Privacy policy

02 The question the game asks

The first-launch screen is titled Help us improve the game. It says:

We’d like to collect gameplay stats (how far you dig, what you buy) and crash reports, to balance and fix the game. Ads ask separately. No account. You can change this in Settings.

It offers Allow, No thanks and a link to this page. One answer covers both gameplay stats and crash reports; it does not cover ads, which ask for their own consent (see “Ads”). A tester who installed the game before this screen existed sees it on the first launch after updating.

Settings has a row, “Share stats and crash reports”, that turns the answer on or off later. Because the services start when the game starts, a change takes effect from the next launch. Turning it off stops new data from being sent; it does not recall data that was already sent (see “How long data is kept”).

03 What stays on your device

Your game progress, your settings and your answer to the question above are stored on your device. We do not receive your save file. Deleting the game removes it.

04 What is collected after you tap Allow

After Allow, the game starts the three services below. Each is a separate company that receives data from the game and handles it under the terms stated in its own policy, linked in the table at the end. In every case the data is about the game on one device, not about a named person. We use Firebase Crashlytics only, not Google Analytics for Firebase.

GameAnalytics: gameplay stats and game settings

GameAnalytics (GameAnalytics ApS) receives:

• Gameplay events: for example that you finished a tutorial step, entered a new area, bought a skill, hired a dwarf, or won; how deep you are; how many dwarves and skills you own; how many days you have played; totals of in-game currency earned and spent; which rewarded-ad button you used and whether the ad was watched, closed early or not available (see “Ads”); and which purchases were offered, bought or failed (see “Purchases”).
• Session information: when a session started and how long it lasted, which is how first-day, seventh-day and thirtieth-day return rates are worked out.
• Technical information, such as your device model, the iOS or iPadOS version, the game version and build, whether ad tracking is limited on the device, and the App Tracking Transparency status (the setting that records whether you allowed apps to track you).
• Two identifiers. The first is a random identifier GameAnalytics creates for this installation of the game. The second is the identifier for vendor (IDFV), which Apple gives to apps from LeMax, LLC on your device. The IDFV is the same for all our apps on that device, it is reset when every one of our apps has been removed from the device, and it is not the advertising identifier. The advertising identifier (IDFA) is empty unless you tapped Allow in Apple’s tracking prompt (see “Ads”); GameAnalytics documents that its software adds the IDFA to events only when iOS reports that tracking is authorized.
• The game settings (balance numbers, small notices) your device currently has, and which test variant of them it was given, if any. We use these to tune the game without publishing a new build, and to compare two versions of a setting on different players.

GameAnalytics describes how it handles this data in its own policy.

Sentry: script errors and crashes

Sentry (Functional Software, Inc.) receives, when the game hits a script error or crashes:

• The error message and the stack trace, which is the list of functions that were running.
• Technical information, such as your device model, the iOS or iPadOS version, the game version and build.
• Short log messages the game writes just before the error, and whether a session ended in a crash, so we can tell what share of sessions do. To count those sessions, Sentry’s software may send a random installation id that it generates itself.

The Sentry software we use sends no user information by default, and we add no name, no email and no account to it.

Firebase Crashlytics: native crashes

Firebase Crashlytics (Google LLC) receives, when the game crashes at the level of iOS itself:

• The crash trace and the state of the app when it crashed.
• Technical information, such as your device model, the iOS or iPadOS version and the game version.
• Identifiers: the identifiers Firebase creates for the installation, and the same random identifier that GameAnalytics creates, so that a crash can be matched to a gameplay report.

What none of the three receives

None of these services receives your name, your email address, your phone number, your contacts, your photos or your location. The game never asks iOS for permission to use any of them. We do not use the data these three services receive for advertising, and we do not sell it. Ads are a separate matter with their own data and their own prompts, described under “Ads”.

Like every request over the internet, the requests these services receive come with your device’s IP address. We do not read it or store it ourselves. The services may use it to work out an approximate country or region, as each describes in its own policy.

05 What happens after you tap No thanks

None of GameAnalytics, Sentry or Firebase Crashlytics is started, so none sends anything. (This does not turn ads off or change your ad choices: “Ads” below covers them.) The game does make one request each time it starts, to download its current game settings, so that players who declined get the same base settings as everyone else. The request goes to GameAnalytics’ game-settings service (or, if we move it, to a file on le-max-app.com) and carries:

• one identifier that is shared by every player who declined, and so cannot tell one of them from another; it is never your device’s identifier, and not the IDFV;
• the technical details any request carries, such as the iOS or iPadOS version and the game version.

Like any request, it shows the IP address it arrives from. It carries no gameplay events, no crash reports and nothing from your save. Players who declined are never put into a test variant of a setting.

06 Ads

The game shows rewarded ads only: an ad you choose to watch in return for a reward. It never shows banners or ads you did not ask for. The ads come from Google AdMob (Google LLC), through Google’s Mobile Ads software inside the game.

When the ad service starts

• It starts only after you have answered the first question above, whichever answer you gave. On a new install it starts the moment the required tutorial steps are done, never during the intro or those steps; on every later launch it starts after that first question.
• Each time the ad service starts, the game first runs Google’s consent check (described below). This check contacts Google and sends it your IP address and basic device and app information. The ad software itself starts, and an ad is requested, only after the check says ads may be requested; until then the game shows no ad.
• The game decides this on each launch from what it knows you own. Once it knows you own the No-Ads Pass (from your save, or from Apple’s record of your purchases that it reads at launch), later launches do not start the ad service: no consent check, no ad software, no ad request, and neither Google’s consent form nor Apple’s tracking prompt is shown. A session in which you buy the pass may already have started the service.

What AdMob receives

Google lists the following for its Mobile Ads software; it receives them when an ad is requested or shown, after the consent check:

• Device and app information, such as the app, the device model and the iOS or iPadOS version, and diagnostic data: crash logs not tied to you and performance figures (app launch time, hang rate, energy use).
• Ad interactions: which ads were shown, taps and video views, which Google uses to measure and improve ads.
• The IP address, which Google may use to estimate the general (coarse) location of the device. The game does not ask iOS for your precise location.
• Identifiers: an identifier limited to this app or to apps from the same developer, which Google uses for example to limit how often you see an ad and to report in aggregate. The advertising identifier (IDFA) is included only after you tap Allow in Apple’s tracking prompt; Google states that its software does not send the IDFA in an ad request when tracking is not authorized.

Google handles this data under its own privacy policy, linked at the end. It may use it, as it describes there, to choose and measure ads, including ads based on your interests where you have agreed to that. We do not receive this data per device, and we do not use it ourselves.

Two separate questions about ads

1. Google’s consent form. In the European Economic Area and the United Kingdom, where the law requires it, Google’s consent form is shown before any ad is requested; elsewhere no form is shown. It lets you consent, decline, or set your choices. Where the form is required, Settings shows a row, Ad privacy choices, that reopens it so you can change or withdraw your choice at any time. Where it is not required, the row does not appear.
2. Apple’s tracking prompt (“Allow Deepheart to track your activity across other companies’ apps and websites?”). It asks whether the game may use the IDFA. In the EEA and the United Kingdom it follows Google’s form and is shown only after you consent there. Elsewhere the game may show it itself, once, right after Google’s check, and only if you have not already answered. If you tap Ask App Not to Track, or you decline in Google’s form, no IDFA is used; ads may still be shown, but not matched to the IDFA. You can change your answer at any time in iOS Settings under Privacy & Security, Tracking.

The game’s first question and Google’s form never change each other’s answer: a player who tapped No thanks to the first question is still shown Google’s form, because the first question is about gameplay stats and crash reports and not about ads, and tapping Allow there does not allow tracking. The one link between the two ad questions is the order described above: if you decline in Google’s form, Apple’s prompt is not shown. You can also limit how Google personalizes ads for your Google account at myadcenter.google.com.

07 Purchases

The game sells packs of gems (an in-game currency) that you use up, and the No-Ads Pass, which you buy once and keep. Purchases go through Apple’s App Store (StoreKit):

• Apple processes the payment with the payment method on your Apple Account. No payment details (card number, billing address, Apple Account name or email) reach us or the game. Apple reports sales to us in aggregate, for example by country and currency, not by person.
• The game receives a signed record of each purchase from Apple, such as which product and a transaction id. At every launch it also asks Apple which purchases you already own and which are still unfinished, even before you have answered the first question. The game keeps these transaction ids on your device only, in your save file, so a purchase is never credited twice. We do not receive your save file.
• The No-Ads Pass is tied to your Apple Account. Restore purchases in Settings asks Apple for it again after a reinstall or on a new device. Gem packs cannot be restored.
• GameAnalytics, if you tapped Allow, is told which product was offered, bought or failed, and may be told its price and currency as shown to you; it receives no payment details, because the game has none.

Apple’s privacy policy governs what Apple does with your purchase and account data.

08 Game Center

If you are signed in to Game Center on the device, the game reports your achievements to Apple’s Game Center. Apple processes them under your Apple Account and its own privacy policy; we receive nothing from Game Center. The list of achievements you have unlocked stays on your device, in your save file, which we do not receive. Without a Game Center sign-in the game works the same and keeps the list on the device only.

09 Reporting an ad and the support form

Where the ad service has started, Settings shows Report an ad. It opens the support page, le-max-app.com/apps/deepheart/support/, in your browser. If an ad was shown, the link carries that ad’s response id from Google AdMob, and the page puts it into the message as a line (“Ad response id:”), so the report can name the ad. Opening the page sends that id to our website as part of the link (?ad=), so the site host’s request logs may keep it. The game itself sends nothing to us; the message and the id reach us as a report only if you send the form.

The support form asks for your name, your email address and your message, and the app version if you choose to give it. They reach us by email at support@le-max-app.com, and we use them only to answer you. This is the one place where we ask for a name or an email; the game itself never does. You can write to support@le-max-app.com directly instead, and ask us there to delete a message you sent.

10 Beta versions through TestFlight

Beta versions of the game are distributed through Apple’s TestFlight. Apple collects its own information about testers and about crashes of TestFlight apps, under Apple’s privacy policy; that is separate from the above, and we receive only what Apple’s tools show developers, such as install counts and any feedback you choose to send.

11 How long data is kept

We state the periods as each service publishes them; we do not control them.

• GameAnalytics: its general privacy policy says it keeps data for as long as necessary to provide the service; it names no fixed period for this data.
• Sentry: on the plan we use, error events are kept for 30 days, after which they can no longer be accessed.
• Firebase Crashlytics: Google states that it keeps crash data for 90 days before starting to remove it from its live and backup systems.
• Google AdMob: Google sets the period under its own privacy policy, linked at the end; we do not control it and do not receive the data per device.
• Apple (purchases, TestFlight): Apple sets the period under its own privacy policy.

12 Your choices and deletion

• Stop collection: turn off Share stats and crash reports in Settings. From the next launch, none of the three services is started.
• Ad choices: where Google’s consent form is required, change or withdraw your choice with Ad privacy choices in Settings. Change Apple’s tracking answer in iOS Settings, Privacy & Security, Tracking. Once the game knows you own the No-Ads Pass, it does not start the ad service on later launches.
• Delete what is on your device: delete the game. This also removes the transaction ids the game keeps; your purchases stay with your Apple Account.
• Ask for deletion of data already sent: email support@le-max-app.com from any address. We hold no name or email for you, so to find your records we may ask for details such as the game version, the device model and the dates you played, and we will tell you plainly what we could and could not find. We then ask the services above to delete what we find. Records age out on their own at the periods listed above whether or not you ask.
• Your legal rights: if you live in the European Economic Area, the United Kingdom or California, you can ask us for access to, correction of, or deletion of data about you, object to processing, and withdraw consent at any time (Settings, or by email). Our legal basis for using the data after you tap Allow is your consent; for ads, it is the choice you make in Google’s consent form and in Apple’s tracking prompt. Data Google holds about ads is Google’s to access or delete, through its own policy and the ad settings linked above. You can also complain to your local data protection authority.

13 Where data is processed

GameAnalytics, Sentry, Google (including AdMob) and Apple operate servers in several countries, including the United States. The data in this policy may be processed outside your country, including in the United States, under each service’s own safeguards.

14 Children

The game is not directed at children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from them. Because the game has no account and asks for no name or email, the data described above is not tied to an identified person. If you are a parent and believe a child under 13 tapped Allow, email us and we will treat it as a deletion request. A parent can also turn off ad tracking for the whole device in iOS Settings, Privacy & Security, Tracking.

15 Third-party services

16 Changes to this policy

We may update this policy. The “Last updated” date at the top shows the latest revision.

17 Contact

LeMax, LLC. Questions, access or deletion requests: support@le-max-app.com.