BlitzMax Demo Expired on First Run!

Hi all,

I have just downloaded the BlitzMax Demo, which is supposed to have a 30 day trial period, but when I install and run it, it tells me that my trail period has expired and orders me to buy the full version. I can only assume that when I was choosing between Blitz3D and BlitzMax a couple of years ago and installed both demos (uninstalling them once I decided on and bought Blitz3D) the uninstall left a registry entry which is now being checked by the current demo. Does this mean I can never run the BlitzMax demo again? :o(

I guess there's a point leaving such reg.entries around, otherwise one could just use a demo-version each month again.. :P

The idea is that 30 days should give you enough time to work out if you think its worth buying or not. Bottom line is, BRL want to make money. They have nothing to gain from allowing people to use a free demo version forever.

If that's the case, wouldn't removing said registry entry solve the problem?

Gfk - I realise that - but assumed that after 2 years BlitzMax might have evolved somewhat and therefore thought I was not simply trying to run the same demo again (I deleted the original demo so have no idea if it is the same version - but would hope not after all this time!).

When I chose Blitz3D I was very new to game programming. However, my 2D (unlike my 3D :o() programming has progressed considerably and I would now like to use a dedicated language for 2D and leave Blitz3D for when I eventually get my head round 3D game programming. Having seen some of the recent excellent examples created with BlitzMax I was hoping to re-evaluate it via the new demo with a view to purchasing the full version soon after. I don't want to use the demo forever - like I didn't with Blitz3D, which is why I bought the full version and deleted the demo.

Looks like I won't be able to do that with Max then.

I thought Mark released a new demo with a fresh evaluation period when MaxGUI came out. Was that really over 2 years ago?

Ok - I'm going senile - just checked my Blitz3D license - and found it only began on 13-Jul-2006 (good grief - have I REALLY only been using Blitz3D for 6 months?!) so guess I downloaded Max demo a few months before that. I seem to remember that the demo was restricted to code-buffer size, couldn't save and wouldn't compile exes - but my memory is evidently flaky so might well be wrong. I DO remember looking at the blurb on Types and thinking "gawd - it's OOP" and deciding the differences were too great at the time compared with what I was used to. Now I'm a bit more experienced at game programming in general I wanted to have another look. Guess I'll just have to buy it and hope I'm capable of using it properly!

I cannot believe,
1) That you havent done a clean instal in two years
2) That you havent done a registry clean in two years

Anyway Nomen is right the demo with MaxGui is a new one, so ......

'Average Joe' doesn't reinstall his OS every 6 months, if he ever does it at all.
...and he won't even know what a registry is, let alone how to 'clean' it.

You're slightly wrong to assume that everyone does this.

Maybe, but I wouldnt include people who computer program as "everyone".

Well H&K,

1) I haven't done a clean install (assuming you mean re-installing windows etc) for 3.5 years. Since I have no problems with my system, why would I need to?
2) I use Tweaknow RegCleaner to clean my registry once a month. Any problems that it reports as "not safe to delete" I leave well alone.

Not sure what you're implying by "so ......"?

I was a software engineer for 17 years (albeit business rather than games orientated) - so am well aware of the nightmare of software theft/fraud. However, I have never installed a cracked piece of software in my life, always pay for shareware etc. that I use (and delete it if I don't) and expect to get nothing from anything I am not prepared to pay for.

However, I WOULD like to re-evaluate BlitzMax (after learning to program 2D games over the last year) before deciding whether to buy it to use alongside Blitz3D - but it looks like I won't be able to do so because I installed/uninstalled the demo earlier this year when deciding between Blitz3D and Max.

At the time I went with Blitz3D because it allowed me the flexibility of 2D or 3D and the way Max handled Types scared the pants off me. Unfortunately I am struggling with 3D and would like to concentrate on 2D. Having got to grips with Blitz3D (and Blitz2D before it) I would prefer to stay with the Blitz family - but before I commit to Max, I would like to play with it again for a few days to assess how big a learning curve would be involved syntax-wise etc. I don't see what's wrong with my wanting to do that?

Just buy it. Totally worth it. :)

What I was implying by so... was that the current Demo is a new one, so... either you havent bothered to download the new one, or you are wrong about the two years ago, or something strange has happened. Why you would then defend not stealing software I have no Idea. If I had thought you were the sort of person to do that I would simply have told you to do exactly that.

In fact I notice that your "two years ago" is now only "earler this year". so...

If it is any consolation - I much prefer Blitz3D to BlitzMax - in fact, I don't even use BlitzMax.

The Cobra demo is out now - you could have a play with that too:
http://www.squeakyduck.co.uk/index.php?categoryid=9&p13_sectionid=2

H&K,

Ok - fair enough - I was (wrongly - so please accept my apologies) jumping to conclusions on what you were implying based on my own opinions on fraud/theft. You are quite right about the "2 years" - unfortunately this duration is due to me going prematurely senile rather than being based on fact. Since I bought Blitz3D last July, I must have tried the demos around May/June this year. How time flies when you're having fun!!

hahaha. The simplest solution, "IF" you can, is to run the demo on another computer.

I dont think BRL could posibly provide any other solution due to the obvious posibility of abuse that it could be put to.

It has been said (by me), that the PC demo needs to be updated anyway to be a more current version, because to be honest, its not the same language anymore. (the demo is 1.12 and Bmax is now 1.24)

I would say just buy it, trust me you will like it. But if you havent got the money to take the chance then ... well you know.

If you want to stick with basic, then Bmax is the most advanced of the current crop. This is not to say its the best, because obviously the best is subjective, and there are times when I wished I bought B3d (Or dark, Ai pack, physics pack etc), but I think Bmax is the one to go for.

Chalky - I would bite the bullet and buy Max... you won't be disappointed. You can program it almost exactly like previous blitzes... OO is not required and the only real difference at the basic level is you have to assign types to a list... a single list per type is not assumed.

Thanks everyone. Since I won't be able to try it on another PC I think I will do as suggested and buy it anyway. If the recent examples I have seen are anything to go by, then I'm sure I won't be disappointed (as long as my games-programming ability is up to the challenge!).

A merry Christmas to one and all!

Its quite strange. Blitz3D has an unlimited demo which is missused by FAR TOO MANY for full projects (I know at least 8 users using the demo and sending it to others for compiling :-( ), but for BM, which is much more fragile than B3D, the demo is heavily restricted.

Thats strange to me. One of the demos is a little missconcepted.

Maybe they learned from their mistake.

Not sure, as the restricted BM demo came out before B3D 1.90 unrestricted demo ...

And B3D has much little problems running on many different systems than BM has ...

Why?

I haven't done one since I put together my computer three years ago, myself.

As long as you don't install everything under the sun, it's pretty easy to keep 2000 and XP running smoothly for a very long time -- no reinstalls necessary.

Buy it, and enjoy full abilities.

Hey, I swore an oath never to reinstall Windows XP because of slowdowns, and it is still running perfectly! (Albeit with a few potential crash & burn points that it narrowly passes every day).

Oh help me Please. I seem to be abnormal!!!!!!!!!!

I clean instal at least every six months and.... it does seem to make the computer faster.

Am I really the only one who does this?

Come on, its quicker to reinstal than it is to disk fragment and virus check

"Hansie" used to do that.

I think a lot of people did it with Win98, and WinME didn't last more than a month before vomitting on itself and forcing you to reformat. Win2K wasn't very stable for me, so I did on that too, but I think XP Is so stable and doesn't really degrade performance much that there isn't a huge advantage to it to pay you back ( well me anyway ) for the two days backing all my crap up and reinstalling thing and then wondering where the hell I left my Nero CD,etc. So now I only do it if I'm getting errors I can't easily fix. If I get regular crashes/BSOD's and I can't diagnose them in a couple of days, it's cheaper ( in time ) to just reformat. But that's only ever happened to me once since XP was released, and was quite possibly my fault.

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SO have I. However I still clean install at least twice a year.

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It not a question of needing to, I do it more as a re-organising the computer thing. Sort of like moveing your furniture round in your house, or spring cleaning.

You dont spring clean because your house is dirty, you spring clean cos your house could be cleaner.
Its an opitunity to make sure that everything that needs to be backed up, is backed up. Everything that you didnt want to be there, (Spam, spyware virus etc) is removed. Things that you havent used/accesed ever can be moved to storage. Projects that you have put on hold and forgotten about can be re-looked at

Dont get me wrong, I didnt even start to do this under windows, I used to do it under workbench on my 1200. And I would say that even if the point of doing it is getting less and less, (that is the OS is more stabe, and I have massive HDs) its becomeing easyer and easyer to do, what with more programs putting there user data/save position into the "My Documents" folder.

Also, and here I think is the important thing, I dont just have the one computer. So while (say), this one is being cleaned I can use the other one, and vise versa. So as not really to have downtime

(Mind you, it did catch me out, when B&W1 put the creatures mind in the reg)

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Sadly I still do it in winuae ;(

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Hi BrEgOrS, no need for the demo any more - I bit the bullet yesterday and bought & downloaded BlitzMax/MaxGUI. At least now I'll have something to play with today. However, I'm very interested in the concept of "remapping" the XP swapfile to another drive - how would I go about doing that?

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