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Why would you want to "protect" the data in this way? It's user-hostile, and anyone determined enough will be able to get at it no matter what you do. If it's

Why would you want to "protect" the data in this way? It's user-hostile, and anyone determined enough will be able to get at it no matter what you do. If it's popular and valuable enough, instructions and/or code to break it automatically will then be published, regardless of how much money or time you invested into the protection. (For proof, look no further than the game industry's DRM over the past 30 or so years)

bstar77 6y ago
It's not meant to be user hostile, it's for a game. I allow data exports, but I don't want to expose the inner workings of the game via direct access to the DB.
- Vendan 6y ago
  You do realize, exposing the "inner workings of the game" seems to be at least somewhat responsible for massively increasing the appeal of the game in other cases? see Minecraft, Rimworld, KSP as a few examples...
  - serf 6y ago
    ... see Minecraft, Rimworld, KSP as a few examples... I mean, I agree that games should be moddable, but not from the premise of game profitability and popularity. The highest-grossing video game franchise list is over-ran by products that are , pretty much, famously unmoddable.[0] [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_highest-grossing_video_game_franchises https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_highest-grossing_video...
    - TeMPOraL 6y ago
      That list has some old and long-running franchises (e.g. Mario), some semi-interactive movie experiences (e.g. CoD), and some games that have in fact been modded to ridiculous extent (Warcraft, StarCraft, The Sims). I wouldn't read too much from it.
    - Vendan 6y ago
      The unmoddable ones are mostly there cause they are big names or old names. I mean, heck, LoL was literally inspired by how moddable Warcraft 3 was. If you aren't using a massively well known source material, and you don't have a AAA game studio, your main chance to make a big game according to that list seems like either moddability or cheesy facebook game tactics.
- lxdesk 6y ago
  Data mining is an old gamedev worry. Nobody who's been doing it for a while particularly cares. If the game is remotely popular, data mining will happen. Disassembly to find the decrypt function is a talent possessed by many, many people who have the reverse-engineering bug. If you then obfuscate the code, you have made things interesting and then increasingly talented people will try to have a go at it. If you combine a changing obfuscating technique with updates, you can slow down community possession of the game with respect to modding etc., and Minecraft worked that way in its beta phases. But it's really all a question of your purpose at that point. If you haven't already, I suggest cruising through TCRF: https://tcrf.net/The_Cutting_Room_Floor https://tcrf.net/The_Cutting_Room_Floor

bstar77 6y ago

It's not meant to be user hostile, it's for a game. I allow data exports, but I don't want to expose the inner workings of the game via direct access to the DB.

Vendan 6y ago
You do realize, exposing the "inner workings of the game" seems to be at least somewhat responsible for massively increasing the appeal of the game in other cases? see Minecraft, Rimworld, KSP as a few examples...
- serf 6y ago
  ... see Minecraft, Rimworld, KSP as a few examples... I mean, I agree that games should be moddable, but not from the premise of game profitability and popularity. The highest-grossing video game franchise list is over-ran by products that are , pretty much, famously unmoddable.[0] [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_highest-grossing_video_game_franchises https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_highest-grossing_video...
  - TeMPOraL 6y ago
    That list has some old and long-running franchises (e.g. Mario), some semi-interactive movie experiences (e.g. CoD), and some games that have in fact been modded to ridiculous extent (Warcraft, StarCraft, The Sims). I wouldn't read too much from it.
  - Vendan 6y ago
    The unmoddable ones are mostly there cause they are big names or old names. I mean, heck, LoL was literally inspired by how moddable Warcraft 3 was. If you aren't using a massively well known source material, and you don't have a AAA game studio, your main chance to make a big game according to that list seems like either moddability or cheesy facebook game tactics.
lxdesk 6y ago
Data mining is an old gamedev worry. Nobody who's been doing it for a while particularly cares. If the game is remotely popular, data mining will happen. Disassembly to find the decrypt function is a talent possessed by many, many people who have the reverse-engineering bug. If you then obfuscate the code, you have made things interesting and then increasingly talented people will try to have a go at it. If you combine a changing obfuscating technique with updates, you can slow down community possession of the game with respect to modding etc., and Minecraft worked that way in its beta phases. But it's really all a question of your purpose at that point. If you haven't already, I suggest cruising through TCRF: https://tcrf.net/The_Cutting_Room_Floor https://tcrf.net/The_Cutting_Room_Floor