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LEAVING ALL OF THIS UP FOR HISTORICAL PURPOSE, BUT REALLY YOU CAN IGNORE ALL OF THIS AND JUST USE FLASHPOINT TO PLAY HATPC. SEE THIS POST IF YOU WANT MORE DETAILED INSTRUCTIONS


Once again, I'm rewriting an existing guide. Or rather, instead of making a "How to open" guide, I'm making one solely focused on the problems you can face when trying to play Hannah and the Pirate Caves (HATPC). I designed this guide like a flowchart to make it easier and faster to work through.

STEP ONE: Try Again

Just open and close the game window until it finally works. If it still doesn't work after about three tries, move on to the next step.

STEP TWO: DGS Error?

If you get a DGS Error, it is most likely the fault of neopets.com. Although, this theory has never been proven. Wait a few hours or a day, and if you still get the error, move on to step three.

STEP THREE: Which browser are you using?

HATPC is a very old Shockwave game, so it does not work properly in all browsers anymore. We find that HATPC works best in Google Chrome (download: here) and Apple's Safari (download: here). Many users on this site prefer to use Chrome for HATPC. EDIT: Chrome has betrayed us. Use Safari.

If you are currently using a different browser, that may be the reason why you cannot play HATPC. Download either Chrome or Safari, then try opening HATPC from one of those browsers by clicking here. If you still can't play, move on to step four.

Side note: If you do not want to change the browser that you normally use, you may be interested in some added convenience in another of my guides, which teaches you how to create a desktop shortcut that will open HATPC from any browser.

STEP FOUR: Do you have the latest version of Shockwave Player?

http://get.adobe.com/shockwave/
Visit the above link and download the latest version of shockwave. Beware of any offers to download a free toolbar or security scan. I suspect them to be safe, since they are from Adobe, but they are an annoyance.

Try opening HATPC again, by clicking here. If still nothing, go to step five.

STEP FIVE: Try visiting the game files directly

Click here: http://swf.neopets.com/games/g349_v9_99392.dcr

This is known to work in every browser except Internet Explorer  9.

If it still doesn't work, see the next step.

STEP SIX: Try clearing your browser's cache

Your browser saves a cache for many web pages in its attempt to cut back on loading times. Some of our users have found that clearing their cache enables them to play HATPC again.

To clear your cache in Chrome, click on the wrench icon at the top-right corner of the screen. Then click on "Options". An Options window will open up. Click on the tab called "Under the Hood". Right under the "Privacy" heading, click on the button that says "Clear Browsing Data...". Another window will open. In this window, uncheck everything except for "Empty the cache". Under "Clear data from this period:", select "Everything". And finally, click the button "Clear browsing data".

To clear your cache in Safari, click on the gear icon at the top-right corner of the screen, and click on "Reset Safari...". A window will open. uncheck everything except for "Empty the cache". Then hit the "Reset" button.

Try opening HATPC here.

If it still doesn't work, you can also try deleting all other forms of browsing data, and this usually works for most people.

Finally, if it still doesn't work, try clearing it again! Surprisingly this does make a difference quite often.

If even that doesn't work, move onto the next step.

STEP SEVEN: Maybe it's not your fault

There have been times in the past when HATPC wouldn't work for anyone because something would go wrong with neopets.com's game servers. This is similar to the DGS Error problem in Step Two, but neopets is clever, always finding better ways of screwing up HATPC. While in the past, the game used to go down occasionally, it seems very rare these days. However, the possibility is still there. To make sure if something is only happening to you, try asking other Interguild members if they are having any difficulties opening HATPC. If they are having the same problems as you, then it's possible that something's temporarily gone wrong with the game.

STEP EIGHT: Try downloading someone else's cache

We've now moved on to a daring step. We will now attempt to get HATPC to work for you by downloading almost 290 MB 755 KB of my own cache so that HATPC will always work for you. However, this cache is for Google Chrome only, so if you do not have it, download it here. However, Chrome must be closed while you follow these steps.

This method was developed when I noticed that there was something in my cache that allowed HATPC to work for me, and when the cache was cleared, it no longer worked. Luckily, I saved a backup of my cache, and I tried to find out what file was in there that was allowing HATPC to work. However, because I did not know what I was doing, removing things from the cache made it very unstable, as Chrome would sense errors and automatically change things to fix them. Therefore, I was not able to reduce the file size of the overall cache that you must download.  However, so far this method has managed to fix HATPC for two people: jellsprout and Yaya.

Also, I am sorry I cannot provide any support for non-Windows users.

Here are the steps to successfully replace your cache with mine:
  1. If on Windows Vista or Windows 7, go to:
    C:Users[USERNAME]AppDataLocalGoogleChromeUser DataDefault

    If on Windows XP, go to:
    Cocuments and Settings[USERNAME]Local SettingsApplication DataGoogleChromeUser DataDefault

    The [USERNAME] represents the name of the user that you are currently logged into on your computer. There will be a folder named after that user name.

    If you are having trouble finding some of these folder, it may be because they are hidden. Click on the Start menu at the very bottom-left corner of the screen and type in "folder options" into the search. Click on the "Folder Options" program that comes up. Click on the "View" tab, then look under the group of options under "Hidden files and folder" and select the option to "Show hidden files and folders". Now try again to find the above folder locations.

  2. Delete the following folders entirely:
    Cache
    Media Cache
    (if you don't want to lose your caches, for whatever reason, you may want to just rename those folders in case you want to keep a backup).

  3. Open this: https://docs.google.com/leaf?id=0By4BC80t6oOoNzQ5YjZhNzctNWY1NS00M2ZmLWEzNWYtNjk3NGI2Njk3YjY4&hl=en&authkey=CN3A8PAK

  4. Take the two folders inside that zip file and extract them to your "Default" folder, mentioned in the first step. Make sure that the Cache and Media Cache folders within the zip file are placed directly into the Default folder. You do not want them to be inside a new folder (which may be automatically called "ChromeHATPCcache").
Now that you have successfully replaced your cache, try to play HATPC here. If you have any problems with this complicated step, please ask for help in the comments below.

If this doesn't work, try going through this step again, but instead use this cache: https://docs.google.com/leaf?id=0By4BC80t6oOoNzlkNGIzMjktMWUwZC00YTgyLWJiOTUtNjk5YzMyMjAxYTZh&hl=en
Be aware that this file is nearly 290 MB.

STEP NINE: Ask for help

If you still can't get HATPC to work, just post a comment below. Try explaining in detail what happens when you try to load the game, and I or some other members will try to figure out what's wrong.
[?] Karma: +2
User Comments (290)
« Forum Index < The Hannah and the Pirate Caves Board
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Kooler
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Saturday, December 3 2011, 1:16 pm EST
find me in your local trashcan

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'Cedric_09_' said:
I use Safari to open HatPC, while I use Firefox for websurfing.
I used to do that until Safari started giving me problems, now I use Chrome to open HatPC, and I use Firefox for going onto the web.


go drink some water
Yaya
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Saturday, December 3 2011, 1:27 pm EST

Age: 28
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Hey, HATPC magically worked in Chrome this time, despite the +20 failed attempts I had last night. This gives me the impression Livio's cache did not make any difference for me this time or last time and legitimately had a month of unprovoked random shockwave errors. Great. I'll probably end up leaving HATPC window up for a week just so I won't have to go thru this crap again, lol.



COMING SOON: A giant meteor. Please.
Give me +karma. Give me +karma.
Yaya
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Sunday, December 4 2011, 1:40 pm EST

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Sorry for the double post, but HATPC in chrome stopped working for me again, so I downloaded Safari.... I got a shockwave error, go figure. And now, it just gets eternally stuck in the loading animation, it doesn't freeze. I just get to watch the stupid sea monster scream for eternity or something. Does this mean my computer sucks and it's my fault, or does the ghost of Steve Jobs hate me (I didn't want to download those semilegal songs)? Cuz I don't recall anybody ever having too serious of problems with Safari.



COMING SOON: A giant meteor. Please.
Give me +karma. Give me +karma.
Isa
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Sunday, December 4 2011, 1:41 pm EST
No. I'm an octopus.

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The same happens for me from time to time. It's not a Safari-specific issue.
Livio
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Sunday, December 4 2011, 6:44 pm EST

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I just did the cache thing, and HATPC works for me.
Thomas
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Sunday, December 4 2011, 6:54 pm EST
the clique shall prevail

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How do you get this thing in your cache that makes HATPC work? Perhaps you can do that on Safari as well but there's gotta be a certain file you load that makes it work.
Livio
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Sunday, December 4 2011, 7:23 pm EST

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I really don't know. I got the cache idea when I was trying to get one of my home computers playing HATPC again. The solution was to get the cache of a computer where HATPC works and put it into another computer where HATPC doesn't work. So if we want a cache for Safari, we first need to get someone who can play HATPC in Safari right now.
Thomas
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Monday, December 5 2011, 1:14 am EST
the clique shall prevail

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I was looking in Chrome's cache and I found the following URL:
http://swf.neopets.com/games/g349_v9_99392.dcr
From there I was able to play HATPC from FF, Chrome, and Safari. It didn't work in IE 9. My guess is that because this bypasses the launcher, you don't get the error about shockwave because it's the launcher that is falsely detecting that you can't play the game. So, could this be the new way of playing HATPC?

Also, I just found out the game grabs the COTW level from the following URL:
http://www.neopets.com/games/cavemaker/pirate_level_load.php?caveoftheweek=1

By the way, this thought occurred to me a while ago and it just came back to me. So when you search for a user level, the game takes what you entered and sends a request to neopets for the level. There's got to be some way to intercept the HTTP request and have the browser return a different file. This new file would contain a level code and it would allow for us to play uploader glitched caves. Whether it's a browser extension or a java code (can you do that with java?), there IS some way. Anybody wanna look into that?
Bmwsu
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Monday, December 5 2011, 1:32 am EST

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Thomas.  I love you.


Isa
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Monday, December 5 2011, 3:55 am EST
No. I'm an octopus.

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Awesome, Thomas.
shos
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Monday, December 5 2011, 12:32 pm EST
~Jack of all trades~

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wow, this is seriously awesome man. I can play again, that's a first, and the idea of having uploader glitched stuff uploaded could be the start of me making an imperio walkthrough if you get that too, you deserve the win of the year, not only the week


Livio
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Monday, December 5 2011, 1:19 pm EST

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I changed all of the links to the HATPC window to load Thomas' link instead. This means no more stupid pre-loader!!

'Thomas' said:
By the way, this thought occurred to me a while ago and it just came back to me. So when you search for a user level, the game takes what you entered and sends a request to neopets for the level. There's got to be some way to intercept the HTTP request and have the browser return a different file. This new file would contain a level code and it would allow for us to play uploader glitched caves. Whether it's a browser extension or a java code (can you do that with java?), there IS some way. Anybody wanna look into that?
I really have no idea how to do that, but that would be super awesome.
canadianstickdeath
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Monday, December 5 2011, 4:36 pm EST

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My first comment is afshkfjh neopets ur game works just fine fix ur crap. User levels apparently work just fine in FF, lol. I tried to find this link before (and I believe I was at a very similar url) but I was trying .swf's >_>. Wasn't really sure what I was looking for.

"There's got to be some way to intercept the HTTP request and have the browser return a different file."
Yeah this has been considered before. I forget why nothing ever came of it, but it just might have been that nobody ever tried. Personally, I'm pretty interested to see what would happen if I put something other than "background 1", lol, what would the background look like? Five bucks says it looks the same. :p
Isa
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Monday, December 5 2011, 4:43 pm EST
No. I'm an octopus.

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Five bucks says it looks corrupted or entirely black.
canadianstickdeath
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Monday, December 5 2011, 4:48 pm EST

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But there's ONLY ONE BACKGROUND! Lol, but then again, common sense doesn't sound like something that TNT would apply, so you're probably right (though I think all white is a better guess). :p
Isa
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Monday, December 5 2011, 4:48 pm EST
No. I'm an octopus.

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Anyway, I too tested with Firefox (downloaded it just to test), and it does indeed work. Salute, everyone of you who for some mysterious reason doesn't like the wonder that is Chrome.

Also this entire guide is now probably obsolete. =p
canadianstickdeath
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Monday, December 5 2011, 5:08 pm EST

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It still has a use b/c it still won't work in the most recent version of the most-used browser, and you probably would want to have updated shockwave and the like... but yeah it's basically like "don't use IE 9 and then click this".

But really though, fingers crossed for "background 2" actually existing.
Isa
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Monday, December 5 2011, 5:09 pm EST
No. I'm an octopus.

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It works on my IE9. ;p
shos
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Monday, December 5 2011, 5:35 pm EST
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Yer well, this guide needs to be updated with a header of, 'if you can't play because you tried to get it from neopets, just click here'. this guide is now completely useless, but I'd keep it as interguild pack of history


Thomas
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Monday, December 5 2011, 7:58 pm EST
the clique shall prevail

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'Livio' said:
'Thomas' said:
By the way, this thought occurred to me a while ago and it just came back to me. So when you search for a user level, the game takes what you entered and sends a request to neopets for the level. There's got to be some way to intercept the HTTP request and have the browser return a different file. This new file would contain a level code and it would allow for us to play uploader glitched caves. Whether it's a browser extension or a java code (can you do that with java?), there IS some way. Anybody wanna look into that?
I really have no idea how to do that, but that would be super awesome.
You know Java, right? Or do you know C++ as well? I'm sure it's possible to intercept HTTP with C++ at least. Or maybe someone knows how to create a FF addon to do that. I downloaded one called Tamper Data and it allows you to modify many things but the only thing you can't change is the file the request is sent to. Maybe it's possible to send feedback to the developer about that...

'Isa' said:
It works on my IE9. ;p
For me it asks me if I want to download the file.
Sefro
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Monday, December 5 2011, 9:22 pm EST

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This is fantastic! Great discovery, Thomas.
jazz
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Monday, December 5 2011, 9:30 pm EST

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So, if we're able to play uploader-glitched levels, would we also be able to use swearing and make levels that have <a href="www.google.com"></a>; in them?
Silver
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Monday, December 5 2011, 9:40 pm EST

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I tried saving the file to my computer and playing HatPC from my files, but I got a message saying "Sorry, this game is not being run in its intended location" (or something like that) and it didn't play at all. Just saying.
jazz
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Tuesday, December 6 2011, 2:20 am EST

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Ok, how about we just hack NEopets and check out the script, then we copy it down (and other information) and use our own script so we dont,t need to rely on NEopets? im on a phone so dorgive me for any mistakes
Isa
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Tuesday, December 6 2011, 5:38 am EST
No. I'm an octopus.

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'Silver' said:
I tried saving the file to my computer and playing HatPC from my files, but I got a message saying "Sorry, this game is not being run in its intended location" (or something like that) and it didn't play at all. Just saying.


You don't need to save the file to play it =p

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