that is used in the game (because it has to fit in the layout of the game page) and it would no longer allow changes of the game play window. As we want our tool to be generic we decided to run the games in a separate window.
Mark
It went from wonderful dream to disaster in less than 24 hours.
Dear Mr. Overmars, I would like to make my game maker games as web versions, but without using yoyogames. Please explain how I can LEGALLY do this?
I think this was a very badly thought out decision on Mark’s/Yoyogames part.
By the way, I would like to see a reply from YoYo on this one. It is clear that they are trying to preserve their InstantPlay monopoly.
gamez93,
“I guess they are allowed to ’split’ the games as they are the owners of the system. The License Agreement says we (as game creators etc) aren’t though.”
The licence agreement also says that I’m not allowed to permit anyone else to decompile the game, the licence agreement even says that I should attach an eula to my game stating that, so actually YoYo Games has no permission to split my game either. Moreover, it would be fun to sue them: if you win, InstantPlay will no longer have unfair advantages, but if you lose, others will probably also be allowed to split the games. It’s almost a win-win situation.
YYG InstantPlay ftl.
It’s just a file that YoYo wants to keep to themselves.
Thats retarded. Why exactly is it illigal? its just a file.
I thought I ought to let you know that TGMG has now removed the splitting feature (which Mark was referring to), so it no longer separates the EXE runner data from the game.
While this does slow down load times, it also makes it legal.
Revel, I can’t stand you saying this all the time.
I have to tell you …
it’s spelt “illegal”, for Christ’s sake.
XD
Shame the file-splitting was removed, but at least it can still be used. 😀
I have not studied the whole agreement in full detail however unless an admin from YYG finds the topic and sorts the issues out quickly it may not make a difference.
The whole Instant Play is what makes the main site a decent site for the casual gamer, without it will just be a collection of very bad (and some good) games. They need more USPs in order to attract people outside of the GM users to their site.
I guess they are allowed to ‘split’ the games as they are the owners of the system. The License Agreement says we (as game creators etc) aren’t though.
That quote should be as follows (so note that the quote below is not real):
“I am sorry to say that what we are doing is actually illegal. We are not allowed to split the game executables and get the data out of it and download only that part. According to our own license agreement we are not allowed to changed the game executables. However, this is the way our InstantPlay function works.
I am not commenting here on our InstantPlay function in general. Just on the fact that we are only downloading the data part of the games. That is not allowed.
Mark”
Although what I was doing was legal I removed it to make them happy. I am interested to see if this will make them change instant play in anyway.
But anyway I have released the system and everyone can embed their own games now!!
Remember to convert gm6 exes to vista aswell as regular so everyone can play them 🙂
I suspect this applet could work without the need of splitting the games. What’s always concerned me about this, is that even binary difference/patch programs, and compress engines would modify the executable. In reality they are also saying even zipping a game is against the EULA.
Robin
The GM Decompiler broke the License agreement equally, it wasn’t stopped too well and is still in use by many. Mark’s words are worthless, I doubt YoYo will (or will be able to) do anything as long as TGMG can release this in the near future.