The New GameTap Feature Guides: Browsing, Downloading, & Playing

Wow, looks nice!

Bubble Bobble.
Rated M for
*Blood and Gore
*Intense Violence
*Sexual Themes
*Strong Language
*Another Descriptor

It’s the year 2161…

Something tells me it’s the wrong description. :p

Looks very nice.

its the unreleased M rated version lol

@Penquin, :O Thats awesome.

Bubble Bobble is &@$#&ing extreme.

The one constant in the universe is that change is bad.

Please tell me that I’m not doomed to playing console games in a small window inside a web browser…. I’m not sure I like the multipage layout on games either.

Reminds me of the time I took a look at Metaboli. Regardless, I think this is a good change. I just want my saves to sync!

It looks nice, though I still prefer my shell. Provided overall performance and features are improved than I can slowly be persuaded to use it. (That said, I do want to beta test the hell out of it.)

Looks like that version of Bubble Bobble is “Bubble Bobble: Fallout Edition”.

I’m not optimistic about this change. I really hated the last “update”, so much that I canceled. I only re-uped for the kids. This may kill that reason too.

I dunno. So far, I’m not too enthusiastic. I LIKE having the Gametap Player as a dedicated platform, and migrating over to a browser plugin feels… iffy. I’m especially concerned that it might impact the gameplay experience of player/browser-based games. Will you be able to take the games to the mostly-fullscreen level you can now? More importantly, will it lock out Mozilla from detecting the keyboard, so that your games aren’t constantly interrupted by accidentally hitting key commands recognized by the browser?

Will gametap ever be able to handle 64 bit browsers?????

I hate using ActiveX and IE. Is there a Firefox plugin in the works?

G4 is reporting that you’re dropping Mac support. I read the relevant blog post (the last one) and you say that some features won’t be available “at launch.” So do you expect OS X support to return, or is it gone for good? Whatever the case may be, you might want to let the good folk at G4 know, because that’s how they’re reporting your “big changes.” That’s the headline.

I agree….64 bit is a must. I like the idea of all this but it is useless going forward without 64 bit enabled

@Hostesscupcake, it does now and will continue to for the foreseeable future.

@Saranjeuhal, yes this update is adding Firefox support.

@Spekkio, Mac OS X support is being retired, I suppose it could resurface one day, but there are currently no plans for that.

Will Windows games still be included with the subscription or is this becoming a here’s a demo, now buy the game from us situation? Just want to clarify this cos someone else had mentioned this being similar to another service that does just that. Also, assuming that the Windows games won’t change (I hope this doesn’t mean that Windows games will stop being added in favor of selling them through your store), will we still play them full screen like they are now?

If Windows games stay the same, the new looks pretty darn cool. If Windows games are going away or are going to become dusty as you shift to a buy from us platform, that may just be the end of Hulkamania. I thought Hulkamania never died…:(

Boot camp for the mac users. That’s what I do on my macbook.

Yeah, Window’s games are still part of the subscription, there’s a post outlining th subscriptions on the forums.

I really, REALLY don’t want to play games in a browser window. There’s so many options for that it isn’t even funny. I want ONE. UNIFIED. CLIENT. You’ve been steadily making the Gametap client worse and worse (no Gametap TV) and now you’re taking it away entirely? WHY?

Will this update run in chrome, or am I going to have to migrate back over to firefox?

So there will still be playlists right? But no more awesome Gametap launcher just firefox and internet explorer right? Well hopefully it will work out alright. will there be ETA of his update anytime soon??

@Penquin–Thanks!

I’ll probably cancel if this goes through. I much prefer the one stop shop app for this subscription type service. Dropping Mac OS X support is pretty lame as well. I pop in to quite a few of the arcade games for a quick spell rather than booting into Windows.

I really loved the old client that had lots of content in one place, and slowly you’ve been making it worse and worse.

You’ve likely lost yourselves a longtime customer with these changes.

What does “Requires Key” mean in the screenshots above? That it’s a Gold member-only game, or is the adding of a CD Key now a separate step even for single-player games? Or is it like before, multiplayer keys only, and the list of games saying that they require a multiplayer key is just ipsum lorem?

Another vote in favour of Google Chrome support. Since I have to have a separate OS just for GameTap anyway (my computer has more than 3GB of RAM), Google Chrome seemed like the easiest, smallest non-IE to install for the little bit of browsing I do while booted into GameTap’s XP partition.

I think this change could be good to great. HTML as a UI is probably easier to develop than a standalone client, and I’m sure we’ll see improvements in usability and new features more quickly than with the standalone client. It should be especially easy (technologically, I don’t know about corporately or legaly) to add “social” features like commenting on games, or improving recommendations for similar games.

The only thing I’m concerned about with the new UI is that you don’t mention any experience above similar to going to “Search” in the client and just browsing through the complete list of games, which is something I like to do. I hope you’ll support the back button too, since it will be the only thing which is like the client’s current flow of something like: look at a game and then click the the close button to return to a list, still in the same position. I also suspect that the pick a random game feature will take you to a game’s page, rather than a game’s position in the list of games, which is another change in the flow, again in favour of less exploration of what’s available. But I’m sure whatever changes, it will still be an improvement, and will always be improving.

Another eventual improvement could be adding the ability to select which component/version of a game to launch directly on the game’s page or through shortcuts, instead of the current technique of saying play game and then getting a bespoke per-game, “My First Program(TM), from Visual Studio’s Design View” (j/k, let’s call it RAD instead pop-up asking if you want to play the game or run the editor or launch in safe mode.

As for the in-browser games (Arcade, Console, Dos), there’s no reason it won’t add fullscreen even if it doesn’t launch with it — Flash, another browser plugin, supports full screen. The one thing I’m curious about is how the downloading works. Is it going to be completely silent? How are failed downloads handled, and what notification do I receive on failure or completion? Do I need a browser window open to “My GameTap” for a download to be active?

And most importantly, will a GameTap service continue running in the background when I’m not using GameTap, and if so, how long until you add an option for automatically stopping it when no longer in use (see: Steam)? Either way, I don’t really care — GameTap has it’s own dedicated install of XP, so no matter what it installs for me it will only run when I’m using GameTap anyway, but if it has an always-running service expect complaints from others.

I slept on this news to see if I felt better about it in the morning.

I don’t. I have such little interest in playing games in my browser that I can guarantee I won’t play any games that way. I guess I’m paying full price for a fraction of the games. I have had far too many headaches and memory problems with games poorly optimized for play in a browser and enough technical issues with games from Gametap as it is that I’m not at all willing to risk it. I suppose this ultimately means it’s time for me to seriously consider whether my money is better spent elsewhere. I didn’t sign up for just Windows, Saturn and Dreamcast games.

@Stugga53, That requires key button is the same as the multiplayer code button in the client. There is a much improved search function on the site, and the ability to browse through all the games. The service in the background will shutdown after, IIRC, 2 minutes.

i try to run the player for about 1 week but send a error to try later

I sure hope their servers have been drastically upgraded. The last time I went to Gametap’s website online I couldn’t stand it because it was so slow. If we have to launch all our games through there, it’s going to be a gigantic pain.

Wow. Maybe GameTap should seriously reconsider what it’s doing, because I see nothing but negative feedback.

I will only resubscribe when 64 bit is supported for the windows games.

2 things…..
1 - Please tell me that full screen will still be an option….because if i’m playing games in a window like what i just saw above…….well only thing i can say is “NO WAY!”

2 - Please dont tell me since this will be a plug-in that i will have to rely on flash in my browser to work for GT to work right…….flash especially since v10 breaks regularly…..

So, it looks official. All arcade games will be broken with the new update, because that is what putting them into a window in the browser is… broken.

@Alex, they won’t be full screen at launch, but will be in an update. It does not rely on flash.

Ahhh. Isn’t it nice to hear that people will always decide on changes even though they may not know the full story or have the chance to give it a try.

I don’t want some browser plugin crapping up my computer. If you really intend on making the standalone player stop working, then I really intend on cancelling.

So it was a caching issue and Sierra titles plus Fable show up. Sorry for the disturbance. But my apprehensiveness still holds true, you better get it up to par in under 3 months. That is all, thanks.

I am really hoping this is a joke and the client will be supported somehow. I have gametap mostly for my kids and there is no way I’m letting them on the internet with a insecure web browser that has plug ins active

My favorite part is the little asterisk that denotes, “The screenshots above are taken from pre-release designs and may be subject to change.” This was posted on March 4th, and it’s to be released on March 16th? What happened to such necessities as quality assurance and play-testing? If changes are still being made this late in the project, I don’t see where either one of those things actually fits in. I’m preparing for a complete disaster with this, over and above which I think our collective gaming experience is in serious jeopardy of becoming yet another browser experience, one which we pay for.

Personally, I think this all sounds _great_. The client was nice, but the world has really moved on, and the current support in browsers + what is right around the corner make this look like a really appealing idea. I also like the concept of simple access to my games from any computer… moving GameTap towards the ‘cloud’ is only good stuff in my book.

Here’s another vote for Chrome support - although given that Google doesn’t even support Chrome for their own toolbar, I can imagine that might be a little much to ask…

It sounds like there are a lot of things that will be available with “an update”. When is that update scheduled to be launched? If it’s a month after you launch these changes, I can see that. You need a few weeks to see what bugs appear under real user stress. If you’re talking 3, 6, 12 months…well, you’ve got a problem. That’s too long for people to be paying money to run your beta tests. If you need more time to test, then take it. Don’t force it on your users.

This is actually a nice installment

Will all of the games in the client now be able to support 64-bit computers? I have had issues with this for a long time and cancelled subscriptions because of it. If you could change this i’m pretty sure i will come back to the system.

wow this looks really awesome i can’t wait

Will this be a plugin?

Will this be IE only? *guntothehead*

It works with IE or Firefox

It still amazes me how many closed-minded people there are in this day and age. After reading how many people comment that they won’t play a game simply because it is run in a browser. I’ve played numerous games over at instantaction.com and when I play them in full-screen mode IT IS IN NO WAY DIFFERENT than playing any other computer game that I’ve bought. Why are some people so stubborn in their ways that they won’t even try it? It really makes me sad.

@TheDude I’m upset by the browser-only thing because I didn’t pay a subscription fee for a jazzed up version of Addictinggames.com. Who seriously had their day ruined because they had to look at the online game catalogue, then had to click over to the player. And, if they had just released an optional beta version of this update, I would have been more than glad to try it out and decide then. But, this is apparently a non-negotiable step and if we don’t like it, too bad. If I wasn’t paying for this service, then I couldn’t complain, but since I do, I should at least have that much of a voice as to the direction it should go.

So enjoy your open mindedness while gametap railroads through it.

I’m going to try to old my full opinion till launch, but so far this doesn’t sound good.

But I gotta throw in a vote for Google Chrome support, I do got Firefox installed for times like this but it is a pain to switch back and forth.

My computer died at the perfect time, now it’s formatted and working beautifully. It is great to see a new GameTap coming…I love the variety of games offered and the subscription is less than an MMO, what’s not to like? Can’t wait to get started with the new launch!

cant wait for the avatarS!!!!!

I’m not excited at all. I like the old gametap better. God, gametap just keeps getting worse. First they took off URU, then they replaced the perfect gametap with a bad one where there isnt gametap tv and you can only download one at a time. the first one was perfect. When will this ever stop??? they made the easy gametap hard and now i have to download games at the website?! aww c’mon! you sh**ing me?

I really like the way that the game browsing looks, but I am really going to miss the way the player worked. That being said, I’m kind of excited to try this update. Any ideas when we can expect this to happen?

Im using the new gametap plugin now and it really sucks, i dont know if it is just me but it loads so slow and i havent been able to do anything

Well I’ve installed it into a 32 bit vista system with Internet Explorer 8. And I must say I’m QUITE miffed, it seems to have hosed IE8 (even with the plugin/addon disabled) in that the browser will work for a little bit (even without visiting gametap at all) but opening a ’second’ complete browser window will 90% of the time wedge, and about 50% of the time opening a new tab in the first (or only) IE8 window will wedge the tab. The only ‘fix’ is to go to taskmanager and kill the iexplore.exe processes.

This is completely unacceptable as now IE8 is effectively unusable and on a cursory look it appears that it’s actually broken the browser not just the plugin/gametap but the whole dang browser. If they tell me that I have to do an os reinstall and then upgrade to IE8 again and not install the plug-in, I’m going to go ballistic.

Add to that premium members being shown ads, being ‘forced’ into the ‘beta’ as of 3/31/09, and the security ramifications of disabling DEP for gametap processes and having to remove ‘protected mode’ from the ‘internet zone’ for security, and the problems with the install… This all adds up to make me pretty mad.

What the heck was wrong with the old client.. it functioned flawlessly for me for years.

If they don’t find me a fix that doesn’t require a reinstall… I’m not sure what I’ll do. My computer consulting rate is 250/hr so maybe I’ll charge them that for all the work that their shoddy plug-in has caused me.

Oh did gametap also mention all the accounts they deleted that has a _ in their name? That’s right my old Lord_Tony account was deleted for having a _ in their name.

This browser based player is awful. I have gametap mostly for my son, and he could navigate the old player just fine. He used the browser based player and told me he couldn’t find any of his games. I took a look at it and had no idea where they were either. Hopefully I can get a refund on my yearly membership when I cancel.

Was hesitant about the switch but decided to hold my tongue until launch. Spent time reading the blogs and the update emails and started to feel a little better about things… Well now that I’m in the thick of it I really hope things improve rapidly.

I’m aware it takes time and there are inevitable bumps in the road, but my question is why such massive change when there was neither a large customer call for one or substantial issues with the former platform requiring one? The plug-in transition was wonky, I have spent more time walking the family through navigating the site than enjoying it (way not user friendly folks), I could not play the first day at all because I kept getting nonsense errors, and Downloading is paaaaaaaaainfully slow through the browser.

I’m giving it some time to see how it all comes together. I really hope I am not going to be forced by these “improvements” to say goodbye to what was once a really beloved service.

lol… pain the the arse men. i have a 32bit vista.. and it never downloads.. tried turning off every protection. every fire wall. i used run as admin trick.

still dosent run. so i tried on my XP laptop.. it downloads BUT ITS SLOW… really slow…

is there a way that i can copy the downloaded game here. and play it in my vista?

Games not migrating, unsure where the Files are going, what’s about this wanabe-Update?
It seems more like a downgrade, than an Update, compared to the usual and working GameTap application.
I don’t know why they’re thinking, that they improve the software, but it’s purely nonsense, when it works so poorly, and without any migrations going on.
I may not have any payed game on GameTap yet, but if it works that way, I doubt, that I would ever buy me one over that Platform, I’d rather buy on Steam, which works way more smootly.
A rollback to the solid Application-Version would add more appeal to that Wannabe-Platform for me.

Worst idea ever. I liked the application, it was FASTER and SMOOTHER than this crap you have right now. Way to change gametap into shit… will not renew my subscription.

I am also pretty pissed off with this. Plugin is buggy as hell. Clicking on games only sometimes brings up the list of games, othertimes it just just loads up a shell as though I have no games downloaded at all. It also seems non responsive when I attempt to stop a download/delete, forcing me to wait until it’s finished to delete it if I change my mind..

Terrible…