I have been rather quiet on the blogging front recently and there have been two reasons for this. Number 1 - well... see the title of this post, and number 2? I'll explain that one in a week or so.
Anyway a couple of weeks ago (10th of July 2006) the new Miniclip website was released. For those who don't know Miniclip is the company I work for, as a web/ game designer.
For the last 7 months we have been working on the design and implementation of the Miniclip site and, as a web designer, I got to do all of the html. Yay!
The design was a collaboration between myself and another designer. Once the layout was decided upon Nic (the other designer) took the lead on styling and fine tuning the design and I got to play with the code. We also built a brand new cms (content management system) so that we can add and update games and other content much easier than before.
Before and After
Web Standards - Woo Hoo
Since I was coding the thing there were no conversations about whether or not to use web standards. It was going to happen, like it or not. Fortunately my bosses are very forward thinking and were quite happy to let me just get on with it. They were also excited about the SEO possibilities of a page that is more text than layout.
We didn't get to save a whole lot, in terms of file size, simply because we added so many new features. But the code is, by and large, quite clean. For the standards zealots amongst you the site doesn't validate 100% but I hope to sort out the majority of the errors in the coming weeks.
Design decisions
Before we started creating the site we did some user analysis to see what was being used and where. This is not something we had done an awful lot of before so it was very interesting to play with. The helped form some of the decisions for the new design.
The most significant, and equally the most surprising, thing we found was the amount of people who used the list all games menu was staggering. It was easily the most used part of the homepage despite being one of the smallest insignificant elements. This lead onto the full game listing you now see at the bottom of every page. Just as a side note, the full game list at the top of the page is actually populated by all of the links in the full game list. This was to reduce file size, and to keep the main body of the page loading nice and fast.
We also added the "Latest Games Played" and "My Miniclips" sections. These are both powered by Javascript; this is to reduce the load on the site and, more importantly, so that users aren't required to create accounts to use the new features. The My Miniclips section is actually carried over from the Miniclip toolbar which lets you save your favourite games. If you install the toolbar then the Miniclips you have saved are automatically added into your favourites.
Another big new feature is the search box. I'm not sure how miniclip managed without a search function before but I use it all the time now.
We also added a rather cool new 404 system. Part of the problem with moving the site was all the urls breaking so we decided to set the 404 page to forward to the search page. Add the old urls as keywords for each game and bam - go to an old link and you get moved straight to the new page. A rather noice side effect of this is that we now have a pseudo tagging system (not a published feature but I like it). Go to http://www.miniclip.com/sports and you will be presented with the search results for sports - a totally unintended brand new feature. Me likey.
The homepage is now largely flash free. On the old site there were about 8 flash elements, and we now have the animations and two banners. The game pages are even simpler, at most they have a single banner plus the game content. This is all in a bid to make the site less processor intensive keeping things nice and light so the games runs as fast as possible.
A few people have commented on the lone tab on the homepage. Well that's there for a reason - all will be made clear later this year.
Apple
I was going to post something about the site not working properly in Safari on the Mac but we got a Mac Mini a few days ago and I spent yesterday morning playing around on that to fix up all the errors.
Feedback
The response to the redesign has been mixed. Thankfully most people like it, but there have been a few negative rumblings. The biggest problem people had was the removal of the traditional Miniclip branding (the blue background) so this week we added the the theme switcher (check the footer) so that people can view the site in a more familiar colour scheme (I rather like this feature and now use the classic theme all the time).
And...
It's been a lot of hard work, especially considering the size of the team working on it, but it's also been a lot of fun. It's incredibly satisfying seeing a project of this size completed. We are still tweaking, adjusting, and fine tuning the site but it's largely complete.
Thankfully the last time Miniclip was overhauled was 4 years ago. Whilst I enjoyed the work I am hoping the next redesign is in another 4 years time.
I have a MacBook - I can get into miniclip and load a game (eg snooker) and log in with name and password. I then select the "room" I want to play in..... nothing! I just get a static message about Multiplayer launcher and that is it. Any ideas? I miss my daily fix!
August 16, 2006
Hi Mark
Firstly - I'm a webdesigner - I don't do support, especially not on my personal blog, and secondly - the game you are playing is actually not part of miniclip.com. The tournaments games are run by a separate company so you should contact them to get help with this problem. The easiest way to do this is to use their forum which can be found on the menu at the top of the tournaments pages.
August 16, 2006
I got used to the colour scheme you used and I'm glad that you got it back))
August 19, 2006
I use Mozilla Firefox and would like to get the Miniclip toolbar. Please can you make a version of it that works with Firefox, as its a great web browser and Miniclip is a great games site.
Thanks!
October 6, 2006
yeah, i agree with what luke said. please give us a firefox toolbar.
December 24, 2006
Could you make a firefox version of the miniclip toolbar?
December 28, 2007
I use Mozilla Firefox and would like to get the Miniclip toolbar. Please make a version of it so that it works with Firefox, as its a great web browser and Miniclip is a great games site, for children as well as older one's.
December 7, 2008
funnily enough we're looking in to making a new toolbar for firefox.
December 9, 2008
Why did they remove snooker and pool multi-player games, mate? The latter were written very, very well. I cannot find something good like that!
February 11, 2010
Unfortunately snooker and Pool were removed because the contract with the company that supplied them ended. I have tried to look up the company that supplied the games and it seems they have now closed down. The only reference I could find online was for a website that says it will be online in November last year
February 12, 2010
Hello Ben,
can you please let me know the website address you mentioned finding or the address of the company that owned the old pool and snooker games on miniclip? i think it was the best game on the net as far as graphics and ease of use was concerned and nothing miniclip has now comes even close to it, i think miniclip should dig deep into its pockets and return this popular game, i for one would'nt mind paying for it if money was the only reason it was dropped, lets get a petition together everyone, bring back our old pool and snooker!!!!!
April 13, 2010
As I mentioned, the company that published the game has now closed, so we can't buy it back I'm afraid. However 8 ball quick fire pool was made by the same team and is a pretty close representation of the version we had before.
April 13, 2010
Hello again Ben,
I have played the pool game on miniclip and I have to say if you had played the old java version there is no way you would say it compared to miniclips latest offering, the only thing it has in common is a rectangular table and round balls, the old games were smooth running and the balls ran in a realistic motion, even the spin on the cue ball was far superior to what is on offer now, the present pool is boring having to play against yourself.
Surely you must know a guy who knows a guy that has the software stored on a disk and talk him into putting this game back online, or let me have his contact number and I will make him an offer on the rights to it?
Every pool game thats on offer on the web at the moment doesn’t even come close to the old pool and snooker games from the past, I think if it was brought back people would be glad to pay as they will now have realised how good this game really was.
Please do some digging for us Ben, if you get control of the software you could make a killing if you put it back online.
Regards 8ballmaestro
April 23, 2010
Thank you for your reply, Ben. They were written on Java very smoothly and professionally as far as I remember. I am amazed they've disappeared.
May God reward you for your work.
February 12, 2010
You're right, they were Java games. The team who made the games now work with us, and you can play our quick fire pool games which were made by them in Flash.
February 12, 2010
Yeah but they are not the same , Snooker game was the best , has any1 found where to play yet?? What was the company name , they dont have a site?
tanx
March 24, 2010
The website has closed. They no longer exist.
March 25, 2010
ok but how can miniclip cancel their most profitable games ?? realy strange
March 25, 2010
who said it was miniclips most profitable game?
March 25, 2010
Hi Ben,
yes but it sure doesnt come close , so i sign the petition!
i mean , u dont have an opponent, no real point system , snooker was the bomb , im willing to pay too
April 15, 2010
It is complete madness that the snooker game has been wiped from the net. I mean. . . what on earth were they thinking!!! The physics, aesthetics, playability and over all feel of the game was second to none. Surely some bright spark would've seen sense by now and created a standalone website for it, gear it towards the European market and maybe allow for betting. Paying to play the game is a nonsense (as someone suggested above) - you'll only attract the old players who already know of it's genius whilst alienating new players by forcing them to pay for something that they know nothing about. Advertising and betting would be ample enough to support its needs. (Of course, all of this is just a pipe dream for a select few who had the chance to play it) Any notion that it will be brought back is just ridiculous. Eighteen months has passed since it was last available to play and that's a long time in cyberspace. Unfortunately some people just lack the creativity and foresight to make something like this golden opportunity work. No way back now. Real shame.
December 17, 2010
Hi Jim - sorry you feel that way. Unfortunately the company that ran the game was not Miniclip so there is nothing we could do to change the fact that they closed. We now have a new multiplayer pool game that is just as good (if not better) called 8 Ball Multiplayer Pool.
Please note though that I am a web designer and not involved with the business decisions that are made in the company.
December 18, 2010
The snooker game was really one of the best games. It is true that 8 Ball Multiplayer Pool looks as good as Snooker but it's not that interesting as Snooker was. Snooker was much funnier than Pool. I really regret that there is no way to bring it back.
October 3, 2012
8 Ball Pool is made by the same team that made Snooker - it's a really good game, but clearly it's not snooker.
October 4, 2012
Recently ive been thinking a lot about the old Miniclip pool and 9 Ball games that i used to love and play alot.
I was once told about it and immediately fell in love with the games,not only i but i spread the word and got
many friends playing it.
It was so realistic and great playing different opponents from all over the World, Haha remember the silly faces
u could get.I didn't pay to play but players who did got even more funnier faces for their profile...
The last two days ive been searching the net looking for answers why this once great game has completely disappeared.
Who designed this Game?? Does anyone have the Rights to it.
I bet if we could ever get the 9 ball and 8 ball tables up and running again it would make a fortune
(Only ever played the snooker once or twice)
Someone must be able to get those games back
October 17, 2012