For Electrofringe, we’ve created a quick way to play games without having to register online. Find the gameid of the game you want to play (the number after the “g” in the URL of the game poster) then SMS our number, 61429357459 - with:

!join gameid

You’re now ready to go!

This is an evolving feature so feel free to discuss it in our Forums.

It has been a huge month and a half of hammering, tinkering and polishing but we’re finally releasing a batch of new features and redesigns to you all. We believe this release adds a much needed, greater locative and global dimension to Cipher Cities. We hope you like it!

.
Mapping for Games

You can now locate your games on a map using the Game Builder!

When you save your game, Google Maps will automatically detect which country your marker is in. As a result, we’ve extended our country list from just Australia to any country on Earth (ISO 3166). But don’t worry, if your game isn’t located in a physical space (like many existing games) you won’t have to specify a marker.

What we do now ask for is a Play Area for your game. This can be as simple as a city name (Cipher City), street address (40 Downtown Avenue, Cipher City), location type (Any Outdoor Venue) or even a play area that’s not located (Online). This helps others find your game, both within the Game List and in the real world.

Please note that this “Play Area” field used to be labelled “Location” so any existing games are still valid.

If your game is located, its map location now appears in its Game Poster. The map displayed is centered and zoomed to the same level as specified in the Game Builder.

We’ve made a couple of changes to the Game List so that others can quickly determine if they can play your game when they find it. A map indicates where games are located and we’ve replaced the Start Time and End Time columns with Availability. This quickly shows whether a game is Upcoming, Available or Over (accurate to 24 hours after the times specified).

Please note that any existing games may need to be updated with more accurate mapping information. We have approximately positioned markers for existing games but these can be repositioned if desired.

.

Sharing

We’ve redesigned the Message List navigation system so that it is divided into three main sections: Invitations, Messages and Forums.

We’ve also renamed the entire section to Share to reinforce our main features: Play, Build and Share.

Guests can now preview the Share interfaces. Each section contains a short description of what it entails.

.

The City

We’ve overhauled the Cipher Cities homepage, The City, so that it contains:

• More activity and ranking information pertaining to Games and Citizens
• A map that displays the top and latest games
• A latest news feed straight from our blog
• 3 videos that describe our main features, starring a couple of members from the Cipher Team!

As a Citizen, you will receive a slightly different version of The City that contains more news and a larger game map.

.

We hope you’ll like our new features and designs. They are available now so have a look around!

If you have any feedback on this release, please feel free let us know in the forums, through private messaging or via email. We would love to hear from you!

We’ve just added a few features that will make it easier to share your games.

The new Toolkit that you will find in your game’s Builder Info section gives you access to a number of new tools that will make recruiting players a whole lot simpler!

Invite Your Friends
Before, you would have to go into the message section to invite your friends to your game.

With “Invite your Friends”, one click will take you to the Invitation page with your game pre selected, so all you need to do is choose the friends you want to invite.

Post to Forum
Submitting a game to a forum used to involve opening a multitude of windows and a fair bit of copying and pasting. We will be the first to admit that it wasn’t the best way to get people sharing, and so we’ve worked on improving it.

“Post to Forum” will take you right to the new “Your Forum” section.

Choose a forum and select “Post Your Game”

This will take you to the post page. Clicking on “Show Your Games” will display a list of your games and allow you to add a link to them from the post.

“Submit to Competition” works in exactly the same way, and it’s good to note that you can post your games direct from the forums. You don’t have to go through your poster.

Right now we’ve limited game posting to Competitions and Your Forums sections, but go ahead and try it out. Then let us know what you think in the forum!