Compatibility question

[SoulsSilhouette]

I want to buy a tablet. These are the specs. Do you think it will run Elvenar without a problem?

HP 11.6" Chromebook, AMD A4, 4GB RAM, 32GB Storage, Black 16W64UT#ABA


Support hasn't gotten back to me and I need to make a decision ASAP.

Thanks













1

 

[helya]

Support can't really tell you if a specific device will be a good purchase. This meets the minimum specs, but it really would depend on what else you're doing with it. The RAM is pretty low.

 

[Zoof]

The device I use to play Elvenar on the go is an LG L322DL, which is a low end and cheap smartphone. Relevant specs include:

* 2 GB RAM
* 16GB internal storage (up to 8GB usable)
* Qualcomm MSM8917 1.4GHz quad core
* 1440 x 720 pixel LCD

The game is definitely playable on my device, but I'd prefer using my desktop if I needed to do any time-sensitive or action-oriented things.

There may be some incompatibilities due to the device you want not having the same hardware as a cellphone or tablet, chiefly a touchscreen. I haven't gotten my hands on the game's APK to figure out what it requires. If you want to try to find the info yourself, you'll be looking to find the AndroidManifest.xml file in the game's APK, which I haven't figured out how to get to yet. The info on this post discusses various compatibility features. You'll be looking for entries that specifically deny access to devices without a touchscreen, or disallows touchscreen emulation. I'd do this myself but my cities need my attention now, and I've spent far too long working on this post. Sorry

 

[SoulsSilhouette]

Im going on vacation and I wanted to bring elvenar with me... which I can't do if I don't buy a tablet. This is now an addiction. I'm not sure I want to kick it, but when I am anxious over not being able to play for a week I think that speaks for itself.

 

[SoulsSilhouette]

I just can't find the minimum operating requirements anymore..

 

[Zoof]

Im going on vacation and I wanted to bring elvenar with me... which I can't do if I don't buy a tablet. This is now an addiction. I'm not sure I want to kick it, but when I am anxious over not being able to play for a week I think that speaks for itself.

When I said that my phone was cheap, I meant it. I got mine at Walmart in the prepaid section. Mine is a $30 Tracfone, and the newest one is definitely better than what I currently own. A 90 day service card cost me 20 USD (plus applicable fees such as 911 service) and $10 for 1GB of data. You should install the app over wifi to save on data, though once the app is installed and updated (via attempting to run and play it at least once), the data usage is rather tame. A typical one-city quick visit uses 3-10MB.

If a tablet is required, make sure it has a touchscreen. I wouldn't worry about any minimum OS version as long as the tablet is newish. My phone is currently running Android 10, so that gives a point of reference.

If you go the phone route, play responsibly. Don't Elvenar and drive.

EDIT: I may have used the word "tablet" too loosely here. Not that it matters much at this point. See later posts.

 

[crackie]

Agree the RAM number is on the low side. It will probably run, but crash a lot. For example, I have an old iPhone6 that I sometimes run my second city on if I'm too lazy to log in/out on my main phone or am away from computer. It meets the minimum specs to install the game, but it crashes a whole lot and is not quite all that playable. RAM issues because there's nothing else on this phone (no photos, emails, etc). It only has 1GB of RAM.

Also, a chromebook is a device with a laptop form factor that runs on chromeOS instead of Windows (or MacOS/linux/etc) whereas a tablet is more like a giant smartphone. Most chromebooks do not come with a cellular antenna so you'd need wifi connection for internet. Are you sure this is what you want (a laptop that runs Google apps)?

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

For the Android versions of games, all that really matters is RAM, enough GBs to power the game, and the version of Android running on it, which I think the ancient 5.0 version is the minimum. And of course, enough storage space built into the device to hold the game as it slowly gets bigger with each update.

 

[SoulsSilhouette]

Thanks everyone! I think I will be okay. I have a laptop so I can take that with me. I was just hoping that I could pick up a cheapish tablet so I didn't have to lug the lappy with me.

 

[Zoof]

Thanks everyone! I think I will be okay. I have a laptop so I can take that with me. I was just hoping that I could pick up a cheapish tablet so I didn't have to lug the lappy with me.

I see now. I was confused for a bit but now I see. The device you linked to in the original post is not a tablet. None of the product docs mention the screen having any touch sensing capabilities (which is something that'd be prominently advertised if it existed). Having a touchscreen is part of what makes a tablet a tablet so a device that doesn't have a touchscreen by definition cannot be a tablet. What was specified is just a normal, if cheap, Chromebook.

Either way, further digging reveals that the device that you specified will, in fact, load Android apps, and I managed to get the game's APK and dug around inside of it. Turns out, there's a few lines in the manifest that explicitly denies any requirement for a touchscreen (i.e. appropriate values are tagged android:required="false"). So it ought to work just fine.

Worst case being that it doesn't work because of some other reason. You could always return the product in that case, saying that the device was unfit for your use case.

Neighborly help takes a lotta time across multiple cities.

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

I see now. I was confused for a bit but now I see. The device you linked to in the original post is not a tablet.

Well, a Chromebook is really just a glorified tablet because most of them only run Android and apps from the Play Store. So installing the game app will work a lot better than trying to play the browser version.

 

[Zoof]

Well, a Chromebook is really just a glorified tablet because most of them only run Android and apps from the Play Store. So installing the game app will work a lot better than trying to play the browser version.

I'm using some very precise definitions here. And these precise definitions matter in some cases. Here, it doesn't, but only because the app in question (Elvenar) is set to not care. Whether or not the game is actually playable without a touchscreen interface remains to be seen, though.

A Chromebook can be a tablet, but it may also be laptop or both (or both some of the time, in the case of a detachable keyboard).

The contention is that the device in question is a laptop, not a tablet. A tablet, as I've said before, implies a set of features that simply is not present in that device. Simply calling all Chromebooks a "tablet" is an offense on par with calling all tablets a "smartphone". Sure, there may be some overlap in the device functionality, but calling one the other implies features that are not guaranteed to be present.

If the game developers really wanted to be a pain, they could've just set text following "android:required" to "true" instead of "false" in their manifest file:

    <uses-feature android:name="android.hardware.touchscreen" android:required="..."/>

Then the app wouldn't appear in the Play Store for any device that wasn't "tablet" enough.

EDIT: I wasn't perfectly precise with my use of the term "tablet" in my purchase suggestions post. This is my fault and should not have rushed the post. It also didn't help that interim research made the distinction far clearer to me and told me "well crap. Better go inform them of another possible hiccup before they actually buy the thing because holy hell even if it's cheap, I wouldn't want to burn 80USD at Wal-Mart for something that might not even work" [EDIT2] This whole thing was about whether or not the App would install or be usable at all, not whether they should go app or browser. [EDIT3] Well then. This was far too much work for something that probably shouldn't have been argued or researched, but dammit I wanted to be about as certain as one could be without actually testing using the device that it'd work. Because having assurances about being able to play is important.

 

[SoulsSilhouette]

I, my friends, am an idiot. I thought that it was a tablet. It is not. So, it was all a moot point. I need a tablet not another laptop. This is why I usually enlist my daughters to get me what I need. I was trying to do it on my own. LOL. I am technologically challenged to say the least.