WHOOPS! We forgot to update the blog, AGAIN!

Well, it's been 3 (almost 4) years since our last findings post. I think it's fair to make a new one for 2023, let us go through what has happened since our last post.

March 2007

Back in March 2021, a March 2007 client was given to us by an anonymous donor. This client contains many differences compared to August 2007. First of all one of the most obvious things is that ControllerFlags have their flag models seen in many early Roblox videos.

Included with the ControllerFlag visuals is a toolbar dedicated to them as well.

This version also contains a game option named "FilterChat", which will block any words listed in the diogenes.fnt file from being sent from other players, if it's disabled it just turns red.

Another game option that is neat is cameraLerp, which was used to give the camera a smooth effect which was used for cinematic camera movement in early 2007.

Google Video

This is one that many people have already heard about, but we never went in-depth with any of the videos that were found. The most interesting one that was found was Roblox Weapon Coding1, which displays logged-in website pages as well as Studio footage. You can watch it here:

The video is a tutorial on how to modify variables in order to change a HopperBins behavior, it shows Tie It Up joining his own place and showcasing some features of HopperBins and scripting. One of the interesting points in this video is when he goes to his profile page, it shows a profile actions list eerily similar to the one used later in 2007/2008, etc. In fact it is the same one, except with some options missing or replaced.

Due to this similarity and a bunch of eye squinted reading, we can easily figure out what the links said: Inbox, Change Character, Edit Profile, View Profile, and Configure My Place. The change character option being present is very interesting due to the common consensus being that characters were just randomly picked and you couldn't choose what it was. It can be assumed that the change character page actually would present you with all 8 figure choices and you could choose one, obviously we don't exactly know but one can dream.

Other notable things in this video include the use of a "Command" string type which we will see later on instead of an enum for HopperBins and a prototype "StarterPack" showing up in the explorer (the hammer icon).

Oh yeah, if you're curious on how to create a plane in crossroads, we now know!

The use of going upside down and sideways is very interesting, not sure how it was done or why it happened.

Offsale Toolbox models fully found

Back in December 2021, a dump of all of the toolbox models were shared online. Looking through the files themselves revealed very interesting thing on how they were meant to work.

The details that the XML code showed for the minigame-centric models is very interesting. Although most of the data contains functions that you would expect, such as the win beacon firing the win condition. The most interesting part would be how these beacons would play sounds according to the StockSound they were assigned to, and also define whether it can be fired multiple times or not.

If you want to know more about StockSounds, feel free to check our old post about it: https://robloxopolis.com/archives/february-2018-from-metamodding-to-opengl-shaders/

There are also several other Enums in this list including ActionType, KeywordFilterType, etc. These Enums can be accessed as leftovers via the object browser in some 2008 clients and have some pretty interesting values that can be set to.

I did a rough restoration of some of the leaked 2005 models based off the XML code with scripts in 2007. This is how it turned out.

All of the other classic models are also in this collection, including the classic Roblox tree which was actually meant to be way greener.

If you'd like to check out the other models in this collection, feel free to download it here:

2005 Level leftovers

After looking at some very early 2006 places with lots of 2005 leftovers in XML, I noticed two strange properties named "Music" and "MusicVolume" inside of SoundService. Since the music tag is a "Content" tag, that means that it was meant to store some type of file data such as a MP3 or MIDI file.

This means that back in 2005, minigames could play music while they were being played. (no, not Rusty Bucket Bay)

There are also some leftovers for HopperBins being able to be accessed with a certain cost, and being used with a certain quantity. Not sure exactly what they could mean but it can be inferenced you could earn certain tools after some sort of expense is satisfied.

Unused BrickColor palette from early 2006

After messing around with some 2005 models, I noticed that some of the parts BrickColor names were of BrickColors that weren't selectable in the actual BrickColor menu.

After further analysis, I found out there is a wide range of colors in the BrickColors table that aren't possible to display normally, here is the full list. (including used colors)

After analyzing some old models to see if these colors were ever used, I found out one of the default character models that was used for accounts on signup, Figure2 to be specific, used one of the colors from the unused palette, that being Medium reddish violet on the torso (although formatted in RGB, it is likely an internal leftover from 2005). The color is improperly displayed as Medium Red in clients after the change. Many other figures also have slight differences like this in them.

These colors would later reappear when the palette was extended around 2009 and onward.

2005 Online Building Toy patent screenshots

Speaking of color, the 2005 patent screenshots have been found in full color, we made a blog post about this in April when it was found on a U.S. Government patent search website.

Uncensored DynaBlocks mockup

Back in April 2021 when the excitement from March 2007 calmed down, the full uncensored version of the famous DynaBlocks mockup from BloxCon was found on another presentation David Baszucki did which provided a download.

It also came with some 2006 screenshots which are neat.

Blocks3D

While we are here, lets also talk about Blocks3D (formerly G3D-Fun) and the recent progress being made.

We have successfully gotten physics working! Using a modified version of ODE for our purposes, it is also surprisingly fast. Here is a demo of it on a 2006 place running on an old 90s laptop (for fun):

Last little tidbit, the "character.png" image texture was actually meant to be used in the ControllerFlag HUD, suggesting that sometime when humanoids were being added, this symbol would be used and would also use the ControllerFlag schema.

That's all folks! Sorry for the lack of updates in recent years, we plan to get the ball rolling again soon. For now, I hope this post will have updated you on what has happened lately. Thanks for reading!