Midnight Mansion FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions)

License Questions

Q: When I buy a registration code, can I install it on more than one of my computers?

A: Yes. Our policy is to allow you to install the game on as many computers as you own, provided that only one person is playing at once. You should purchase multiple license codes if you want more than one person to play at the same time, i.e. one person playing on the iMac while another plays on the laptop. 


Q: Do you ever transmit my personal information to your website?

A: No. There are only two times information is transmitted from your computer to our website:

1) When your registration code expires, and you click the "Get Updated Code" button to get an updated code. Only your "Registered To:" name and registration code are sent to our website, so that an updated code can be generated for you and sent back to your computer. Nothing else is sent to our website.

2) When you submit a high score. In this case, only your score is submitted.

Under absolutely no circumstances will our games ever collect or transmit personal information about you. We value your privacy.


Mansion Questions

Q: When I download 3rd party mansions, how can I play them?

A: After downloading a 3rd party mansion (you can get some from www.midnightmansion.org) and extracting it, you must put the mansion file inside the Custom Mansions folder, which is in the Midnight Mansion folder. Don't double-click the mansion file -- this won't open it. Instead, start up Midnight Mansion, choose Start Game, and then click on the "Open Mansion..." button at the buttom of the Difficulty screen, instead of choosing Easy/Normal/Hard. This will allow you to open any mansion inside your Custom Mansions folder.


System Questions

Q: I bought a new computer, and want to transfer my saved games and high scores from the old computer. How can I do this?

A: You will find all the files that keep track of your user accounts, saved games, and high scores by following these steps:

1) Go to the Finder by clicking on the Desktop, or on the happy face in the Dock.
2) Select "Home" from the Go menu.
3) Double-click on Library.
4) Double-click on Application Support.

Inside of Application Support you will find a Midnight Mansion folder that contains your High Scores, Saved Games, movies, and more. Copy this folder to your new computer, to the same location. (Home->Library->Application Support) The next time you run Midnight Mansion on your new computer, you should have access to all your old saved games, high scores, and so on.


Q: I get this message at startup: "The Sound Manager couldn't be initialized. The game will continue to run, but you won't hear any sounds. (Error code -2004)". When I run the game, music plays, but there is no sound.

A: Sometimes other misbehaving programs can cause problems like this. Try restarting your computer, and trying Midnight Mansion again. Restarting will cause all other open programs to quit, and will reset your system so everything is working as it should. One program known to cause problems is "MPlayer OS X 2.0". Sometimes this program causes other programs to lose sound effects. Using it again seems to help.

TIP: A great way to tell if a problem, such as the one above, is Midnight Mansion's fault, is to run other games and see if the problem happens to them as well. If it does, then the problem is not Midnight Mansion's fault. One easy test is to run Nanosaur, which comes with most Macs, and should be in your Applications folder. If the problem happens there too, then try quitting all running programs, or restarting your computer.


Q: Why does the game start up blasting full volume, even though my system volume was low, and Midnight Mansion is set to not change the system volume?

A: This can happen if you have a 3rd party sound card installed. Sometimes these cards aren't controlled by normal system calls to adjust volume, and there is nothing I'm aware of that can be done to fix this for Carbon applications.


Q: Why can't I take screenshots?

A: You must be in windowed mode for standard screenshots to work. Otherwise the game may freeze when you try. 3rd party programs may or may not be able to take screeshots in full-screen mode.


Q: Can I change screen depth while the game is running/paused?

A: No, don't do that. Midnight Mansion will quit with an error if you do.


Q: Why won't the space bar register on the Options -> Controls dialog?

A: Upgrade to a newer version of MacOS X. Certain versions before 10.2.8 (such as 10.2.0) had a bug that would cause the space bar to not register.


High Score Questions

Q: If I didn't submit a high score to your website when I got it, can I submit it later?

A: No, sorry. You have to submit it when you got it.


Q: How can I erase the High Scores?

A: Open up the Midnight Mansion folder that's inside of Application Support, and delete the "Midnight Mansion High Scores" file.


Q: Why are some names in red, and others in white?

A: White names indicate players who reached the end of the mansion, while red is for those who didn't.


Development

Q: How long did it take you to create Midnight Mansion?

A: That's a hard question to answer. Work began on projects such as the ActionSoft Level Builder long before this game was even planned. Likewise, I've worked on SpriteWorld (the animation library used by Midnight Mansion) for years. Midnight Mansion would not have been possible without either of these tools, and years of work went into each.

Development of Midnight Mansion itself began in Summer 2001, and wasn't finished until early 2005. The long development time is mainly due to my being a college student, so development practically halts during each semester. That means I have Summer and Winter sessions to develop it, which is about 5 months each year. All together, Midnight Mansion required about 20 months of work to create. That's not counting the time that my artist, musicians, sound effects creators, or level designers spent.

Future games should be able to be developed much faster, since I can reuse certain tools I developed while working on Midnight Mansion.


Q: What was your development system for Midnight Mansion?

A: A B&W 400mhz PowerMac G3 running CodeWarrior Pro 5 on MacOS 9.2.2, and CodeWarrior Pro 8 on MacOS X 10.3.7 towards the end of development, for testing MacOS X compatibility.
