Tag: Computer Games

What can scare you to death with Google Application Updates!

Paul

 

Retrieve Running Applications

Why would an Application need this?

It isn’t like we ask for much but it does seem a little peculiar and a little scary. The Game in question right now is Subway Surfers (Kiloo Games).  I emailed the developer to try to find out what this is but I can only imagine what they are using this data for and why they would need it in the first place.

So far I received this:

Hello,

Thank you very much for your email. Our support team will get back to you as soon as possible. Thanks for your patience and understanding.

Please note that this is an autogenerated response.

Have a great day!

Support@kiloo.com

Although this isn’t surprising to say the least it isn’t helping their case.   I am sure they are quite busy with this new update.   I really don’t mind the game for my kids but that was the only reason I had that on my tablet. 

The Dangers of it all!

I hate to be a worry wort and have people worry to much but when an Application needs to “Retrieve Running Applications”, this really worries me because you don’t know what else they are doing on your tablet.   Could be monitoring your emails and even get your credit card information.   I know I like to us my tablet more and more.  

Although I am sure I’m the only one on this, I do not want to see people get taken advantage of by any developer or game.   Unless they tell us in their privacy settings what they are doing and why, it makes me concerned every day of the week.   I don’t know what they are collecting or why they have to have to collect this information in the first place.   I urge everyone who uses this game to contact them and also check with them about your privacy settings.  If we don’t make noise about this then they win.  Tell you friends and family and let them know what to look for when you update your games or applications on your tablet or phone.

When I get the response email from them directly I will be sure to post it and let you know what they say!

Paul Sylvester

Spore Creature Creation — Unleashed

Paul

I’ve been playing around with Spore Creature Creation a couple days.  I must say for the so called Demonstration game is not bad.  It actually works quite well at making basic creatures.  I made some basic creatures myself. Some of the creatures I’ve made should be able to survive when Spore goes online.  One of my favorite ones is Natsela, although the generic name generator is kind of lame.  I like the way you can upload little videos up to YouTube.  The Creature creation is really nice to make the creatures. The videos that I uploaded to YouTube can be seen HERE.

My Dinosaurs:

As you can see, I’ve made some other types of dinosaurs and this one is one of the ones, you won’t want to meet in person.  Although, the sophistication of this creature isn’t as much as others have created in the full version, I think I could start off with this one and actually be quite happy with him.  When the game goes live I’d evolve him into a fearsome dinosaur, and would be able to fight of others without much trouble.

My stalking Dinosaur

I also have some theories as to why they released the Creature Creator early.  I know some people have thought about this themselves and know that it’s all just speculation and theories but I wouldn’t mind seeing the game when it comes out.  Are they, also going to release a demonstration or a Trail version of the full game.  I would say they are because they did the demo version of the Creature Creation.

Now what about these theories I have.  Here are some of them, and I am sure you will like them.  The reason they released Creature creation early is so they have a base line of creatures to use when the game go live.  This means that if you start playing with this creature when you start they have other creatures to draw from to help populate the game and make the game play even more enjoyable.  Now that comes with a price.  You will probably have limits when you first begin because you did not start off as a single celled organism.  Essentially making the game play fair and making sure there is not any cheaters trying to create a powerful creature and swooping down killing other peoples creatures.  I say the more complex the creatures are going to be the more chance of you having to fight off attacks of the AI, they probably made an +2 attribute for head monsters that will be retrieved from the sporepedia and then it will add the attributes to it to make it even more powerful.  So I was thinking starting off from the beginning to get used to how the game reacts and all.  Then once you get used to it to load up your creature and try it out.

Now on a nicer note, I love to see the creatures everyone else is making to just seeing the creativity of the community.  I also like the animated Avatars you can make with them.  Like these two:

Now if you like the avatars and want to create your own all you need to do is look for it.  I love the avatar selections, If you have an avatar you want to show off use the comments and show yours off.  If you dare.