Virtual Villagers 4 on Big Fish Games requires flash player to install any way around this?

[Mr Stizblee]

I'm sorry this is off topic. I didn't know where else to ask. Recently I've dug up the old Big Fish account I shared with my mom when I was a child and several games on that old account including Virtual Villagers: The Tree of Life (That is the 4th one, right?) require flash player to install. Is there anyway to get around this now that flash player is gone?

[AC Denton]

You could try Ruffle[ruffle.rs] or Lightspark[lightspark.github.io], two open-source Flash Players.

It may be possible, theoretically, hypothetically, at ones own will, to say acquire Flash Player from a good samaritan of the internet. If one was so inclined.

They really should bring the rest of their games to Steam, I'd buy them right away, this was my childhood. I tweeted the CEO and Lead Designer, Arthur Humphrey on Twitter a while ago about a Steam release, to no response.

[Mr Stizblee]

No dice with either of those flash players. Thanks for trying though.

[mime]

Big Fish will tell you the installation failed, but the game will still be downloaded, default is the program files x86 folder
it'll run if you still have flash installed, not sure if any of the alternatives work though
also the game won't be activated, you'll have to do that through the big fish launcher

[Mr Stizblee]

Thanks guys! I somehow got it working running it from the program files x86 folder with ruffle.

EDIT: Nevermind. After playing for about 45 minutes, it suddenly crashed with no error message and crashes as soon as I start it up now.

[mime]

It's still on the trial version, you have to activate it through the bfg launcher

[Mr Stizblee]

When I go to the big fish games manager, under activation status it just lists it as "Ready to install". I have my doubts that that's even the problem though tbh. The way I'm getting it is that it's the only VV game in my old big fish accounts purchase history which would indicate to me that it's activated, And I've seen nothing to indicate that the version I'm playing is a demo.

More to the point though, I have no clue how I would even go about activating it without installing it. There's no option to view it's information without installing it first that I know of.

[mime]

I think what I did was under the recent activity tab, it said the trial ran out, and had an activate button under it, I just clicked on that and it activated, and could then run the game with no problems.
I'm honestly not sure how it did that with it still thinking the game wasn't installed, but somehow it worked for me.

[Mr Stizblee]

Unfortunately it won't show up under the recent activity tab no matter what I do. I'm pretty sure it's just an error of some sort related to flash rather than me playing a demo without realising it.

I actually dug through the files this morning and despite not being a programmer, after some experimentation I figured out the flash requiring file that may be the root of the issue. Under pics there is an SWF file titled 175x150. In the games directory there are also two relevant xml files, basebfgstate and bfgstate with similar content. basebfgstate contains the following:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<state>
<installerVersion>%INSTALLERVERSION%</installerVersion>
<name>%GAMETITLE%</name>
<siteId>%SITEID%</siteId>
<langId>%LANGID%</langId>
<downloadId>%DOWNLOADID%</downloadId>
<extData>%EXTDATA%</extData>
<executablePath>%EXEINSTDIR%%EXECUTABLE%</executablePath>
<strategyGuide>%STRATEGYGUIDE%</strategyGuide>
<noGameClubCredits>%NO_GC_CREDITS%</noGameClubCredits>
<productID>F5599T1L1</productID>
<icon>%INSTDIR%pics\60x40.jpg</icon>
<thumbnail>%INSTDIR%pics\80x80.jpg</thumbnail>
<feature>%INSTDIR%pics\feature.jpg</feature>
<buildNumber>40542</buildNumber>
<trialLength>3600</trialLength>
<state>5</state>
<feature_flash>pics\175x150.swf</feature_flash>
</state>

And here is bfgstate:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?><state>
<installerVersion>1.3.0.8</installerVersion>
<name>Virtual Villagers: The Tree of Life</name>
<siteId>1</siteId>
<langId>1</langId>
<downloadId>3167414962</downloadId>
<extData></extData>
<executablePath>C:\Program Files (x86)\Virtual Villagers - The Tree of Life\vkttltv.exe</executablePath>
<strategyGuide>0</strategyGuide>
<noGameClubCredits>0</noGameClubCredits>
<productID>F5599T1L1</productID>
<icon>C:\Program Files (x86)\Virtual Villagers - The Tree of Life\pics\60x40.jpg</icon>
<thumbnail>C:\Program Files (x86)\Virtual Villagers - The Tree of Life\pics\80x80.jpg</thumbnail>
<feature>C:\Program Files (x86)\Virtual Villagers - The Tree of Life\pics\feature.jpg</feature>
<buildNumber>40542</buildNumber>
<trialLength>3600</trialLength>
<state>5</state>
<feature_flash>pics\175x150.swf</feature_flash>
</state>


That last part of both of them, feature_flash is the relevant part and is how I discovered the SWF file in the first place. From what I can tell, these two files show information the Big Fish games launcher "knows" about the game such as whether it's a demo or the full version or which files if any require flash. Cross referencing them with similar files for games I have that don't require flash reveals that other games that don't require flash simply don't have the feature_flash section. The SWF file is largely unnecessary to the game itself as well! I ran it with a flash emulator and it only showed a trailer for the game. Unfortunately you cannot simply delete the SWF file and erase feature_flash from both of the xml files. Upon installing the game it checks if everything is intact and restores the xml and SWF to their former state. Presumably this is so that you can't edit things like the demo length or accidentally render the game non-functional. You would have to be the developer and contact Big Fish to release a new update that removes the SWF from the game.

Something else I noticed is that despite needing flash to run, the game is still on Big Fishes store with no indication that flash is necessary. I'm reluctant to contact Big Fish about it because they may simply remove the game instead of asking Last Day of Work for an update but at this rate I'm worried there may be legal repercussions to selling a game that shouldn't ever work in it's current state and with no indication that flash is needed.

I plan to send a customer support request to Last Day of Work on their website but my hopes are low as from what I can tell that site hasn't been updated since around 2015.

EDIT: I submitted a support request to their website including a link to this discussion and all the relevant files. Hopefully this gets results. I would hate for some of these games to be lost to history.

[Mr Stizblee]

So I sent the following Support request to Last Day at Work:

Hello. I have recently been going on something of a nostalgia trip and going back to the old Big Fish account I shared with my mom when I was a child. Some of the games I remember most distinctly are the Virtual Villagers series you created and so I redownloaded Virtual Villagers 4 (the only one still on my account but that's a problem for Big Fish.) However, upon redownloading the game and attempting to install the game (installation reached 100% before I encountered an error) I was informed that I needed Flash Player to run it. I'm no programmer but from what I can see the game includes a SWF file under pics titled 175x150 that simply runs a short looping trailer of the game. Big Fishes launcher detects that, possibly automatically and is unable to complete the installation. In addition the game is still available to purchase from Big Fishes website (https://www.bigfishgames.com/games/5599/virtual-villagers-4-the-tree-of-life/?pc) despite requiring something that should not even be possible and I'm concerned there may be legal ramifications to that. I've been discussing this with fellow fans over on steam (https://steamcommunity.com/app/16180/discussions/0/3055111535934058795/) and the best conclusion I can come up with is that the only way to fix this is for the developers to release a patch to remove the SWF from the game which should be relatively simple as it doesn't seem to be anything important. I've attached the files I believe to be relevant to this matter below.

I've been a big fan of these games for a long time and I sincerely hope that they are not lost to history. I don't know if any of the other Virtual Villagers games have similar problems so you may also want to check if any of the other games still include flash files. At the very least I can confirm that Virtual Families still works so that's nice.

Attachment(s)
175x150.swf
basebfgstate.xml
bfgstate.xml

And I received the following response:

Hi there!

I am very sorry that you're having problems with Virtual Families. (Typo)

Because other game sites repackage our games with their own branding and digital rights management software and/or download managers, we are unable to provide accurate technical support for their version of the game.

However, we would be happy to help you by providing you with our version, free of charge, to see if that resolves the issue you are seeing. We will need to see your purchase receipt to verify proof of purchase.

The easiest way to provide us with your purchase receipt is to forward your email receipt to us at (omitted). If you no longer have that receipt, you can request your purchase details from the site where you purchased the game. Many game sites offer a method to look up your purchase information online.

You can also perform a screen capture of your receipt and attach it to this support request (if you are logged into our help desk) or send it to (omitted).

Once I receive a copy of your receipt, I'll provide you with installation instructions for our version of the game.
Thank you for contacting LDW Support!

Keegan
LDW/Gogii Customer Support & Community Manager

Considering I bought the game over a decade ago I think at this point I'm probably just going to give up even though the sunken cost fallacy is rearing it's ugly head. Thanks to everyone for their help.