This game seemed to be offered as a multilayer optional game. The game would naturally require the individual players to be connected in some way to each other in order to play as one of the group of people playing. Fair enough so far.
I prefer not to play in a group. It should not be necessary to be connected to any server to play the game by myself against the the game engine itself. The game file is large. The game as downloaded and unpacked is sufficiently complete to play without a live internet connection.
The requirement for the live internet connection is in fact an addition to the core engine. It's not necessary to the game. It's a busy little thing too.
Since it's not necessary, I question the presence of the little add on that says I have to have the internet connected to play the game.
That little add on is removable, but doing so disables the game. I think that's real odd given that it's not really an in game part. But somehow it's been written in to be essential to game play after all.
That to me reeks of ulterior motives.
I do find it very interesting that the game attempted to connect to the internet while I was examining and attempting to modify some random game variable files without having the game itself open or running.
Writing a game is a huge amount of work. A goof argument can be made that there are far more time/cost effective ways to data mine that hiding one in a game. There are. But that there are better ways does't mean that other ways aren't being tried.
I'm not accusing Vortex Cannon, or anyone else of doing anything like that. I AM saying it's possible and that in this instance it LOOKS a bit probable.
I will also point out that even if going over the files line by line finds no such 'warez, the ongoing "multiplayer" connection grants the game server feedback priviledges on the individuals computer.
That feedback can be employed at any time the game is active on that computer to trigger events and applications that are not game related. It's quite the wide open back door.
I prefer not to play in a group. It should not be necessary to be connected to any server to play the game by myself against the the game engine itself. The game file is large. The game as downloaded and unpacked is sufficiently complete to play without a live internet connection.
The requirement for the live internet connection is in fact an addition to the core engine. It's not necessary to the game. It's a busy little thing too.
Since it's not necessary, I question the presence of the little add on that says I have to have the internet connected to play the game.
That little add on is removable, but doing so disables the game. I think that's real odd given that it's not really an in game part. But somehow it's been written in to be essential to game play after all.
That to me reeks of ulterior motives.
I do find it very interesting that the game attempted to connect to the internet while I was examining and attempting to modify some random game variable files without having the game itself open or running.
Writing a game is a huge amount of work. A goof argument can be made that there are far more time/cost effective ways to data mine that hiding one in a game. There are. But that there are better ways does't mean that other ways aren't being tried.
I'm not accusing Vortex Cannon, or anyone else of doing anything like that. I AM saying it's possible and that in this instance it LOOKS a bit probable.
I will also point out that even if going over the files line by line finds no such 'warez, the ongoing "multiplayer" connection grants the game server feedback priviledges on the individuals computer.
That feedback can be employed at any time the game is active on that computer to trigger events and applications that are not game related. It's quite the wide open back door.
