It's been a while since I last posted here, and the reception for the post was really awesome - thank you all for that! I also created a community in Lemmy for the game: [email protected] where I'm posting every development blog post.

We have a new Closed Beta wave right now, so if you'd like to try out the game, you can follow the instructions available at walkscape.app/help. The wave is running until January 7th.

Since the last post, we've now started to add some Quality of Life updates to the game and we're nearly finished with the lengthy optimization process of the game engine and servers. We're expecting to release the next update next month!

If you haven't heard about the game before, I started this project as a personal hobby project to help myself walk more. I tried most of the games available, but I wanted to have something that didn't need attention while walking and wouldn't have predatory monetization like most mobile games tend to have these days.

The game is inspired by RuneScape, and you level up skills, craft gear, find loot and so on by walking IRL. We have a short introduction video to the game where I explain and show how the game works in more detail.

Once again, thanks Lemmy for all the awesome feedback we've got and for the countless encouraging messages that you've sent us. And I'm hoping to see more of you in the game & community!

I'll answer any questions or feedback here in the comments and in our own community. Happy new year, and happy walking <3

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[–] HollowNaught 22 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Hiya, walkscape user here!

Been loving the game, I'm just wondering if you could add a section to the website/game that explicitly goes over what data is collected and what it's used for?

[–] [email protected] 19 points 5 days ago (1 children)

We do have the privacy policy on there, which lists what sensitive information we collect. It's a bit vague, and we could later on edit it to be more specific, but I don't have the required skills to edit those kinda texts and we can't afford a lawyer at the moment. The sensitive information we collect are your email, username and step data, and the step data includes device information (phone model & operating system).

Non-sensitive information includes all kinds of gameplay data, like items you got and how many things you've crafted etc. which we use for game balancing and when designing new content.

[–] Senshi 6 points 4 days ago (2 children)

Does step data just mean the number of steps (and timestamp, I assume), or do you actually track the routes walked, which would mean gps coords/ tracks.

Cause the first is much less invasive and problematic than the latter option.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 4 days ago (1 children)

It's just steps and the timestamp, no location data. We don't ask for location permission, and it's not accessible through OS APIs either.

[–] HollowNaught 3 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Thanks bro, a game with privacy in mind when it comes to data collection is a godsend these days

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 days ago

And thank you! I know it's hard to also trust game devs these days, but we're doing all we can to protect our users privacy. That's why there are already privacy settings in the game too - you can hide your steps from other players if you don't want to share those. And you can also hide your entire user profile so it's not visible to other players. These settings also protect you if 3rd parties scrape the leaderboards etc.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

The game doesn't access your GPS, it won't even ask the permission. It's all steps only.