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[iJohn]

Hi everyone,

I went through the forums, and couldn't find a definitive answer on the best practices to make your Flash game into a standalone projector (exe and dmg). VVVVVV explains briefly but that was 2 years GO. I know a few games have done so fluidly.

I'm planning to release a commercial flash game soon (it's a revamp of one of my older games) and I was wondering if anyone has suggestions for up to date software that can do this?

As a Flash dev some things I worry about:
- someone decompiling the exe, getting the .swf, and publishing it to websites
- performance issues
- full screen: even though I'm publishing in
- Is an installer necessary if I it's a small game?

I'm also new to the TIG forums but I plan to get involved with the indie community more :]

Any help would be appreciated!

[Fallsburg]

Well, the Flash debug player can do it, so no need to buy anything else.

As for your concerns:

- someone decompiling the exe, getting the .swf, and publishing it to websites

Not worth worrying about.  There is no way that you can protect against this or the more likely someone just cracking your game and putting up a torrent.

- performance issues

Not sure what performance issues you are worried about.  You are worried about performance issues in the projector?  Or you are hoping that the projector will make your game run faster? 

- full screen: even though I'm publishing in

Well, your sentence cuts off so I'm again not sure what you mean.  To my knowledge, if you want to run your game full screen it has to be in a projector, as the only key input that is allowed while in full screen mode otherwise is to exit full screen mode.

- Is an installer necessary if I it's a small game?

Well, if you are just using a projectored up .swf, then no it isn't. 
- Is an installer necessary if I it's a small game?

[iJohn]

Thanks for the help Fallsburg.

- True, I can't fully protect the file but hopefully just reduce the risks. I'm okay with piracy, since I know there's nothing I can do about that (and it most likely helps with exposure / distribution) but what worries me more is a webmaster putting it on their website as a swf game.

-  I know it won't make it faster, but there are some projectors that actually slow down the performance of the swf. My game is pretty graphic intensive (2D and super colorful).

- Oops, haha yeah what I meant to say is there a way to achieve full screen and use the arrow keys? Adobe said it would work in Flash Player 10, but as far as I know it doesn't work.

[randomnine]

Currently your best option is to package with AIR, which gives you full control over things like full screen and right click, an installer, an update system, etc. AIR's a bit of a pig to work with but it beats just shipping a projector version.

- someone decompiling the exe, getting the .swf, and publishing it to websites

Sitelock the game to only run locally and run it through SecureSWF or similar before packaging with AIR.

- performance issues

Well, it's Flash At least it's likely to run better than it will in a browser.

- full screen: even though I'm publishing in
- Is an installer necessary if I it's a small game?

AIR provides an installer and full screen functionality.

btw - AIR also lets you read and write files on disk, which you should use for save games as browsers can wipe the Flash shared object cache and delete your save games etc when you're not looking.

[brettchalupa]

Yup, AIR is the solution that you're looking for. It eliminates the option of webmasters using your swf, as it is an OS application.

If you built your project in FlashDevelop, converting it to an AIR application is easy. If you built it in Adobe Flash, I'd hope it's even easier. I can help you if FlashDevelop is the case, as I've done this many times!

Let me know, and I will see what I can do.

See st33d's post below. 

[st33d]

Get the standalone desktop projector here:

http://www.adobe.com/support/flashplayer/downloads.html

Open the swf with it.

menu, file, create projector

bam

Flash executable. You don't need AIR.

Actually protecting your code in an swf is different topic anyway. There are decompilers and techniques that allow you to rip open any swf or air app. Usually just by loading it into the memory of another swf. Then you have to get pretty devious to fend people off, you can do it, but it requires a load of reading up on the matter.

[Attila0413]

If you're interested in protecting your Swf, take a look at SecureSWF.

http://www.as3gamegears.com/obfuscation/secureswf/
http://www.kindi.com/

I've never tried it, but I've heard it's effective 

[iJohn]

@randomnine:
I'll definitely be sitelocking it locally. The only thing is my game was made exclusively in Flash (non air) and really doesn't utilize the features that Air offers, so no Air for me :[

@st33d:
Wow, thanks for that link, that might be exactly what I'm looking for! I'll check it out and see how it goes. I didn't realize they had a standalone projector for Flash Player 11

@Attila0413:
I've heard of it, I'll be checking that out as well

Thanks for all your help guys! I'll post any updates for other devs having problems with Flash projectors

[Fallsburg]

The only thing is my game was made exclusively in Flash (non air) and really doesn't utilize the features that Air offers, so no Air for me :[

Ummm...all you have to do is use the AIR compiler.  AS3 is a proper subset of AIR, i.e. you can write something only using standard AS3 and it will compile just fine in AIR, but you can't write something using AIR capabilities (native extensions, seamless file i/o, etc.).

[st33d]

If you're interested in protecting your Swf, take a look at SecureSWF.

http://www.as3gamegears.com/obfuscation/secureswf/
http://www.kindi.com/

I've never tried it, but I've heard it's effective 

It generally breaks the code of games I put through it. Otherwise, it doesn't really stop determined sites from stealing it.

The best practise we've found is to have a container swf which carries the game in a scrambled form hidden in something like an image. After we started doing that, we found only one site stealing the game, and they only could be bothered with changing the url lock to their site.

Don't use AIR unless you absolutely have to. In order to make AIR work you have to get the client to install AIR. There are ways now of bundling the installer with your application, but honestly theres not much point in using it unless you're managing files.

[Franklin's Ghost]

The best practise we've found is to have a container swf which carries the game in a scrambled form hidden in something like an image. After we started doing that, we found only one site stealing the game, and they only could be bothered with changing the url lock to their site.

Hey st33d, do you think you could give some tips on how you go about that? It's sounds like an interesting approach.

[st33d]

It's the work of another guy in the office so I don't know the specifics.

It's based on the Flash Develop preloader for as3 only projects.

In the Flash Develop preloader you've got a preloader object that is the swf document that loads in the rest of the swf as an attachable MovieClip. This guy just hid where the data was being loaded from. Then he also needed to hide where the levels were separately because you can load the swf into another swf and then extract it once it's been unpacked.

[iJohn]

@Fallsburg: sorry, forgot to mention my game is programmed in the very ancient AS 2.0.

But yeah that's right, I really just wanted to avoid AIR all together, haven't heard too many good things about it.

So I think st33d pretty much led me down the right direction. I tried the full screen with Flash Player 11, and the arrow key input works! As well as the space bar.

I'll have to manually configure Flash Player 11 into Adobe CS5 itself (http://blogs.adobe.com/rgalvan/2011/11/adding-fp11-support-to-flash-pro-cs5-and-cs5-5.html) so I can publish for that version, also so that it doesn't automatically compress the file. Compressed .exe's will cause your anti-virus checker to pop up. Then I'll have to edit / hack the projector to have a custom icon, custom window etc.

As for obfuscation, I'm looking into Flash Secure Optimizer. It's cheap and from what I read seems pretty effective.