Design Notes
July 14, 2015
Update Your Flash Player Now!
Adobe Releases Patch to Zero Day Exploit
GOOD NEWS! Update your Adobe Flash player at https://get.adobe.com/flashplayer/ and come join us in AQWorlds. Adobe just released an update fixing the major issue with the Flash Player Plugin that has been making headlines today. We are pretty impressed at how fast they got this out.
To put your mind at ease, AdventureQuest Worlds is and has always been safe. We have known you guys a long time, and you know we are dedicated to protecting our community and making the games we love better every week. Update your browser's Flash Player from Adobe's official website and we will see you in game!
March 20, 2015
New Flash Player Update: 17.0.0
How to update Flash Player and keep it up to date!
Adobe Flash Player upgraded to level 17 (this comes after last month's update to 16.9). And this has caused some problems for some online games that use the Flash Player plugin—like, for example, all Artix Entertainment games!
From our end, we think we have solved most of the issues, so now it’s our turn to help YOU get rid of some your Flash bugs if you have them!
What is the Adobe Flash Player?
The Flash Player is a plug-in that is required to play all of our games, and is automatically ‘plugged in’ to your browser (Internet Explorer, Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Opera, Safari, etc.). Adobe Flash Player makes our games run, displays the flashy animations, makes your shiny Blade of Awe glow bright, and plays all the epic cutscenes!
Which version of Flash Player do I have?
First of all, you might need to know which version of Flash Player you have on your browser. To find that out, follow these easy steps:
- Open your browser.
- Go to www.aq.com/play-now
- Right click somewhere near the ‘Login’ button.
- In the menu that then opens, you need to READ the last line, which says something like “information about Flash Player 17.0.0.305…”
- IF it DOES NOT say “Information about Flash Player 17.0.0.…” and gives another number, then you need to upgrade your Flash Player to the latest version.
How to upgrade Flash Player to the latest Version?
If you do not have the latest version of Flash Player, you‘re in trouble…. O__O ….. because older versions of the Flash Player will cause your game will lag, disconnect, have sluggish animations, etc. So it is ALWAYS better to upgrade. Here is how to upgrade your Flash Player if you do not have the latest version:
- Open your browser
- Go to http://get.adobe.com/flashplayer/
- If you have an older version of Flash Player, the page will automatically tell you to upgrade it.
- Click the link “Download the Adobe® Flash® Player system plug-in”
- Click “Install now” to download the newest version and install it.
- Follow the instructions given by the program.
- Restart your browser and it should be working fine now!
This method should work for any browser you use. Some browsers, like Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox, automatically update Flash Player when a new version is out. Other browsers do not and then you will have to update Flash manually.
I want Flash to automatically update!
When you update your Flash Player, there is an option in the installation process where you can check the box to make Flash Player update automatically, like in the picture.
However, you may not know if you enabled that for your computer. Or that you are sure your computer has not enabled automatically updating Flash Player. In that case you can still enable it in this way:
- Go to www.aq.com/play-now
- Right click near the “login” button.
- Click “General Settings” in the dropdown that opens.
- Go to the tab “Advanced Options” in the Settings Manager that opens.
- Click on the button “Change Update Settings”, this might require administrator rights.
- Check the bullet/box of “Allow Adobe to install updates”
- Additionally you can click “Check now” to see if there are any updates for Flash Player.
- Close the window and you should be fine.
I am using Google Chrome and it does not work like that!
Oh yes, Google Chrome acts a bit weird in that case. Chrome usually updates Flash automatically, unless something (or someone!) disabled it. Here’s how it works for Google Chrome:
- Go to www.aq.com/play-now
- Right click near the “log in” button.
- Click “General Settings” in the dropdown that opens.
- The browser will bolt you to a help page of Adobe in a new tab.
- Scroll down till you see a link called “Panel General Notification Options” and click it.
- Set “Check on updates” in the screen that follows on 14 or 7 days, and check the box “Warn me about new updates”
- Close the tab and it should be set now.
What if it still does not work right?
Curse technology!! It could be that your computer just refuses to update the Flash Player, or that it keeps messing up because of conflicting versions.
In that case, it is better to entirely remove Flash Player and re-install it. To remove Flash Player, it’s best to do that via your computer’s configuration panel. (Note: this might differ per Operating System)
- So go to “Start”
- Open the configuration panel.
- Go to “Programs and Software”
- Search for “Adobe Flash Player” (there might show multiple of them)
- Right click them, and select “uninstall/delete”
- If you had more “Adobe Flash Players” showing in the list, uninstall these too.
- Then open your browser and go to http://get.adobe.com/flashplayer/
- Click the link “Download the Adobe® Flash® Player system plug-in”
- Click “Install now” to download the newest version and install it.
- Follow the instructions given by the program.
- Restart your browser and it should be working fine now!
Still having troubles after? Then you might want to check if your Firewall or Security programs are not blocking it. Programs like AVG could still be blocking it. Quick options to change that would be:
- Open the AVG panel
- Go to Firewall
- Go to Options
- Go to the tab Applications
- Make sure “Adobe Flash Player” is on the list of allowed applications.
- If it’s not, add it manually.
This is all we can teach you about Flash Player—a tricky but very good plugin that all our games run and live on. If you have additional questions, feel free to comment below and we will try our best to help you out! Please only write our Player Support team if there is a serious and/or complicated problem.
Thank you, Gjappy!!
When you see Gjappy in game, be sure to give him lots of /cheers for helping US help YOU! We could not have done this without his help, and we cannot thank him enough. So if you want to share your love, be sure to thank him on Gjappy’s Facebook and on Gjappy’s Twitter!