Again, after another long absence, I am breaking my silence to announce the reworked "Featured Slider" ... which actually appeared a few weeks ago. It's a bit trimmer (40px narrower) and now showing only 12 titles, but the the best thing about it is .... wait for it ..... the 12 titles are new .... well not new-new, they've been available on the site for some time (years actually), but they're new to the slider. Two questions might come to mine here ... or not, but I'm going to address the two that I thought you might like to know.

First: Why resize and reduce the number of games of the slider? Good question! The answer is rather simple, to reduce the amount of data your browser has to load so the page will finish loading quicker. Depending on your internet speed, the 40% that was trimmed from the slider could result in the home page loading several seconds quicker. And anymore, quicker is always better!

Second: Why are you featuring old titles in the slider? Again, excellent question! Boy, you are a sharp one, no getting anything past you! Again, keeping it simple, the titles were good when they were released and honestly, they still are. Jumping ahead to the present and missing the opportunity to highlight these titles just wouldn't be right. Without a doubt, some gems were missed along the journey (even a shapie like you probably missed a couple), and this will be the perfect chance to discover them! Presently, I have a nice cache of finished featured game slides and will be releasing a few each week until I'm caught back up to the present. Now, with this being a span covering close to 3000 titles and there being over 200 titles in the featured query, it will take a while. I will start rotating in new slides next week.

There are at least a couple of other things which need be addressed shortly (one just being the long lost "New Features Added" notice with the last big site rework), so expect to see more releases here on the News Page soon. Yes I know, you've heard it before, but this time I mean it :) ....

Thanks!

It might be hard to believe, but no, I did not forget how to type, I simply had very limited time and used what was available keep the sites going with gamepacks while working on this update. Now, as sad as it sounds, this update was in the works for over 18 months, but I do believe it contains many useful improvements. I will save expanding on these for now, and will do what I hope you find half as exciting I do ...... introduce you to two new sites Gameville Arcade .com & Gameville Arcade .net. These are two completely green/new sites, when made available just a few moments ago, all stats were setting at zero ... no plays, no ratings, no nothing ..... well except for the thousands of games! These are the first of several new sites coming in the near future, some based on a completely different script. But that info can wait a bit, for now though, check out the two new sites and I will put Part I of th new features up very soon!

Thanks!

The newest site change is pretty obvious, the Random Free Game has been replaced with a Featured Slider. I really liked random picked game idea (and it might return someday (: ), but with the size of games increasing these days, easily surpassing 10MB in some cases, it just seemed the right time to test other options for highlighting titles. The slider will feature new titles plus ones which you might have previous missed, and for a bit of added spice, a couple of games which will be appearing soon could be included also (yes Shadez and Boxhead: The Zombie Wars are coming this month). At present, it is only at Hippo Games on a 60 day test run, so let us know what you think.

Thanks!

You probably have noticed already, but with the last gamepack upload, the default size of games was increased about 25%.
It not a big thing, just one of the many positive changes that will be introduced in the coming weeks (some might have caught me testing one of these Tuesday afternoon on Bugnut.org (; ). I am hopeful most will find the upcoming changes to be helpful and a real plus for your continued use of this site.

Thanks!

For those that tried to play Warfare 1917 which was added late Wednesday (?) and found it would not load, try playing it again as now it works fine. The SWF I originally uploaded appears to have been another "site-locked" version of the game, pulled from the same source as Karoshi, which presented a similar problem earilier this month. This time around though, as soon as the issue with it came to my attention (Thank you mdm), the correct version was simply uploaded as Warfare 1917 had been sourced from several locations, including the games sponsor, Armor Games. Again, if anyone notices a problem with any game, please use the contact page to let us know as we will do what we can to solve the issue and supply you with a top notch gaming experience.

Thanks!

Those that tried to play the recently added game Karoshi were met with a message screen rather than the game loading. The site I downloaded this title from several months ago appears to have jumped the gun, supplying a "site-locked" version of the game. Back when this title was tested for inclusion in a game pack for the website, it worked fine off-line which is where I check out all the games (it still plays fine off-line). This issue wouldn't become apparent until it was placed up for online playing, which is what happened here. As soon as the issue with it online came to my attention, I did a quick check on it and found the title seems to still be locked, available only to sites willing to pay for sponsorship of it. I find this title entertaining and was looking forward to it appearing, sooooo ... the new and improved version (and not site-locked), Super Karoshi, has been inserted in its place. There is a link on the title screen of Super Karoshi where you can play the original if you want to give it a try. If anyone notices a problem with any game, please use the contact page to let us know.

Thanks!

With the discovery of several very good sources for solid games, the addition of four new games a day should continue well into 2010, maybe as long as to 2011. We are pleased with what we'll be offering you in the coming months and hope you will find a few new favorites to play. Some decisions concerning the direction of the site are currently being hammered out and will be shared in a future notice. Nothing major will be changing, just some necessary tweaks to the site for your continued enjoyment. (:

Thanks!

The decision was recently made to require a game to have at least two votes before it will appear on the 'Top 25 Rated Games' list. This change does not effect a games rating being shown any other place on the site. Hopefully, this will give the Top 25 list a better "weighted balance" as now more than one persons input is required for it to appear. It is very possible the minimum votes necessary to be in the Top 25 will increase again in the future.

Thanks!

With the recent FireFox 3.5 release, a problem with the site was discovered and solved. Along with fixing the issue the new version of FireFox presented, possible issues with the other newer browsers (IE 7.0, IE 8.0, Chrome 3.0, Safari 4.0 and Opera 10) were adddressed and mostly fixed. Earlier versions of IE and Firefox should still work as they did before. I believe there are still some issues (spacing, gaps, off-center, etc.) with the various browsers, but the site does appear to work okay with them and trying to fix every single one of these would consume more time than I have at the moment. The site is built to work, and look correctly with current version of FireFox (that would be v3.5 right now), the only browser I personally use. If you happen upon a serious issue on our site while browsing, please let us know.

Thanks!

As you can tell there have been some changes made to the site. The first of the three major changes is rather apparent. The basic script was updated with an excellent mod, and while it improves the looks of the site, it also made it possible to make other additions in the script. The second new feature is the nice Nav-Bar located near the top of ever page. With it, you can easily find your way around Hippo Games. The last major change is the addition of a script which will automatically add games to the site. Until further notice, 4 new game will appear everyday without needing yours truly to doing anything. (: I really like this addition!

Well, got go now, but I will be back in a few days to go into more detail of the changes which have been made and to give you a peek at what's to come, so check back.

Thanks!