Automated error reporting

24.07.2010

Suppose you're trying out a new game, and it crashes on startup or one minute into the game. The likelihood you're going to tell this to the developer and help them is probably below 0.1%.

Many developers are of course fine with their games crashing. If you're just developing freeware for your own fun, it might not matter if the game doesn't work on every last machine. As for me, I'm determined to fix all of the errors I possibly can.

So to this end, I implemented an error log sending system into Driftmoon. If the game crashes, the game will ask whether you allow it to send me a report of the error. Basically it will try to log where in the game code the crash happened, but it doesn't of course tell me what you did to crash the game. So telling me what happened is still extremely helpful!

The server collects your IP number so I can identify which reports belong to the same computer. I take privacy seriously, so I'm the only one who can access them. As for user created mods crashing, I'm still debating whether to allow mod makers to get access to crashes in their own mods.

With the automated update system this should allow me to quickly react to any crashing errors I happen to forget in the game. This will be especially useful for all of you mod makers, since modders will use the game in ways I didn't originally intend - now instead of going around the problem you can report it to me and hope to get a fix not only for you, but also for your players.