Are gamesalad games being hacked?

ericdg123

I have a game I've been selling for about a year on the appstore and I've recently seen somebody listing my game for sale as a template.

I don't want to say the name of the game, but this person put up a youtube video of my game running with many of the graphics changed, but many left the same. He stated he is offering the template for sale.

I have always been very careful with my game salad files. How is it possible that someone could actually get my game salad project? I don't think there is any way possible that you could somehow get the project out of a hacked ipa file.

The only other thing I could thing of that would be a security risk is when I send my file to game salad servers, but I know they have security for that.

What do you guys think?

JohnPapiomitis

Unfortunately you can do this to any app if you know how, not just gamesalad.

Report the member to gamesalad.

ericdg123

Do you think he was just able to change some files in the app or do you think he was actually able to get my game salad project source.

tenrdrmer

Currently All .ipas are able to be reverse engineered even The big names like Angry birds and Cut the Rope. GameSalad is working on some new changes that will make theirs more secure than standard apps. Unfortunately these things happen and if you believe this to be the case then you need to contact Apple and request the other app be removed for copyright infringement. you should also notify GameSalad. Although there is nothing they can really do they may choose to ban the user or some other action they see fit.

ericdg123

I did a little research and I see what you are saying about ipas, but what I was most worried about was that he could actually sell my game as a template. I'm 99.9% sure that that it would be impossible to actually get the game salad project file out of an ipa. I know you can change the graphic files and so forth.

As far as I know he didn't release it on the appstore and I don't know if he is a game salad member or not.

He just had a youtube video of it saying it was a game salad template. It worried me at first that he was actually selling my game salad project file. I'm not worried about people changing stuff within the app and I know that most apps are highly pirated, so I feel a little better seeing how you can edit an ipa file.

PPenguin

We use Unity3D and GameSalad. They are both basically engines that run a Game file.

Unity3D distribution format of your project is protected and different from the development format.

I think GameSalad should just apply a light obfuscation to the distributed project so it is not so easy.

But yes, from an IPA, it is easy to get the actual game salad project.

mynameisace

Hey dude, I think it'd be best of you edited your comment to not show people how to reverse engineer a GS built app, don't want this happening regularly.

Ace

DigiChain

It was only about a week ago that T-shirt had one of his apps hacked, and there was also talk of Grisly Manor project files and others being offered up for sale too!

This certainly worries me a little - and I hope GS are willing to look at adding protection to the distribution format so it at least makes it more diificult for your average person to do.

I hope SSS is reading this thread?

EDIT: Yes he is!

tenrdrmer

ericdg123 said:
I did a little research and I see what you are saying about ipas, but what I was most worried about was that he could actually sell my game as a template. I'm 99.9% sure that that it would be impossible to actually get the game salad project file out of an ipa. I know you can change the graphic files and so forth.

As far as I know he didn't release it on the appstore and I don't know if he is a game salad member or not.

He just had a youtube video of it saying it was a game salad template. It worried me at first that he was actually selling my game salad project file. I'm not worried about people changing stuff within the app and I know that most apps are highly pirated, so I feel a little better seeing how you can edit an ipa file.

I can tell you it is possible. Not gonna tell you how. But I have had it proven to me cause didn't think it was either. Unfortunately There will always be bad people who care nothing about anything but themselves and always find ways to steal your work.
Its the nature of Software development.

You really need to report this to Apple.

ericdg123

That really blows my mind. Are you saying that even if something was coded entirely in objective c, the actual source code could be extracted from an ipa?

Or lets say if something was made with corona, could the actual lua files be extracted from the ipa?

I can't imagine that multi million dollar source code like that from angry birds can be extracted by an average user.

Hey tenrdrmer, I didn't know you were from springfield. I live near there and have a bunch of family in springfield. What a small world.

JohnPapiomitis

ericdg123 said:
That really blows my mind. Are you saying that even if something was coded entirely in objective c, the actual source code could be extracted from an ipa?

Or lets say if something was made with corona, could the actual lua files be extracted from the ipa?

I can't imagine that multi million dollar source code like that from angry birds can be extracted by an average user.

Hey tenrdrmer, I didn't know you were from springfield. I live near there and have a bunch of family in springfield. What a small world.

Yep. Where theres a will theres a way when it comes to this unfortunately.

tenrdrmer

ericdg123 said:
That really blows my mind. Are you saying that even if something was coded entirely in objective c, the actual source code could be extracted from an ipa?

Or lets say if something was made with corona, could the actual lua files be extracted from the ipa?

I can't imagine that multi million dollar source code like that from angry birds can be extracted by an average user.

Hey tenrdrmer, I didn't know you were from springfield. I live near there and have a bunch of family in springfield. What a small world.

Its not doable by the average user. They have to know what they are doing or know someone who knows. This is why its important to identify those doing to bar them from the tool but its not something to flip out and no longer publish games. This is software and software gets hack. Heck apple trys like crazy to kill jailbreaks yet every single time there is a jailbreak within days if not earlier of a new iOS version.

dont worry about it and just report it to Apple.

And yeah theres another user that lives south of Springfield as well

Cheers

DigiChain

Cheers for the reply SSS...

and yeah I know piracy is here to stay - but I did see that post before it was edited, and was shocked by how simple it currently is to reverse engineer a GS game from app back to project!

I'm glad GS are working on some sort of added security. I hope you'll keep us updated on that too because the current lack of it will surely be at back of many of our minds.

Cheers

PPenguin

Sorry about showing people how to do it.

I was trying to show what I considered a problem and demonstrate that it was real.

-John

james-bible

[img]http://www.webcam-steamate.com/cookies/37/b/happy.gif[/img]

why