Jazz2Online news for May 2025
Jazz Twosday: JJ2+ v5.12a and the future of JJ2+ - May 6th 2025
Source: JJ2+
It’s been a while since the last JJ2+ update, but we’re back! Let’s go over today’s release and what to expect going forwards.
5.12a is now out. It updates plus_install.exe to work on Windows XP and show better error messages. More importantly, we’ve added a new screen that automatically detects newer versions of JJ2+ and downloads and installs them for you (if you choose “Update”).
Currently, the game should feel completely unaltered, except that the main menu will say 5.12a instead of 5.12. However, please download this anyway. We want to make absolutely sure that this new update code didn’t mess anything up before we move on to the next release.
5.12b will release on May 13th at the earliest. It will feature assorted little changes that shouldn’t break anything, and will be the first public test of the automatic update code. Once 5.12b is out, when you run 5.12a, you’ll get to see the new update screen.
6.0 will release on May 20th at the earliest, once we’re satisfied that the 5.12b rollout worked. 6.# versions will represent the new JJ2+ era of smaller, more frequent releases instead of releases separated by many months that seem to change every last part of the game at once. We’re currently planning to stay in 6.# until JJ2+ leaves beta at 7.0.
As you may know, since November 2017 we’ve been lucky enough to have GOG.com distribute JJ2+ directly through its website and Galaxy client. Unfortunately, GOG is busier than it used to be, and months can elapse before we hear back from them when we want to do a new release. We eventually managed to get their permission to adopt this new automatic update system—and a big shoutout to grovespaz for coding most of it, and stijn for server support!—which will allow us to finally start updating again. We’re very grateful to GOG for this accommodation and all the others they’ve made for us in the past, and we’ve got loads of fixes and new stuff that we’ve been waiting to show you. :)