Privacy Policy & Terms of Use

Privacy Policy

This policy explains how the mobile game Pearlbound (“the game”, “we”) handles information. It covers the iOS and Android versions of the game and this website.

The game is published by developed by max, who is the data controller for the purposes of the UK and EU GDPR. See Contact below to reach us.

1. What the game stores on your device

The game keeps two small records on your phone. Nothing in them is transmitted to us: Pearlbound has no backend server of its own, and none of it is uploaded anywhere.

• Your records — treasure banked, the deepest chamber you have cleared, your best chain of hits, and how many dives you have finished
• The dive in progress — the chamber, what you carry, your gifts and the reef as it stands — so closing or backgrounding the game does not lose it
• A short list of your most recent finished dives, so that no dive can ever pay out twice
• Whether sound, haptics and reduced effects are on, and whether you have seen the guide
• Whether you own Remove break ads — a single yes or no

That is the whole list. The game has no player name, no profile and no in-game currency, so there is nothing else for it to keep. Safe practice writes nothing at all.

This data stays on the device. It is not backed up to us, it is not readable by us, and deleting the game deletes all of it. If your device or app store is configured to back up app data, that backup is governed by Apple’s or Google’s own policies, not by this one.

The game makes no network requests of its own. It does not check for updates, it reports nothing about how you play, and it has no server to talk to. The only connections it makes are the advertising in section 2 and the store in section 3.

2. What our advertising partner collects

The game is free and is funded by advertising. Ads are served through Google AdMob. Google may fill an ad slot with its own advertisers or with other advertising companies that buy ad space through Google’s platform. No other ad network is built into the game. It has two kinds of ad, and neither is ever shown during the tutorial:

• A break ad, which may be shown when you leave a dive that has ended.
• A rescue, which you choose to watch when your shell breaks: it restores one hull and keeps your treasure and gifts. A skipped or failed ad gives nothing and costs nothing.

To serve and measure ads, Google and those advertisers may collect:

We do not receive this data ourselves in a form that identifies you; we see only aggregate revenue reporting. Google’s own policies govern what it does with it: the Google Privacy Policy and how Google uses information from apps that use its services.

What Remove break ads does, and does not do. It permanently stops the break ads between dives. The rescue ad stays available, because it is something you choose to watch in exchange for something, and taking it away would make the purchase worse rather than better. The advertising code still runs whether or not you own Remove break ads, so that a rescue is ready if you ask for one — which means this section still applies to you, even if you never watch an ad.

Your choices about advertising

• On iOS, the game asks for permission to track before any ad is requested. If you decline, ads still appear but are not personalised, and the game plays exactly the same. You can change this later in Settings → Privacy & Security → Tracking.
• In the EEA and the UK, Google’s consent dialog appears before any ad is requested, and your answer is recorded on your device. You can reopen it at any time from Privacy choices in the game’s Shop.
• On Android, you can reset or delete your Advertising ID in Settings → Google → Ads.
• With your Google account, you can review and limit ad personalisation at myadcenter.google.com.

3. Purchases

The game offers one optional purchase: Remove break ads, a one-off, non-consumable purchase. There is no in-game currency and nothing consumable is sold. The purchase is processed entirely by Apple’s App Store or Google Play.

We never see, receive or store your payment card, billing address or store account. The game writes one thing to your device when you buy: that you own it. Each time the game opens it asks the store whether that is still true, so a purchase made on another device is recognised, and a refunded one is taken back.

On Android, the game talks to the store through Google Play’s billing library, which sends Google its own diagnostic information about purchases. That is governed by Google’s privacy policy, not by this one, and none of it reaches us.

Refunds are handled by the store you bought from, under their policies, not by us.

4. Crash and error reporting

There is none. Pearlbound ships no crash-reporting and no analytics SDK, so no report of any kind is sent when something goes wrong. If the game misbehaves, the only way we learn about it is if you tell us. If that ever changes, this section will change with it, before the build that changes it ships.

5. What the game does not do

• No account, sign-in, email address or password.
• No access to location, contacts, photos, camera or microphone.
• No gameplay analytics sent anywhere.
• No crash reporting.
• No network requests of its own, not even to check for updates.
• No selling of personal information by us to anyone.

6. Children

Pearlbound is not directed at children under 13 (or the equivalent minimum age where you live), and we do not knowingly collect personal information from them. If you believe a child has provided information through the game, contact us and we will delete what we can reach.

7. Your rights

If you are in the UK, the EEA, or a jurisdiction with comparable law, you have rights to access, correct, delete and port your personal data, and to object to how it is processed. These are unusually simple to exercise here, because we hold no personal data about you on any server:

• To see everything the game holds about you, open the game — your treasure and records are on its home screen.
• To delete everything, uninstall the game.
• For advertising data, use the choices in section 2, or contact Google directly using its privacy policy.

If you are a California resident: we do not sell your personal information. Personalised advertising may count as “sharing” under California law, and you can opt out using the same controls in section 2. You may also complain to your local data protection authority. In the UK that is the Information Commissioner’s Office.

8. Data transfers and retention

We retain no personal data, so there is nothing for us to transfer or to delete on a schedule. Data held by our advertising partner may be processed in countries outside your own, including the United States, under the safeguards described in their own policy.

9. Changes to this policy

If this policy changes in a way that materially affects you, the date at the top of this page will change and the updated policy will be published here before the change takes effect in a new version of the game.

Terms of Use

These terms are an agreement between you and developed by max (“we”, “us”) covering the mobile game Pearlbound (“the game”) and this website. By installing or playing the game you accept them. If you do not accept them, please do not install or play it.

1. Who may play

You must be at least 13 years old, or the minimum age your country requires for an App Store or Google Play account, whichever is higher. The game itself has no account and no sign-in — this is the age the store sets for the account you install it from. If you are under the age of majority where you live, you should read these terms with a parent or guardian.

2. Your licence to use the game

We grant you a personal, non-exclusive, non-transferable, revocable licence to install and play the game on devices you own or control, for your own non-commercial use. That licence is subject to these terms and to the rules of the app store you installed from.

You may not sell, rent, sublicense or redistribute the game; modify, decompile or reverse engineer it, except to the extent that law expressly permits you to; remove or obscure any notice in it; or use it to build a competing product.

3. Fair play

Please do not use cheats, automation, modified clients or memory editors, or otherwise tamper with the game or its stored data to obtain treasure, records, rescues or purchases you have not earned or paid for. We may stop supporting a modified installation, and a tampered save may stop working correctly.

4. Purchases

The game is free to play. It offers one optional purchase:

• Remove break ads — a one-off, non-consumable purchase, on that store account, that permanently stops the automatic ads between dives. It does not remove the optional rescue ad, which you choose to watch, and it does not unlock any content: every chamber and every gift is free for everyone.

There is no in-game currency and nothing consumable is sold. The purchase is made through and charged by Apple’s App Store or Google Play. The price is shown in your local currency by the store itself and may vary by country and over time. We do not process payments, and we never see your payment details.

Refunds are handled by the store you bought from, under its own policy. We cannot issue, reverse or override a store refund. If a purchase is refunded, what it bought is removed from the game.

Where the law gives you a right to cancel a digital purchase, that right may end once the content is delivered to you, which for this purchase is immediate.

5. Treasure and records

Treasure, records and a dive in progress are not property and have no monetary value. You do not own them; you hold a limited licence to use them inside the game. They cannot be sold, transferred between accounts or devices, or exchanged for money or anything outside the game.

Two consequences worth stating plainly, because they follow from how the game is built:

• Your progress is stored on your device, not on a server. If you uninstall the game, reset the device, or lose it, your treasure, your records and any dive in progress are gone and cannot be recovered by us.
• Remove break ads is the exception. Because it is a non-consumable purchase recorded against your store account, it can be restored on a new device with Restore Purchases in the game’s Shop.

We may change the balance of the game — how tough a seal is, how fast the reef grows, what a vault is worth, how often a break ad is considered — as part of normal updates.

6. Advertising

Unless you have purchased Remove break ads, the game may show an ad when you leave some finished dives. Separately, and whether or not you have bought anything, you may choose to watch an ad to rescue a dive when one is offered; it is never shown unless you ask for it. Advertising is supplied by third parties; we do not control which specific ads are shown and are not responsible for their content or for anything you buy from an advertiser. What advertising partners collect is described in the Privacy Policy above.

7. Ownership

The game, its name, artwork, sounds, code and this website belong to us or our licensors and are protected by copyright and other laws. These terms give you no rights in them beyond the licence in section 2.

You are welcome to record, stream and share footage of yourself playing the game, including on monetised channels, provided you do not present it as your own work and do not use our name in a way that implies we endorse you.

8. Availability and changes

We may update, change or discontinue the game or any part of it, and we may stop supporting older operating system versions. We try not to break things, but we do not promise the game will always be available, uninterrupted or error-free.

9. No warranty

To the fullest extent the law allows, the game is provided “as is” and “as available”, without warranties of any kind, whether express or implied, including any implied warranty of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose or non-infringement.

Nothing in these terms excludes or limits any right you have under mandatory consumer protection law in your country, including your statutory rights in the UK, the EU and elsewhere. Where those rights apply, they apply regardless of anything in this section.

10. Limitation of liability

To the fullest extent the law allows, we are not liable for indirect, incidental, special or consequential loss, for lost data or lost progress, or for loss of profit or goodwill, arising from your use of the game.

Where liability cannot be excluded, our total liability to you is limited to the greater of the amount you paid us for the game in the twelve months before the claim, or ten US dollars. We do not exclude liability for death or personal injury caused by our negligence, for fraud, or for anything else that cannot lawfully be excluded.

11. Ending this agreement

You can end it at any time by uninstalling the game. We may suspend or end your licence if you materially breach these terms, in particular section 3. Sections 5, 7, 9 and 10 continue to apply afterwards.

12. Changes to these terms

If these terms change materially, the date at the top of this page will change and the new version will be published here before it takes effect in a new version of the game. Continuing to play after that means you accept the change.

Contact

Questions about either document above, a privacy request, or anything else about the game:

developedbymax@gmail.com

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