Featured Mashup: Fishticuffs
Where? http://www.fishticuffs.co.uk/
Developer: Thin Martian

The Site

Created by London-based digital media agency Thin Martian, Fishticuffs illustrates how easy it is to promote online social interaction through innovative use of Microsoft® Windows Live™ network of Internet services. Fishticuffs is a nonviolent combat game—played within the Windows Live Messenger environment—that uses animated fish as weapons of choice. Clicking PLAY on the site's home page opens the visitor's Windows Live Contacts list, ready to invite a friend to a round of virtual bashing (shown on the graphic). In an innovative extension of the game, the player's comparative scores and ranking among his or her Windows Live contacts can be exclusively viewed on social network sites Bebo and Facebook through a downloadable application. The rankings make the game more competitive among friends, and encourages them to install the application and establish contact. The social network application also increases the game's reach to a world-wide group of other players by listing a global ranking at the end of each game." Fishticuffs is the first 'crossover' application that illustrates how to provide a content platform for Live Messenger," explains Thin Martian's James Clarke. "It creates reach and stickiness for the service by tapping into Windows Live contacts from social networking sites." The results are impressive: after only one month, over a million minutes of Fishticuffs have been played, all games initiated through Windows Live Messenger.

Why the Windows Live Platform?

Clarke and colleague Ian Routledge cite security as a key benefit of Windows Live services for this application. Contact information is only exposed if the player agrees to share it. "We wanted to provide a viral but secure means for people to connect online through this game," says Clarke. "The combination of Windows Live Contacts control, Windows Live ID, and Windows Live Messenger was perfect for that." Another advantage of Windows Live Services was ease of use, enabling rapid and cost-effective application development. A strong Microsoft developer network and online support also provided helpful support.

Programming Environment

Microsoft Visual Studio 2008 was used for the scripts and JavaScript. The scripts (for saving and loading user and game data) were programmed in either classic ASP or ASP.NET. The Facebook and Bebo applications are written in ASP.NET in C#.

Under the Hood

The following code illustrates how Fishticuffs is launched when the PLAY button is clicked on the homepage.

flash.external.ExternalInterface.call("PlayGame");
function PlayGame()
{
   // Check the browser version
   if (navigator.appName === "Microsoft Internet Explorer" && navigator.appVersion >= 6)
   {
     // Running IE 6 or later so try and launch the game. (MSNMessenger.P4QuickLaunch only works from IE :))
     var obj;
     try
     {
       // Try and create the MSNMessenger.P4QuickLaunch ActiveXObject
       obj = new ActiveXObject("MSNMessenger.P4QuickLaunch");
     }
     catch (e)
     {
       // Can't so set it to null
       obj = null;
     }
     // Check to see if we can launch the app
     if (obj != null)
     {
       // The activeX object is not null, so launch the app.
       obj.LaunchApp('20575602', '');
     }
     else
     {
       // The user doesn't have (or isn't running) WLM
       alert("You must have Windows Live Messenger to play the game.");
   }
   }
     else
     {
       // Running another browser so tell the user
       alert("Please reload this page in Internet Explorer\n\nOr choose Fishticuffs from the games menu in Windows Live 
      Messenger.");     
     }
} // PlayGame