I've been reinstalling every week, but still show Sprill. I probably need to delete all the registry entries and start again. I'm not bothered about this months though. I 'm sure I beta tested it, so will probably have a key somewhere (If I've not given it away. I gave quite a lot of my Alawar games away a few years ago.

Alawar finally updated the Free Game of the month for this month (but I admit that I hadn't checked for a week or so).

It's Sunshine Acres (Time Management).

I had to play the game with the config files AND the temp files AND run the Gamebox Updater to get it to change.

I have no idea why some people cannot see some of the files I see, and even more so, why it doesn't update itself monthly like it's supposed to do!

I tried that AAUpdater and got no error. Maybe there's an error in your install. However, after doing that the free game was empty. I finally played my game (described previously) to change the conf.xml file in the Gamebox folder and got a new game I haven't seen before - Fashion Craze. I think it's Time Management so I will skip it but at least I found it.

Fashion Craze is available 24/7 from Jenkat Games and MyPlayCity. Jenkat installs to 2 places in Program Files (x86) and MyPlayCity also installs to Program Files. Jenkat does no hijacking, though.

As for the other issue - my link to the gamebox on the site still works. It's the old format so it appears that they are phasing it out. The link is here: http://www.alawar.com/item/alawar-game-box/

It would be a shame to lose the gamebox because installs from the site do not allow you any choice as to where to put the game. It assumes Program Files (x86)\Alawar -- ignore the (x86) if you are running 32 bit. However, if you can download and install through the Gamebox, you can specify where to put the download file and where to put the final installation.

There's a funny little trick that works for SOME games but not all. If you cannot download and install through Gamebox (cannot find it listed), you MIGHT be able to get Gamebox to control the location of the installation by doing this:

1 - Download the game installer

2 - Move the installer to wherever you have specified in your Gamebox options for the downloads to be placed.

3 - Load Gamebox

4 - Look for the new game in your list of game.

5 - If you find it, click on "Play" and it will install it where you have told Gamebox to install games.

If it's not there, this trick won't work. I have no idea why it works in some cases but not others. I found it by accident when I was transitioning to a new computer a few months ago.

I think I found out why my gamebox isn't updating but I still don't understand it.

In the folder there's an entry named AAUpdater. When I doubleclicked it, a text file appeared in the folder. The file says:

info:Updater started (should be written on exe path)
ERROR:LastErr:Can not create file "exe_path.txt"(The system cannot find the file specified.)
debug:exe_path.txt not found

Because I don't understand this sort of thing, I made a blank txt file and named it exe_path.txt but got the same message.

Walthomas, I tried the link which worked for me last month but that one is gone too. It looks to me like they might be trying to phase it out and so doesn't update. Actually, this doesn't really make sense because it updates for some people and not for others so I have no idea.

Try switching to the "old" format of the Alawar site and try again.

Can you post the link for Alawar Game box> I get a 404 error.

It does sometimes say that if you try to play before the install is completed. However, if it's not the right game and your newly downloaded copy of the gamebox is wrong, I would complain to Alawar. They will usually give you a code for the game in cases like this.

I just downloaded the gamebox today, and the free game for the month was shown as Sheep's Quest. I downloaded that too, but the game is showing as a 60 minute game only, and then I have to pay. How do I get the full free version?

Mine says free game is Finding Doggy.

WR, did you uninstall the gamebox first?

Never mind. I just downloaded and ran the installer. Took about 10 seconds, lol. Said free game was Sprill. Said I already had game. On to something else now. :)

If it's Sprill: Aqua Adventures, then it's definitely a repeat.

I'm stuck on Sheep Quest. I tried my swap trick several times and even tried to re-download it and it still insists on Sheep Quest.

I just reinstalled the gamebox and it fixed the issue with it freezing on one game. It had been stuck on Treasures of montezuma for saome time. I missed Finding Doggy (which didn't matter becasue i#I already had it from beta testing it a few years ago). Now the new game is Sprill, which I'm sure has been given away before.

I haven't tried it but maybe the key isn't the config files but deleting the temp files and letting them rebuild that gets it to update itself.

Dragonlair, I don't have the right config files, either. The next time there's a game I want, I'll just reinstall the gamebox. Thanks, anyway!

Nass,

I'm sorry you missed out on Finding Doggy. I did have to play the config and temp files game to get it to update. I discovered that Sheep's Quest is available for free all the time from MyPlaycity. Of course, you have to watch for homepage/search engine hijacking and MyPlayCity currently gives you no choice of install but puts it in Program files (or Program Files (x86) for 64 bit processors) and you may have to put up with the browser opening (unless you can figure out how to circumvent it).

Then again, the headache of the browser opening, isn't much difference than the headache of the Alawar Wrapper opening! You get caught coming or going!

I'm just getting more and more confused! My gamebox would only show (as others mentioned) Curse of Montezuma and I wanted Finding Doggy! I couldn't understand the posts about config files and so on so I kept putting it off until I had time to think about it. I decided to just reinstall. I tried to follow the links to get the box download but got a 404 error. I found my original download and reinstalled on top. Montezuma was gone but the page was now an empty box. I uninstalled and found the contents of the folder deleted, including my install.

Thanks to StevieD for the new link on page 7. I couldn't find it anywhere else. I downloaded and started up gamebox again and checked the free game. It's now Sheep's Quest. I'm okay though because I've never heard of this one and I've played Finding Doggy before. It's just all too much for my poor little Christmas-time brain!

Jevvy,

An uninstall/re-install might help. Just be sure to reset the preferences for where to install the games and if to keep the downloaded install program for each game.

That might give you a chance to find the config files.

Well I can't see nor find the config.xml
Yes I have set all folders/items to show

Would it help if I uninstalled then reinstalled Gamebox?

I'm getting bored with Montezuma ;)

The gamebox is totally separate from the games. You should be able to uninstall just the gamebox and then re-install it without affecting the games. I only use the gamebox for installs (where I can).

Hi again

Well it seems that I cannot find the config files anywhere else on my system so I'll just leave things alone. When I moved from XP to Win7 I used a program to move some of my games from the old system to the new one. Perhaps that didn't quite work as I thought it would, resulting in this problem.

Unless I try and uninstall/remove everything Alawar and then re-install what I can though this will wipe out games that my partner plays on her login, so not too keen to do that.

Cheers John

The settings in the gamebox affect the location of the installation of the games you install through the gamebox. It does not affect where the Gamebox is installed itself. this config file should be with the gamebox executable - wherever you have that installed. In my case, it took the default (it didn't give me any choice and it wasn't worth moving later - although it could have been). Mine is located at C:\Program Files (x86)\Alawar\AlawarGamebox. Note -- Program Files and Program Files (x86) are normally on the C drive, not the E drive.

Note - I said that the Gamebox settings affect the games you install through the Gamebox. That does not necessarily mean you have to DOWNLOAD them through the gamebox. I have noticed an odd situation while re-building my game library. In SOME (not all) cases, I can copy the executable I downloaded before for an Alawar game to the folder where I told it to put the downloads and have the Gamebox think it downloaded it. It shows up in your list of game with "play" beside it. If you click on that "play" button, it will install it -- according to your gamebox settings for where to put the game. Why it only works some times, I have no idea.

For newer games, if it doesn't recognize it, it will put it in C:\Program Files (x86)\Alawar without giving you a chance to change it but you can move it later.

Moving these products will play havoc with the uninstall pointers in the registry but that can be fixed. Unless you plan on using something like Revo Uninstaller, you can just run the uninstall from the final folder location (if you want to remove the game).

Hi Dragonlair,

I don't have any config files in E:\Program Files (x86)\Alawar\AlawarGameBox My games partition so can't edit anything there.

Does the settings in the gamebox options page affect the location of these files? My games should be installed in E:\Program Files (x86)\Alawar.

John

John,

That's the wrong config.xml. That's the one in ProgramData\AlawarGameBox.

You want the one in Program Files\Alawar\AlawarGamebox (or Program Filex (x86) if you're on a 64 bit processor).

Hi Dragonlair

I tried to do this on mine but my config file is different to yours,

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?>
- <AlawarArcade>
<ContentURL>http://www.alawar.com/export/player_xml.zip</ContentURL>
<ContentVersion />
<TemplateURL>http://player.alawar.com/common/content/template.zip</TemplateURL>
<TemplateVersion>0.0.0.223</TemplateVersion>
<WebUpdateURL>http://player.alawar.com/common/webupdate/webupdate.xml</WebUpdateURL>
<ClientVersion>0.6.5.0</ClientVersion>
<MaxGameDownloads>2</MaxGameDownloads>
<DownloadGamesAsExe />
</AlawarArcade>

Any ideas what I have to do/change?

Thanks John

Terri, there is a bug in the gamebox (I've complained about it and was simply told - it's beta) where it doesn't always update. This is the trick I've found (and you often have to swap back and forth between the two settings).

1: make a copy of config.xml in the Gamebox folder - name the original config-old.xml
2: edit the copy and change "config.xml" to "config_full.xml" on the "<ServerConfig>" command (3rd line in the file)
3: In ProgramData\AlawarGamebox\ (you may have to un-hide the folder) delete config.xml
4: In ProgramData\AlawarGamebox\Temp\delete player.xml and player.zip

Then start GameBox and you should see the change.

You may have to swap back to the "old" config so just rename the "new" config.xml file to "config-new.xml" and rename "config-old.xml" to config.xml. The deletions are the same. They just rebuild themselves.

I was originally given this trick because Gamebox doesn't show all the Alawar games. It still doesn't, even on my new machine but it's better. Maybe because everybody is getting re-installed on a fresh system.

That should help everybody get the update. It's a pain in the neck (and the other end of the spine) but it does work.

Mine is still Curse of Montezuma. Do they not all update at the same time?

Delilah,

I pulled a little trick Alawar taught me, changing the config.xml file and deleting two files in the ProgramData folder for the gamebox and the new game appeared.

I did it for another reason (a known bug in Gamebox) but it worked.

It's still Curse of Montezuma for me. 0112 MST Wed 28 Nov 2012 (Southwest US)

Alawar finally changed their free game of the month. It's now "Finding Doggy". I needed to re-do that one after a new computer install so the timing was perfect!