Plugin developers!: Support for SWF movies-plugin

[jannar85]

Hi there,
I want to request this, because I need it, plus that the size of the game will increase quite much. Does anyone else need it as well?

Oh, one more thing... It would be nice if all the movie files could be compiled into one major file, so others can't watch them outside the game.

Just a thought:)

[Privateer Puddin']

Do what butcher did, include the flash player

[jannar85]

Well, it would be nice to... not include the flash player..
Isn't there a tool to built it into a file or something then?

[Pumaman]

This isn't something that I can really support adding myself, but it would be possible for someone to add SWF support via a plugin.

Basically, the time it would take me to implement it isn't worth the amount of use it would get I"m afraid - that is, if it's even possible. I'm not sure if Macromedia have an SDK for building Flash apps.

[Igor]

CJ, i was wondering the same thing as Jannar about compiling movie files into one file. Is it possible?
There's of course a trick with renaming files, for example, from 1.avi to 1.dat, to "hide" movies... but once you know the trick they aren't hidden anymore

[Dorcan]

I found this page :

http://www.macromedia.com/software/flashplayer/licensing/sourcecode/

[Pumaman]

CJ, i was wondering the same thing as Jannar about compiling movie files into one file. Is it possible?
There's of course a trick with renaming files, for example, from 1.avi to 1.dat, to "hide" movies... but once you know the trick they aren't hidden anymore

No it's not technically possible I'm afraid - because AGS uses windows media player to play the videos, and media player can't play out of a compiled file.

The alternative would be for AGS to extract the movie to a temporary file, then play it, then delete the temp file - but that would be very slow for long movies.

I found this page :

http://www.macromedia.com/software/flashplayer/licensing/sourcecode/

Thanks for searching that out - unfortunately though:

The Macromedia Flash Player SDK program is a commercial program designed for a group of third parties who meet selected financial and business criteria.

Sadly, I don't think AGS qualifies, as there's no money in it for them.

[jannar85]

Allright, now, where's that plugin request thread then?

[Scummbuddy]

I would be for this.  I would assume that Igor would be on board with this as well.

[Fuzzpilz]

I'm pretty sure the Flash plugin for IE is based on OCX... does anybody who has worked with OCX know if it would be possible to use it together with Allegro? The sound would probably cause problems. Maybe CJ can allow plugins to do whatever it is AGS has to do before and after it plays movies?

[Scorpiorus]

We need somehow to retrieve the frame by frame with converting into bmp and display.

[wOoDz]

i'm sure i've got a program called swish that imports swf files and breaks them down into frames, then exports as avi's or single frames. i'll dig it out and have a look
i know its not the same as a plugin but its a way

woodz

yes it does import swf's and as exports as avi's..swish 2.01 is the latest version but is a feck on even getting the demo

[jannar85]

Hey, I found a better way...
I used Bink and Smacker, and the Xvid codec.
Really good. It compressed 90 sec (1 min 30 sec) less than a min, and the size was less than 4 MB!

[Scorpiorus]

I'm pretty sure the Flash plugin for IE is based on OCX...

This way it could be integrated into plugin in a separate window I think. So the plugin would stop AGS game and open that window to play desireable swf file. But the same we could do just by converting a swf file into exe. Anyway where is my flash.ocx file.... aha it's worth to try

es it does import swf's and as exports as avi's..swish 2.01 is the latest version but is a feck on even getting the demo

very pity

Hey, I found a better way...
I used Bink and Smacker, and the Xvid codec.
Really good. It compressed 90 sec (1 min 30 sec) less than a min, and the size was less than 4 MB!

that's nice but it would be cool to play .swf file as well. It especially handy if you have a long flash movie but with a little amount of data (only showing a dialog for example).


-Cheers

[samoscratch]

We need somehow to retrieve the frame by frame with converting into bmp and display.

you can do it in through flash mx itself by creating movie and then selecting Export>Saveas>Bitmap Sequence

[Scorpiorus]

you can do it in through flash mx itself by creating movie and then selecting Export>Saveas>Bitmap Sequence

nope, we need to "render" on-fly bmp-sequences from a ready .swf file.

[samoscratch]

forgive me if this reply is abit ignorant , i'm most definitely not an expert on the subject;

but is the main advantage to finding a method for this; small file size? because if its not, wouldn't it be possible to export as a bitmap sequence and then just implement it, not as a flash file anymore obviously, but just put the sequence in the game folder and then call it somehow?, or is everyone planning to use the flash environment as a background or scene builder?

[Scorpiorus]

forgive me if this reply is abit ignorant , i'm most definitely not an expert on the subject;

that's ok, samoscratch. It's just a nice discussion which leads to find a more suitable solution to the problem.

but is the main advantage to finding a method for this; small file size? because if its not, wouldn't it be possible to export as a bitmap sequence and then just implement it, not as a flash file anymore obviously, but just put the sequence in the game folder and then call it somehow?, or is everyone planning to use the flash environment as a background or scene builder?

Yep, the main goal is to be able to play flash files directly from an AGS game. Exporting is possible (for example to avi file) but that costs to much space unfortunately.
It would be perfect to have a bmp-sequency as it, as you pointed out, will allow to place a flash into background. Although I think it maybe impossible and the only way out is to use OCX component instead (what iexplorer does actually)... but I only do not want to see that gray-coloured window....

-Cheers

[Pétur Guðmundsson]

Would it be possible to play .mov files, because if they are images only they can be REALLY small.... just adding something to the discussion...