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FAQ
Market questions
Find and purchase apps
Downloads
Possible reasons:
- wrong card details
- card still unathorized
- Market server is busy
- reset or exchanged phone
Other
Questions about games
Common
Crystallight Defense
Jewellust
| Q: | How can I purchase your game(s)? / What payment methods do you offer? |
| A: |
If you're from: * Australia * Austria * France * Germany * Italy * Japan * Netherlands * New Zealand * Spain * Switzerland * United Kingdom * United States (source) you can find our apps in Market app on your phone: Jewellust Devilry Huntress Crystallight Defense Tap'n'Feed Jewellust Xmas or just All our games Google prepares to distribute apps in other countries soon. Please see this Google Market support site entry which discusses Google payment methods. Note that our games may be invisible on Market if you have "hacked/rooted" firmware. If you can't find our games on Market in your country, you can also purchase our games using Mobihand store: Jewellust Devilry Huntress Crystallight Defense Tap'n'Feed Jewellust Xmas is not yet available thru Mobihand Store. |
| Q: | Why can't I find full versions of your apps on Market? |
| A: |
Currently our games are available on Android Market for:
* Australia * Austria * France * Germany * Italy * Japan * Netherlands * New Zealand * Spain * Switzerland * United Kingdom * United States (source) If you live in one of these countries but can't find our apps on Market, problem can be not in google but in last carrier update. Please contact your carrier support to find out what's wrong. All we can do in such situation is to suggest you alternative payment methods. On our site you can see currently available method: Mobihand Store. As far as we know full versions of our games are invisible for some "hacked/rooted" firmware. |
| Q: | Is the cost for the full version monthly or just one payment? |
| A: | It is one-time payment. |
| Q: | I can't download!!! Why? |
| A: |
Our customers are contacting us to complain that they cannot download the application after purchasing it. We found that there are few reasons for this problem. See if you find the problem that applies to you below. We hope that this description will help you. Problem: User entered the wrong credit card number or the credit card is declined. Resolution: Users that have this problem need to sign into their Google Checkout account and change the credit card information.
Problem: The credit card takes a long time to be authorized. Resolution: Users that have this problem need to sign into their Google Checkout account and check the status of their order. We have no way to speedup the process of credit card authorization. Problem: Google download server does not allow the user to download the application. Resolution: Contact Google by using the Market forum. Here are some our advices.1. Mostly download problems exist on holidays when many people try to download apps from Market and it fails to serve such amount of clients. So purchase NOT on holidays. 2. When you download make sure that there are no other downloads in progress. You have more chances to fail if there are 2 or more simultaneous downloads. 3. Jewellust's size is 3.8Mb, Crystallight's size is 2.5Mb, so you should use fast internet connection (3g gprs network or wifi connection). So if connection is poor you may go to settings->wireless controls and change network type (from wifi to gprs and vice versa). 4. Do not request for refund just after hour you can't download app. Acccording to market rules you can get refund only once per app (and withing 24 hours after purchase), so you'd better to wait and if after 12 hours you can't download (and made sure that you card was accepted by google on our Order Search Form). If your card was declined you can't get a refund because your card wasn't charged. Problem: User cannot download application after phone has been reset or exchanged for a new phone. If you do not enter the same Google Account you will not gain access to your prior purchases. If you forgot your Google password and you need to use a new Google account you need to purchase the application again. Source |
| Q: | Market says that game is purchased, but still "download unsuccesful"! What's wrong? |
| A: | Let's see how Android Market system works. When you purchase application via Market it immediately lets you ability to download app as it uses "optimistic purchase" model. Market can't know status of your purchase until it checked your card (whether it's valid or not). Normally you purchase the app and start downloading it; download pauses for some time (generally about a hour) until your card is authorized and passed all security checks; then download resumes, and as a result you have this app downloaded. BUT: if your card didn't pass security checks - you don't even know about it. You still think that it's ok and waiting for download completion. Yes, Google Checkout sends an email in such cases, where it explains what happens and what to do. But in most cases mailbox attached to your Checkout account is auto generated and looks something like me-bgfcs0f0@checkout.google.com. Of course you don't check this weird mailbox and don't see an email. We saw such cases so many times. Market application keeps telling that app is purchased even after we receive Checkout resume: "The authorization of the customer's credit card failed. Google has sent an email instructing the customer to update their card. If they fail to provide a valid card within seven days, this order will be automatically cancelled by Google." So if you've purchased our game but can't download it for a hour or more, try to check your Checkout account's mailbox and read instructions received from Google. You can learn all details about creating and managing Google Checkout account on Checkout Support Center. If Google Checkout has declined your card it doesn't surely means that card is bad - sometimes it declines cards accepted by others, we don't know why. To resolve this situation you can change payment method in your Google Checkout account and enter another card's details. Also please read this Google article about payment methods accepted by Google. In order to know what happened with your order you can use Order Search Form. |
| Q: | I'm sure, I've paid for the game but it did not download. I have checked Checkout mailbox and it seems that all is right. / Market don't let me download the newer version! Why? |
| A: | If you've checked your mailbox and sure that your payment is ok - don't worry! Such things happened before and in all cases everything finally was ok. It's not our fault. This can be due several reasons: connection may be bad, market may be too busy, etc. You should wait for a while and try to download it later. Optionally you can turn off and then turn on your phone and repeat an attempt. Try to change internet connection type: use EDGE (GPRS) connection instead of WiFi and vice versa. In some cases it helps. Anyway you should check your order by yourself. In order to know what happened with you order you can use Order Search Form. |
| Q: | I bought it but can't download. So I requested a refund and bought again, but app still wouldn't download. Now it doesn't allow me to request a refund and try once more! Help! |
| A: | You should not request a refund in such situation - it doesn't help. It's not in our power somehow make apps getting downloaded, because they are on Google servers. We only upload apps there. If app isn't downloading for 2 hours you should use our Order Search Form to check the status of your order. If app isn't downloading for 12 hours you should take a look at Android Market Help and Android Market Forum. There are two variants here: Market has not check your card yet or has checked but card is declined. By the way - according to market rules you can request a refund only once for a application. |
| Q: | Google doesn't accept my debit card, please help! |
| A: |
Market has some problems with debit cards. Please take a look at Android Market Help and Android Market Forum. You also should look at this thread and other threads on market forum about debit cards. |
| Q: | I have purchased your app, but it still runs as trial! Do something! |
| A: |
Our lite and full versions are different apps. For example lite version of Jewellust is called "Jewellust Lite", and full - "Jewellust"; they are two different apps and can be installed and uninstalled separately. When you buy the full version, download may take some time, that's why you can't see purchased app immediately. You can find all answers regarding to downloads in this FAQ. |
| Q: | When I update your app it says "authorizing credit card". Is it charging my card? |
| A: | According to Market rules you are not chaged for updates. This help center article should explain everything in detail. |
| Q: | Market says your game size is 7.6Mb for Jewellust, 5Mb for Crystallight Defense. You say - Jewellust 3.8Mb, Crystallight 2.5Mb. Whom to trust? |
| A: | Jewellust's package real size is about 3.8Mb. But when you installing it on your phone, Android downloads the package and then unpacks it into file system. So to install game you must have at least 7.6Mb free. Since now package not needed anymore and may be deleted while clearing cache. Therefore real amount of memory needed for the game itself is about 3.8Mb. |
| Q: | Game "FORCE CLOSES"! / When I launch the game it shows black or logo screen and nothing happens! What should I do? |
| A: |
All our games have "Safe start" feature. If game "force closes" or freezes when starts you should use it. When your phone have been running for a long time, about a week or so, Android may behave strange. It became laggy and doesn't wait for apps to save their data. As a result when you exit game by HOME button and then restart it, game may read wrong data and "force close" dialog may appear. To avoid this next time start the game holding trackball button before it loads completely, then release trackball. In this case game "forgets" previous unsuccessful saving and loads menu. By the way in all our games there is an option "Save and Exit". To avoid described situations you should use it instead of "HOME" button when possible or just restart your phone from time to time (about once in 3-4 days). |
| Q: | All my profiles are lost. Why and how can I restore them? |
| A: |
If your phone have been running for a long time, about a week or so, Android may behave strange. It became laggy and doesn't wait for apps to save their data. As a result when you exit game by HOME button and then restart it, game may read wrong data or erase files while saving data. To avoid such situations you should use "Save&Exit" dialog button instead of HOME button. Using such exit method guarantees that all data will be saved correctly. Please use Profile Recovering Feature to restore your profiles. It exists in every our game (except Jewellust). As profiles are synchronized with online storage, we've added a special feature to our games: you can restore all your profiles (up to 7) if they were lost. For instance, you played the game and then uninstall it (when uninstalling, all game data is erased). If you install the game later, you can restore all your profiles and continue to play! Note that it works only if you use the same phone. To restore profiles go to Profiles page in the Main menu, then hold trackball for 3 sec and agree with dialog. |
| Q: | All my progress lost when the battery is taken out. Why? |
| A: | Sorry, but nor we neither Android OS can't "feel" that phone power is off in such way. That is why your current profile's progress can't be saved. However if you exit game, switch to desktop or another application before you take out the battery your progress will be saved. |
| Q: | I have the latest build but my profiles are getting deleted everytime I exit and reopen the app. Why? Btw, I am using a rooted firmware with the Apps to SD card hack. |
| A: | Yes, our game may not work properly on hacked firmware. Install Jewellust on standard firmware - it works perfect there. |
| Q: | Why is your game so laggy? It could be smoother! |
| A: |
Game itself is quick enough, it runs about 30-35 fps. But because of Android OS behaviour game processing becomes unstable and laggy. When Android thinks that there are no resources to run app
it kills some processes and frees its' resources. It is well known that Android distributes resources wrong way, it even never uses available memory (192M for G1). So when
on phone runs some processes in background (Google Map, Google Talk, etc.) and we launch app that uses at least 6M of memory Android sometimes becomes "nervous" -
it kills and relaunches processes,
performs many garbage collect actions and so on. When you playing high-perfomance game like Crystallight or Jewellust you'll feel such Android activity as frame freezing,
sometimes game responses not immediately. In most cases OS does such things not so long and then stays calm but sometimes however it lasts too much time.
As Android was planned as system with no explicit process termination, you can't kill once started processes yourself.
So the only way to get rid of these "lags" is to restart your phone. For quick restart
you can use CALL+MENU+POWER.
If you want you can read about details in this Google groups thread |
| Q: | I beat the whole game. Why can't I play it again? |
| A: |
Go to the Main Menu. Tap the 'Profiles' button. Tap on empty slot and create new profile. Tap on it and play.
You can play in our games forever. When all profiles are used, just delete one of them and continue!
|
| Q: | Market says that you game has access to phone calls. Why? |
| A: |
We don't know why READ_PHONE_STATE permission is named this ridiculous way - "Phone calls". Our games ask for two permisions (you can see full permissions list in Android Reference): INTERNET (for online profiles and access to our site): Allows applications to open network sockets READ_PHONE_STATE (for checking that device isn't an emulator, as we don't support emulator): Allows applications to open network sockets. To make calls application should have CALL_PHONE permission, but we don't ask for it. You can make sure that our games ask only these permissions, for example, using Androlib. Below the game description you can see: System permissions : 2 * INTERNET * READ_PHONE_STATE |
| Q: | Are you planning to update your games to fit WVGA screen? |
| A: |
Currently all our games run on WVGA phones with screen scaled by Android. Due Android limitations most of our current games (Jewellust, Crystallight Defense and Devilry Huntress, as they are) are impossible for "native" WVGA, i.e. with 480x800 or 480x854 graphics. Apk will be more than 10Mb and taking into account permanent problems with download people will be constantly dissatisfied. On the other hand, graphics in memory (it is uncompressed in memory, not jpg) will be too big (more than 4M limit). Yes, we know that your phone has much more memory, and formal limit for process is 16M. But unfortunately Android thinks differ. As far as we learned Android, it appears that when app gets more than 4M of RAM, system for some reason starts to close and gc other processes to get free memory. No idea why. The only thing we know - it's somehow helps to be Android-powered phone to be "multi-tasking". It's strange, but we can do nothing with this. Also we are not sure whether 480x854 app on Droid can run as fast as 320x480 on G1. We are almost "working on the edge" with G1, as fps less than 30 is bad for gameplay. Thus, to update, for example, Jewellust for 480x854 we should make it with less animations, sounds, everything, and we don't want it so far. But we see that Droid and other "big phones" are Android's future. So we're planning to do a research - how to make fast yet spectacular game in spite of Android ridiculous limitations. And maybe next Android major build will help us. |
| Q: | Game don't track my score, I can't see online scores! What should I do? |
| A: |
Try to open our site in the browser on your phone. Technically, if it opens score tracking system should work.
Try to restart your phone, launch the game and press High Score button. You should see High Scores table. If all lines are "loading" check your
Internet connection. If you're sure your connection is ok, but can't see High Scores table, please contact us. If you can see it but think that system don't track your score,
enter http://crystallight.smartpixgames.com/user.php?n=<your name> into browser (you can do it from PC), replacing <your name> with your profile's name. If you have
noticed something strange, please let us know, we'll solve problems together. We're interested in your satisfaction!
|
| Q: | My phone doesn't have a trackball, what is the substitute button for the trackball? |
| A: |
You should use CAMERA button instead.
|
| Q: | Help me to solve the puzzle with the rotating circle! |
| A: | You have to place all gems to cells in the order that repeats the order in the center circle, but with one restriction:
gem in each cell must be one of four colors (shown on the cell's frame). So the main trouble is to find first cell. (Do not read the text below if you want to solve the puzzle yourself). The right order (from the top cell, clockwise): red, yellow, green, blue, orange, purple, white. |
