Future DraStic Android port: help needed

[Exophase]

I don't like when software offers a "free" version that's missing some vital feature, then goads the user into paying for it only after they've committed time to it. I want it to be very clear to people upfront what they are and aren't getting. I don't want people to feel tricked and pressured into purchase because of a feeling of sunken cost over their time.

Besides that, it's quite a bit of extra work to do a demo version that lets you do a purchase upgrade in-app that also lets you resume right where you left off.

It's like this data recovery software I used on a Mac (not mine) a while ago.. it took hours to scan, then listed the files for recovery. When I went to click to recover the file it asked me to pay $99 for the full version to do it. This time the joke was on them, since I just made a bunch of screenshots of the document and re-typed it manually, although that was a far from pleasant experience. No doubt this is an effective way to get more sales, but you'll also get more angry users and there will be plenty who give your free version a poor rating over this, and even some who will buy the full version then give it a poor rating.

I agree that timer limits are an effective way to make a demo, so long as you're very clear up front (like, before you let the user do anything there's a big screen that says this is just for testing if the emulator works for you and will only let you play for X minutes). The problem is that timer limits don't remove functionality in the code, they just artificially add a restriction. So it's almost always possible to hack it out. On the other hand, if you remove functionality other than save games there's a risk that people will think that the functionality isn't in the full version, or that I'm trying to hide a poor implementation. With in-game saves removed you'll get people who are frustrated over lost progress no matter how much you warn them in advance. Removing savestates alone is too little of an incentive, although I will at least consider it down the road.

 

[beeflot]

I think Exophase is right.


No demo version ,and release will be earlier.

 

[Therysin]

Totally agree, not to mention iAP can be hacked really easily. Just go with the initial plan, and offer the refund, that's the safest and best way.

 

[JimmyMistery]

Cool, I agree with the after post

 

[JimmyMistery]

2 app 

a complete version and other app, test version 

no?

I buy the complete version

or install test version for I gameplay and buy later 

no?

 

[Therysin]

:/


One app, offer refund, end of story. No iAPs or anything, you get what you pay for. If you don't like it, get a refund within 48 hours.

 

[Therysin]

Honestly, I think the 15 minute Window is damn enough XD. But I'm being optimistic here.

 

[Exophase]

I definitely encourage people to try to see if they can get it working or not within the 15 minutes, but that's really really tricky :/

About the CoD 24h refund window, is this current? I know the refund window used to be 24 hours for everyone. If they still have it now it might be because they're such a big name title.

 

[rohezal]

Maybe remove the savestate code and add a time limit?

Btw. there are 2 types of time limite local and global.

Local: When you start the emulator, a count down (5 minutes or something) starts. When it reaches 0 the emulator exits. GTA 2 did it this way and the demo was realy fun. You could do everything but only for 5 minutes and you need to restart it each time (no way to save). For Drastic: No way avoid the time limit, other than binary patching. No way to add savestate code. Lots of people are scared of warez apps, since they can contain viruses.

Global: you have 1 hour  (or maybe a half hour) playtime. But when the time is up, the emulator won't start and you have to buy the full version. Very easy to avoid, by deleting the "playtime.log" file (or reset the tablet to factory settings).

But people are lazy. You can download stuff from uploaded.to for free when you are ok with 100 KB/s and waiting times and captcha entering. I know a lot of people who said, fuck it, I pay 4.99€ and can download it fullspeed without shit. So a lot of people won't avoid the time limits, they are lazy and want stuff to work "out of the box". I even saw a guy, who was angry, because a torrent had just the image of the game and not a "no cd" crack in it. People are unbelieve able lazy and pay to avoid work when possible.

The "pay now to save your progress" is on a neutral view nicer then shutting down the emulator after 5 minutes (without a way to save the progress). But subjectivly it looks like blackmail.

EDIT: IMPORTANT add a big, simple screen / image with an instruction how to get the bios file when the emulator starts (and no bios file is present). Android People are often not well educated.

 

[Therysin]

@exophase


I'm not sure if it's current. I know it was there about a month ago. And yup, it's most likely because of their 'fame' as a great fps. I also saw another though, with a week refund period. I think it was hamachi? I kinda forgot, but the app was really expensive, upwards of $30


@rohezal


Sounds good, but these things are super easy to reverse, you just need a little knowledge of smali and some apk decompiling tool(I won't give you a name). It's as simple as decompiling, finding the right file to edit in the small folder, (you don't edit the core), and editing in notepad+. Needless to say, most people can't do this, but I wouldn't class it as something difficult.

 

[bobbybay34]

Yea looks fine, they run well, ill use one of the dragon warrior games to show some of the new features as its a good canidate as to why you might want to use some of them.

@android


if you can can u test it on a low end device like a single-core and a mid end dual-core device just to see how well the performance is on them in a video?

 

[Trich]

@android


if you can can u test it on a low end device like a single-core and a mid end dual-core device just to see how well the performance is on them in a video?

He has a video up a few pages back of him trying it on an Xperia Play (1GHz single core), and some form of Droid (I think) which I believe was dual core. Basically it runs damn well on them, especially with a bit of frameskip. Not at 100%, but still very decent for what it's running on.

 

[rohezal]

Sounds good, but these things are super easy to reverse, you just need a little knowledge of smali and some apk decompiling tool(I won't give you a name).

Drastic is written in C and ASM. No java decompiling helps, the important code is "realy" compiled and no byte code. At least I would guess it. A lot of apps have just some java to launch the game, and most of the game logic is in a normal binary file (like something written in C). apkenv works because of this. When the savestate code is missing in the binary file, it can't be easily insertet.

But the more interessting question is: whats about warez version of the full drastic? I think the best protection is, that the people are scared of viruses from downloading untrusted stuff from "the warez sites". And it would mean that people are able to download apks, disable the protection from google (only trusted stuff) and then install it. A lot of people will fail at this.

 

[Therysin]

@rohezal


Dude, I've never ever come across an app that I couldn't disable iAP(I mean make any in game iAP free except a subscription, but that can be done in a different way) or ads in. The binary file as you call it (or core) is almost like any iOS binary, which can be decompiled into asm via Ida pro. Android apps, are decompiled to smali, not asm which is easier to edit. Almost everything like time limits, ad banner sizes, iAPs are stored in the smali folder when decompiled. Trust me, go on xda and find a decompiler, you'll need the Java sdk first. Every app, when decompiled is broken down into simple smali and xml files, where you can literally change strings, values etc. Then recompile. That's the real danger of having an IAP or ad supported version(time limit included) and why I would advise against it. If people want to pirate, let them, they'll be missing updates.


I honestly hope everyone here is willing to pay, and not pirate. This is probably the only app I'm this excited for. If Gilead actually releases an ad supported or time limited version, I'll disable the time limit and ads and email him, and probably he'll find a way to fix it before anyone else decides to pirate. I'll be buying the real thing though.


On another note, can any beta testers do a nexus 4 and nexus 7 fhd test? Thanks.

 

[rohezal]

which can be decompiled into asm via Ida pro.

Writing asm code is not that easy. Changing the time value or patch the

if (time > 300)

{

exit(0);

}

out, is not this hard. But adding savestate support via asm need some knowledge and work (init the right registers on the virtual cpu, load the virtual ram into the right position). Most sales of normal games are in the first months after the release (and maybe when they are rereleased as 9.99$ version). When the "cracking" takes longer, everything is fine. But I think more probably someone will just release the apk of the full drastic version.

 

[waldo]

Exophase though i agree with the iap is a bad idea,the savestate remove code and maybe turbo function is not a bad one.This way you can sell the app even in China or other countries that have a restriction in paid apps.Thats the tactic most emulator developers use on android platform and you can clearly state in the description of the app that the save function  and turbo are removed in the free version.You can even use adds.

 

[Exophase]

There'll be an ad-supported version for China (it's Chinese language and has Chinese ads so it won't be very pleasant for non-Chinese people..) Depending on how it does I might consider an ad-supported version for other places.

 

[Therysin]

which can be decompiled into asm via Ida pro.

Writing asm code is not that easy. Changing the time value or patch the

if (time > 300)


{


exit(0);


}


out, is not this hard. But adding savestate support via asm need some knowledge and work (init the right registers on the virtual cpu, load the virtual ram into the right position). Most sales of normal games are in the first months after the release (and maybe when they are rereleased as 9.99$ version). When the "cracking" takes longer, everything is fine. But I think more probably someone will just release the apk of the full drastic version.

Agreed, adding asm to enable save state support is near impossible, but I was talking about the time limit, which could be stored in any register say r1. You could NOP the line which assigns the time remaining to that register, or do a simple MOV R1, R7 which should just assign the highest number supported to the time limit register. Writing asm is hard, but editing it... Not so much. Smali is even easier though. You would probably be seeing something as simple as r1, A3. I'm still rooting for just one app with the refund. (also faster release XD). I hope it's this week

There'll be an ad-supported version for China (it's Chinese language and has Chinese ads so it won't be very pleasant for non-Chinese people..) Depending on how it does I might consider an ad-supported version for other places.

That's a good idea. The best protection is a language barrier(seriously).

 

[waldo]

Actually it is not the best protection.Even i can translate chinese with a little google assistance or even edit the build.prop to make the device looks like a chinece one   .Well the point is to make the user see for himself the emulator capabilities before spending 8 dollars and deadling with poor rates.The android platform is insanely fragmented you might need to take this into consideration.

 

[Therysin]

Actually it is not the best protection.Even i can translate chinese with a little google assistance or even edit the build.prop to make the device looks like a chinece one   .Well the point is to make the user see for himself the emulator capabilities before spending 8 dollars and deadling with poor rates.The android platform is insanely fragmented you might need to take this into consideration.

LOL

What a work around. Changing your device in the build prop won't make any difference, you'll still be seeing chinese characters and not english. With chinese ads popping up, I'm pretty sure you'll be annoyed. 

i'll take my own advice and make use of that 15 minute window Not going to bother gilead with any 'asking the dev for a refund' crap. If i don't like it, I'll refund within 15 minutes, else I'll keep it. 

Can any beta testers please use a nexus 4 and nexus 7 fhd? Thank you.