Purchased a couple of games in their recent sale, after playing Demos for each. The games now appear in my Purchase History, but neither game will complete the download of the rest of the game. Usually, you are offered the chance to download the rest of a game immediately after your purchase goes through (and certainly by the time you've received confirmation in your email Inbox). I have gone back several times, over a period of days, and the same condition still pertains. I can find no way to complete the download process and continue playing the games I bought.

These are not the first games I have bought from BF, not by a long shot. I've bought from them for years. Never seen this happen. I sent in a query to Customer Service and got the usual automatic form letter back, so I sent a followup email. This was two days ago. So far, have heard nothing further from them.

Like I said, odd. A new one on me. I have changed nothing in my system setup nor the way I purchased the games.

Has this happened to anyone else?

It's an odd problem but I suspect one that is not unheard of. I haven't had this happen. Maybe someone else here has. I hope you hear back from Customer Support soon.

Me, too. I'm confident they will make things right. After all, it is clear in my Purchase History that I bought the games. And BF always is so good about fixing such things. But I am getting a bit more concerned, since it is three days since my second email query to them about it. It is just disappointing that I can't play the games.

Yes, that is disappointing, for sure. I hope you hear from them soon. If you don't, keep writing to them. I suppose it's possible that an occasional email gets lost in the shuffle.

Update: More than a week later, still no response from BF other than the "canned" first reply, even though I sent a followup email. So I wrote an entirely new email report to them today, hoping they simply lost my original query. This is so unlike them.

Yes, that is very unlike them. I'm glad you wrote to them again - I probably would have done that sooner than you have. I hope you hear from them soon! I'm sure it was just an oversight. Keep writing.

Reenie,

You didn't mention if you deleted the games and then
tried to reinstall them. If not, you might give it a try.

Hope they're running soon & you can enjoy them.

Marion, me too. I tend to give people too much time to fix things. ha ha

Mignone, the games have never showed up with any active "buttons" to allow me to do anything with them. I see them in my Purchases List, but the usual "Install" buttons are absent. Just a note of when I bought them and how much I paid. So odd. We'll see what happens next.

Are you talking about the "Purchase History" in your Big Fish Game Client or the "Purchase History" when you log into Big Fish using your web browser (IE, Firefox, Chrome, whatever you use)?


Instead of trying to "complete" the download from the installed demo, have you tried uninstalling the demo and starting the install from scratch. You can download the install stub for the complete game (not the demo) after logging into the Big Fish website and going to your Purchase History there.


Have you tried running ccleaner to clear your registry after uninstalling the game demos?


The closest thing was when downloaded games wouldn't activate -- which happened because the Big Fish web server was too busy. A few hours later they activated just fine with no change to the computer.

Good questions/comments for Reenie, Jenny. I'm glad you saw this thread.

I am referring to the Purchase History that appears when I click on my bookmark for BF and then click on My Account and then Purchase History. I was unaware there was any other way to view my purchase history at BF.

No, have not tried uninstalling the Demo and starting over. I may try that today. Tired of waiting, and nothing to lose.

No, don't even know what "ccleaner" is.

OK, Jenny, I uninstalled both demos, then went back to my Purchase History and it still looks the same. (The two games are listed as before, with the purchase noted as being charged to my VISA card, but there still is no "Install Now" button, per the usual style.)

For giggles, I went to the BF games list and found one of the games and tried to REPURCHASE it. The Big Fish site popped up with, "It looks like you already purchased this game. Would you like to reinstall it? Just go to your Purchase History and click on 'Install Now.' " I had to chuckle at the irony of that.

So, no go on the de-install idea.

Reenie,

Do you have on your desktop or in your start menu an icon that says Big Fish? I think that is the game client Jenny is talking about. It took me years to find that I had this. I thought it was just a link to the internet website but it is not the same.

Thanks, OldBroad. Yes, there is a BF icon that activates when I am playing a game of theirs. It is called "Game Manager." It turns itself on when I click to play a Demo or download a game. I did not have it on my Desktop anymore because I deleted the two Demos. but i found it in my Start menu.

Under My Games, it only gives a list of the few games I played Demos on but didn't buy; the two games I just bought do not show up. Just for grins, I tried clicking on "Play" for one of the demos I had not finished and got this message: Game manager experienced an internal error <blah-blah-blah> . . . contact Customer Service and mention Error code 1404. Maybe that is part of the problem? I didn't want to take "No" for an answer, so I did some fiddling around with it anyway, and then it asked me for my password again. I gave it, and got into FB through that back door.

The good news is that I looked at my Purchase History after doing that and now see the two games that I bought, with "Download" buttons active! I am grateful to you all for explaining the "back door" approach. The two games are now in the process of downloading. You folks were far more helpful than BF, who has yet to respond to any of my queries.

The second part of the good news is that it has been so long since I finished the Demos that I have forgotten what was happening in each game, or even what the plot was, so I guess I get to replay them both from the beginning.

Very good news, Reenie! And I really appreciate our helpful GameBoomers.

On the left hand side of that game manager you can click on purchase history and see all of your purchased games. Maybe it was just that your manager needed updating.

Anyway, glad you're back in business!