Update 4.16: See finished games, new map designer

Warzone has just been updated to version 4.16.0! This blog post describes what’s changed.

The website and Unity client have been updated to this version now. The Android and iOS apps do not need an update and will stay on 4.15.

See Finished Games

Have you ever been playing a multi-day game, only to find that the game mysteriously stops appearing on your My Games page? This is a common occurrence when your opponent surrenders but doesn’t give you a parting “gg” message in chat.

Prior to this update, the My Games page would only show you active games or games with unread chat. This means that if a game ends without anyone chatting, the game would simply vanish from the list and never give the satisfaction of letting you see how the final turn played out unless you dug it out of the Past Games section. This was a very common complaint, and something that’s now finally fixed!

With this update, Warzone will give you one final chance to see how a game ended by including finished games that you haven’t watched the end of yet in your My Games section. To clear the game, simply open it and watch the final turn. If you never watch the final turn, the game will go away on its own once it’s archived (typically after approximately 24 hours for a real-time game and a week for multi-day games.)

New Map Designer

For the first time in 9 years, the map designer is receiving an overhaul! The map designer is used, along with an svg editor, to make Warzone maps.

Starting with this update, the new map designer is available to anyone whose account is in UJS mode by selecting Multi Player -> Design Maps. If you want to access the old map designer, you can still do so by changing your account into Flash mode.

The biggest feature of the new map designer is that it does not rely on Flash. This means that maps will continue to be able to be created after Adobe kills off Flash in 2020. Yay! It also means it doesn’t require un-blocking Flash constantly and also loads much more quickly as a side benefit.

As a bonus, the new map designer also has the ability to automatically default set the center of point of territories to the center of the object. While this won’t always be the correct center point, it saves a step when it is.

The UI around creating and managing different versions of your map is also much clearer and faster to use.

If you’re a map designer, please let me know what you think!

No longer dependent on Flash

With the map designer no longer requiring Flash, it marks a major milestone. For the first time in 9 years, Warzone is no longer dependent on Adobe Flash. And for the first time ever, we’re is not dependent on any browser plug-in at all! This means that all features of the game can be run in your browser using pure javascript + html, so we are officially ready for Flash’s demise.

Of course, the option to play Warzone in Flash still exists. Don’t worry, Flash users, that option isn’t going away yet. My numbers show that just over 1% of Warzone’s players are still using Flash. You will need to upgrade at some point, though, as Flash is being killed by Adobe in 2020.

Other Changes

– iOS/Android: Push notifications are now sent when someone sends you private mail.
– All: The chat room no longer advertises open game creation.
– All: If no players in a quickmatch game enter orders on the first turn, they will all lose the game instead of randomly picking a winner.
– All: When creating a double-elimination team tournament, third place will now always have coins that divide evenly by the number of players in a team. Thanks to Phakh Gokhn for reporting this.
– Unity/UJS: When loading a template, you now have the option to load quickmatch templates.
– Unity/UJS: Fixed the link color on players using Electric Purple so it’s readable.
– Unity/UJS: Client-side mod failures now get recorded on the server so that the mod author can see them.
– UJS: Fixed maps that use even-odd fill rule, such as Poland Big. Thanks to Dj Storm for reporting this.
– UJS: Fixed an issue with local storage filling up. Thanks to Rome_Warrior for reporting this.
– Unity: Blog posts are now only shown if they’re made within the last 7 days.
– Unity: Decreased the number of posts shown per page on a forum thread to keep things loading speedily.
– Unity: Mod authors now have an option to delete all pending reports at once, as a convenience instead of doing them individually.
– Unity: Fixed a bug that made the map disappear when trying to open a map preview link that does not exist. Thanks to Bane for reporting this.