Program to Install Fonts And Give Your Game RRR Accreditation!, Completely for FREE! Options

[Dart00]

Hello everyone. I decided to make my first large contribution to the community.

I recently released a beta of a game to a friend for play testing. She said the fonts were all gibberish in the game. This is because she did not have the fonts installed (I use the "Play without RTP Hack" so no one needs to install my game and can just run it). I had to email her the fonts and guide her over the phone on how to install them (which took a while) and then things were good. And then I got to thinking...."There's got to be a easier way". And sure enough, I found one.

I'm a programmer so I decided to make a program that would take the Rm2k3 fonts and install them in the fonts folder, then all the user has to do is reboot (for the fonts to take effect) and then play the game. Ill include the Font program in my game and put in the ReadMe to install it before playing.

Then I decided that ill release my "InstallFonts" program to the RRR community . So other people can get use from it too.

But then I decided that I was going to go a bit further. Usually when they run a RPG game, they get this message:



Well, I run a small unofficial independent private Certificate Authority called "Indie Game Development" which I use to digitally sign my games with . I also figured that I should let others do this too.

So I included in my "InstallFonts" a copy of my "Indie Game Development" Root CA Certificate and set the program up to install it before it installs the fonts.

I then issued a "RPG RPG Revolution Community" Certificate (Expires in one year as from today) which I used to sign a unpatched (Standard) copy of RPG_RT.exe and a Patched copy (Patched with Cherrys Pic Pointer Patch) of RPG_RT.exe.



All you need to do is overwrite your RPG_RT.exe with this digitally signed copy. The signature does not effect or modify the code of the RPG_RT.exe, it only signs it. After RPG_RT.exe is signed, it shows a copy of the digital signature in its properties:



If the user installed the fonts and root certificate by running "Install Fonts" and your game has been patched with a signed copy, the user should get this before they play:



As you can tell it looks much better and looks like less of a error and it makes the user feel more comfortable running your game because it came from RPG RPG Revolution. It also is good advertising I think.

I have included "InstallFonts" (which has the fonts and root certificate embedded in it) and the patched RPG_RT.exe's in a zip with a small ReadMe.txt.

This is how I'm going to distribute my game from now on.

Also some notes, the installer is only designed for "Windows 7" until I test it more with Other OS's. Its also only designed for Rm2k3. It also requires "Administrative Privileges" because only a Administrator can write to the Fonts folder.

Im not sure the same fonts are used in Rm2k or if Rm2k's RPG_RT.exe is the same as Rm2k3's. If anyone could enlighten me i will upgrade the program.

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Megaupload Download Link (~7MB): http://www.megaupload.com/?d=SK9TND8A

(If anyone knows better hosting let me know)

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As a additional offer, I could issue a Certificate to you individually so it would read "YOUR NAME - RRR - YOUR GAME NAME" as the publisher, However I have to charge $3.00 USD for the certificate and signing of the RPG_RT.exe. It takes some work to generate, issue and sign a package. Send me a PM if interested.

If anyone has any questions or concerns feel free to PM me or leave a comment.

Thank you. I hope others get use out of this.

This post has been edited by Dart00: Dec 9 2011, 11:44 PM

[TheBen]

These applications are

Although it would be kinda inconvenient to have to reboot the system for your R2k3 games. Couldn't you just include the fonts in the project folder? ... I wouldn't know. Still, the certificate thing seems pretty useful - gives your work of art more authenticity, I suppose.

I give you 4 out of 5 ninja.

[Dart00]

Ya, Im not to thrilled about the rebooting either, however the way Windows 7 uses fonts, once the font is copied into the font folder, it wont show up because it has to have a corresponding value in the registry created and then the registry has to be reloaded (you gota reboot) for it to register the font. Im not sure how dragging and dropping is different, but one reboot for (hopefully) hours of fun seems worth it.

I thought about including them in my folder, but my friend isn't computer savy enough to know how to copy them over....shed be calling me anyway. Only way to make it truly simple is a small installer. Plus the fonts are ~9MB and my program compresses them to ~7MB so it saves a bit of space.

Ya having a certificate with your game to back it up makes it seem waaay more legit!

This post has been edited by Dart00: Dec 10 2011, 12:38 PM

[amerk]

You mean to tell me you can't just copy the font into the font folder like the older systems without first having to reboot the computer? If so, I'm glad I never jumped on the Windows 7 wagon when it was first introduced.

[Dart00]

Mmhmm....copying it from the command line requires a reboot apparently, but dragging and dropping does not...still trying to figure out why.

Windows 7 is just plain strange....

[Scemo]

You can always add a readme file and link to a few step-by-step instructional videos on addings fonts for different OSs. Really fantastic idea btw^^ (: I may have to hit you up sometime haha

[Peekly]

If you go the no-reboot readme file route, you can also provide a shortcut file (.lnk) to the default Windows (7, Vista, and XP) font folder (C:/Windows/Fonts). Name it "Drag Fonts Here.lnk", "See ReadMe.lnk", or "Shortcut To Fonts.lnk". They're easy to make by selecting New > Shortcut from the context menu (right-click) in your game folder.

Even without the shortcut, you can still provide a plaintext of the path. All they have to do is to paste that into the address bar of Windows Explorer or any open folder, and hit enter.

Either way, they can then drag and drop the files there. If they can use a web browser, they can do that. Worth bypassing a reboot to anyone with basic computer skills and moderate impatience.

[Dart00]

If you go the no-reboot readme file route, you can also provide a shortcut file (.lnk) to the default Windows (7, Vista, and XP) font folder (C:/Windows/Fonts). Name it "Drag Fonts Here.lnk", "See ReadMe.lnk", or "Shortcut To Fonts.lnk". They're easy to make by selecting New > Shortcut from the context menu (right-click) in your game folder.

Even without the shortcut, you can still provide a plaintext of the path. All they have to do is to paste that into the address bar of Windows Explorer or any open folder, and hit enter.

Either way, they can then drag and drop the files there. If they can use a web browser, they can do that. Worth bypassing a reboot to anyone with basic computer skills and moderate impatience.

Hmm...interesting idea...