Unable to launch flash game after Adobe Flash Player update.

cgascons

Hi guys,

Not quite sure if this would be a Starling related issue but I want to know if any of you have experienced the same issue that we are currently going through. The thing is, without making any update on our end, players have been sending us tickets all week about an issue after they updated their flash version to 26,0,0,151

They claim not being able to get in the game ever since, it won't load. Any advise?

Cheers

cgascons

I'd appreciate any hint, thanks!

JohnBlackburne

Here are the release notes for Flash 26

https://helpx.adobe.com/flash-player/release-note/fp_26_air_26_release_notes.html

I had a quick look for anything that might be causing previously working apps to fail, but nothing stood out. Generally Flash’s backwards compatibility is excellent – content written a decade or more ago, with the Classic flash API, with AS 2, still works fine.

You could post a link to the game: other developers are more likely to be able to give you useful feedback (more useful than "it doesn’t load"). Without that, or much more detail on what your game is doing, it’s hard to offer any advice.

edit: here is the August 8 security bulletin:

https://helpx.adobe.com/security/products/flash-player/apsb17-23.html

Wonder what a "type confusion vulnerability" is ? Sounds like the sort of thing that could impact running code that e.g. does some odd things with variable types.

cgascons

Hi John,

Thanks for your reply. I indeed checked that as well and found nothing that could lead to the source of the issue.

No problem at all on pasting here the link of one of the games that fails (https://apps.facebook.com/wwiitcg/) the thing is, it doesn't fail everytime.

I actually kind of managed to reproduce the error on Firefox by creating a brand new blank Flash Project and attempting to debug it, it shown the "To view this page ensure that Adobe Flash Player version 25.0.0 or greater is installed. " message even though I have installed it and used it thousands of times. I checked the add-ons on Firefox and also everything seems to be fine. This is what I believe it's happening to some of the users, but again, I can't be 100% sure.

Thanks again,

Daniel

If the problem is that users see the "Get Adobe Flash Player" button, even though the Flash Player is installed — that's currently starting to become the default for the Flash plugin, unfortunately. Browsers are starting to *always* display the alternative content, until someone clicks on it. → Yes, clicking on "Get Adobe Flash Player" will then start the game. A catastrophe in terms of usability, if you ask me ... but that's apparently what browser vendors want.

I know that this is happening in Safari; in Chrome, it depends on how often you visited the website in the past; in Firefox, I must admit I don't know what's the current status.

My recommendation: create a different alternative content that is as big as the game and includes a big "Play" button. People that don't have the Flash Player installed will still go to the Adobe website to download the player; others will go into the game.

Here's a sample: https://gamua.com/media/starling/demos/flappy-starling/

cgascons

Hi Daniel,

Thanks for your reply. I was worried about this indeed, but clicking on the "Get ADobe Flash Player" button won't start it unfortunately, in my case it follows the link (https://get.adobe.com/es/flashplayer/) and nothing else. Not sure what's going on though, your link works fine in all my browsers, but when I attempt to launch this brand new project (New -> ActionScript Project -> Web) it just won't work anymore. I'm using AIR SDK 25 (revision 143) and the setup by default (ActionScript Compiler -> Adobe Flash Player options -> Use version specified by the AIR SDK). Also I've tried adding the argument (-swf-version=36) but it remains the same.

Not sure what could be going on honestly.

Daniel

How are you embedding the SWF file in the HTML website? Do you have control over that?

cgascons

Actually Daniel, it happens by just creating a brand new Flash project and attempting to debug it by using the default URL (not even being launched in a server or something, but in our localhost). And still it won't work.

I have uploaded here (https://we.tl/MjUkCvuKgA) a 35KB project that reproduces this issue (on my end).

[EDIT] I've tried with both Firefox 55.0.3 (64-bit) and Firefox 55.0.3 (32-bit) and none work.

cgascons

Not really sure what else to do, I've downloaded AIR 26 and 27 but no luck either, there's no way I can't see new flash content anymore (at least on Firefox). It's weird though, that for instance, I can access without issues any of my games and will work just fine. It's only happening now to some specific projects created on Flash Builder. Will keep you posted if I find anything, in the meantime as always any extra info will be much appreciated, thanks for the help so far.

JohnBlackburne

You’ve mentioned Firefox a couple of times, and there have been a couple of reports of bugs recently that seem particular to the latest Firefox.

You’ve probably seen this it does not sound like the same thing but worth looking at:

FireFox 55 baselineConstrained Bug

This one is a bit more obscure but sounds more plausible:

Firefox 55 and up: Flash Player Direct mode reports invalid stageWidth and stageHeight

cgascons

Hi JohnBlackBurne, thanks for the links! I took a look at them but none seems to be related, the first one involves Starling, which I'm starting to believe isn't related to this, due to the fact that recently created Flash projects on Flash Builder reproduce the error. On the other hand, I've installed older versions of Firefox to test this and in all of them happen as well. Not sure what else to try, but will keep looking for a solution, in the meantime again, thanks!

joshtynjala

I saw someone mention that the latest Firefox won't load SWFs from file:/// URLs anymore. It will only load them from http:// and https:// URLs now. This would explain why you couldn't debug your project. Flash Builder is probably launching the HTML or SWF file using a file:/// URL.

As I understand it, Flash developers can modify Firefox's plugins.http_https_only setting in about:config to allow file:/// URLs for debugging again.

Unfortunately, this doesn't explain why your regular users are having issues. Regular users won't be loading from file:/// URLs.

cgascons

Hi Josh, thanks for your reply. Indeed after the checks I did today I found out about the first part of your post, debugging from file just won't work anymore, only when debugging from an http url. It's quite a shame because I thought I had the issue located but it looks like I don't.

I'm actually starting to panic because players are reporting very weird stuff to be honest, one of our players replied to our game's official forums this after I suggested to make sure to enable Firefox from the Plugins section of the browser and uncheck the "Block dangerous and intrusive Flash content".

"This is very very odd...
Did what you suggested above...and it (kind of) worked...in a sense that game opened inside FIREFOX. However game is visibly slower than yesterday...cant understand why as i think nothing changed...FIREFOX is same, game is same, flash is same...or at least i think they are...
The really odd part...tried again to play on CHROME...now i get the same message that i had in FIREFOX before..."

The guy previously wrote this:

"Game was working fine YESTERDAY!!!!!!

Message is:
To view this page ensure that Adobe Flash Player version 11.1.0 or greater is installed.
(just a simple text message with adobe logo afterwards, right where the "game box" should be)

https://imgur.com/a/0XMd3

EDIT:
Just tested on FACEBOOK on Microsoft Edge and it works...but game is much slower...almost unplayable...pretty sure will have pvp issues
(doing one raid for test)

EDIT2:
Seems to work on Chrome right now...again, facebook...fast enough."

Not sure what to think because it looks like it's randomly affecting players AND browsers.

Again will let you know if I find something relevant, in the meantime I'll try to figure out how to enable again Firefox's plugin for debugging directly from file.

Thanks Josh!

joshtynjala

Have you asked your user to simply click the link to install Flash Player? When you were trying to debug a file:/// URL, that didn't work for you because Firefox is blocking SWFs completely with file:/// URLs. However, assuming that SWF playback has become click-to-play in Firefox now for regular http:// or https:// URLs, then it's worth trying to get the user to click the link. Be sure to say that they should click it even though they know that Flash Player is installed on their computer.

As Daniel was saying, that's just how browser vendors are handling Flash content now. They pretend that Flash Player isn't installed so that HTML fallback content is preferred (some do it randomly, but others do it all the time). If users click the link to install Flash Player, the plugin will be forced to activate (if it's available) instead of going to Adobe's download page. It's a little weird, but that's how it works, so we have to deal with it.

If your user can click the link and gets your game to activate, then I recommend changing the fallback text that you display when Flash Player isn't detected. Don't have the fallback text tell users that Flash Player isn't installed or ask them to install it. That could confuse users that know it's installed already. It's best to just say something like "Click here to activate" or to show an image with a play button or something like that. Continue to link to the same page on Adobe's website because that's the clue to the browser that it needs to activate the plugin.

Daniel

I created an excerpt from the Starling Handbook for you that talks in a little more detail about the embed problems. Find it here!

cgascons

@Josh Thank you Josh, following your recommendation I just requested the player if he could let me know what the behavior is when clicking that button, will post here the details.

@Daniel It looks like the link is broken! :p

cgascons

Hi,

Managed to enable debugging from file on Firefox right like you said, thanks! I can debug again from file on Firefox, unfortunately it isn't indeed related to the issue our players are experiencing.

We just have also added a "PLAY THIS GAME" promotional image instead of the "GetAdobe" by-default button like you guys suggested. Now a (yet) new different issue is that the players have tried clicking on the button and they say it's unresponsive, it only opens the Get Adobe website when choosing "Open in another tab", which is also extra weird. They tried before we changed the button to our new image, but since we only changed the image I'm guessing they will still get the same results when clicking on it.

This is how the 'flashContent' div looked before we changed it:

<div id="flashContent">
	<p>
		To view this page ensure that Adobe Flash Player version
		${version_major}.${version_minor}.${version_revision} or greater is installed.
	</p>
	<script type="text/javascript">
		var pageHost = ((document.location.protocol == "https:") ? "https://" : "http://");
		document.write("<img src='"
					   + pageHost + "www.adobe.com/images/shared/download_buttons/get_flash_player.gif' alt='Get Adobe Flash player' />" );
	</script>
</div>

Not sure why isn't working when clicking right on it though, weird.

Lastly, one of the players said the following, which is interesting:

Mine also doenst open by clicking...BUT if i choose to "Open in other tab" it will open the Adobe update page.
Link (in Portuguese):
https://get.adobe.com/br/flashplayer/
HOWEVER instead of the "Update" option it says (in Portuguese, but i guess you get it...if not i can translate):
Observação: o Adobe Flash Player está incluído, mas pode estar desabilitado. Clique aqui para solucionar o problema de reprodução do Flash Player.

The link goes to an help document that basically says what you yourself suggested above...activate Flash (which is already active)
Link (again in Portuguese):
https://support.google.com/chrome/answer/6258784
Solves nothing as far as i can tell.

Side note...mine is still working in FIREFOX...but very slow and unstable...worse than yesterday...some symptoms:
"Long delay in clicks"...i click and only 3 seconds later the card/option appears
Jerky animations
Cards become BLACK sometimes
Drag is very very jerky
(This is hard to explain...but game is unplayable unless you really want to and already know how it works)

P.S. I can play normally on Android...and this only makes me work better as i only use PC at work (so my boss would welcome the bug if he knew about it). HOWEVER this is a potentially MAJOR issue for you (Frozenshard) as i assume it will cut a lot of the player base...not urgent to me...but i would try hard to fix it, even if it requires you to complain to Adobe or something...

I'm going to make sure he only has 1 Flash plugin active on Chrome because I've experienced myself some issues having two plugins at the same time.

Chris,

joshtynjala

Do you still use document.write() in your new version? If you do, you could try removing that and use pure HTML instead. I don't think it would cause any issues, but it's worth a try.

joshtynjala

HOWEVER instead of the "Update" option it says (in Portuguese, but i guess you get it...if not i can translate):
Observação: o Adobe Flash Player está incluído, mas pode estar desabilitado. Clique aqui para solucionar o problema de reprodução do Flash Player.

Since Flash Player doesn't seem to work properly on Adobe's website either, it seems that there's a serious issue with Flash Player on their computer, and it's not only limited to your game. That sounds like a major pain to troubleshoot.

cgascons

Hi Josh,

Yes we still use document.write() in the newer version, not quite an expert in html matter but after a quick Google search I'm guessing I should be replacing that with .innerHtml ? I've implemented the changes and tested it and looks like it's working, but I will just paste here the code just in case I'm missing something.

Old code:

<div id="flashContent">
		            <p>
		                To view this page ensure that Adobe Flash Player version
		                ${version_major}.${version_minor}.${version_revision} or greater is installed.
		            </p>
		            <script type="text/javascript">
		                var pageHost = ((document.location.protocol == "https:") ? "https://" : "http://");
		                	document.write("<img src='"
		                                + pageHost + "d1qzmgnbw7y2pl.cloudfront.net/monsterstcg/share/share_game.jpg' width='58%' height='58%' alt='Get Adobe Flash player' />" );
		            </script>
		        </div>

New Code

<div id="flashContent">
		            <p>
		                To view this page ensure that Adobe Flash Player version
		                ${version_major}.${version_minor}.${version_revision} or greater is installed.
		            </p>
		            <script type="text/javascript">
		                var pageHost = ((document.location.protocol == "https:") ? "https://" : "http://");
		                    document.getElementById('flashContent').innerHTML = "<img src='"
		                                + pageHost + "d1qzmgnbw7y2pl.cloudfront.net/monsterstcg/share/share_game.jpg' width='58%' height='58%' alt='Get Adobe Flash player' />";
		            </script>
		        </div>

I'm going to suggest these guys to completely uninstall Flash Player from their computers and try again reinstalling a newer version. Can't be 100% sure that it's an issue on every player computer since it's happening to lots of them. Thanks again.

Chris,