Terms of use

1. Who's behind this

Zombie Hikers is a game developed by Francisco Cubel Martínez (self-employed professional, trading as Atenea Systems), address at Plaça Clara Campoamor, 10, 46530 Puçol (València), Spain.

For anything to do with these terms, with the game or with another player's behavior, the email is [email protected]. It's the same one on the app's store listing, and it gets read.

2. What this game is

Zombie Hikers is a game you play by actually walking. The steps you take in real life are what move your character around a map with other players and with zombies in it.

Since you play it with other people, the game includes two ways to communicate:

• The radio, which reaches the players who are near you on the map at that moment.
• The notes, written at a point on the map and read by whoever comes past.

Anything you write with either of them is going to be read by other people. It isn't a private notebook.

3. What it takes to play

• Being 14 or over.
• An account, created the first time you sign in.
• Accepting these terms. If you don't accept them, you can still play: you just can't use the radio or leave notes. The whole game —walking, moving, picking things up, surviving— works without writing to a soul. In the communication tab we'll tell you why it's switched off, and you'll be able to switch it on whenever you like.

Your account is yours and yours only: don't share it and don't sell it.

4. What you can NOT write

This is the important part, so no beating around the bush. It's forbidden to use the radio or the notes to:

1. Go after somebody. Insulting, humiliating, harassing, stalking or making another player's life impossible.
2. Actually threaten. Talking about killing zombies is the game; threatening a person isn't, and the difference shows.
3. Hate. Content attacking somebody for their race, origin, religion, sex, sexual orientation, disability or anything of the sort.
4. Sexual content, and above all anything involving minors. There are no shades of gray here and no second chances: you're thrown out and, where it applies, reported to the authorities.
5. Illegal activity: drugs, weapons, scams, account theft, piracy.
6. Personal data, yours or anyone else's: address, phone number, workplace, where you study. Here you're writing to people who don't know who you are, and it should stay that way: dropping a name and an address on an open channel is more dangerous than it looks.
7. Meeting up with strangers. Don't use the game to arrange to meet anyone in a physical place.
8. Buying, selling or trading accounts, steps or items for real money.
9. Advertising and spam, including repeating the same thing over and over.
10. Impersonating somebody, be it another player or the game itself.

And cheating isn't allowed either: faking the steps you take, using programs that play for you, or working the game to get steps without walking.

5. What we do with what you write

By accepting these terms you accept that we automatically check every message and every note before it's published. It's done by an automatic system, not by a person reading your conversations. If it picks up anything from the list above, the message isn't sent and we tell you.

We ask you outright instead of taking it for granted, because a message is a conversation between two people and checking it needs both sides to agree. Here they do: nobody can write without having accepted this first. If you'd rather nothing was checked, the way out is not to use the chat — the rest of the game stays the same.

This system isn't perfect and it will get it wrong now and then, in both directions. So:

• You can report any message or note that reaches you, from the message itself.
• You can block any player.
• If you think we've cut off a message of yours by mistake, write to [email protected] and we'll take a look.

When somebody reports something, a person reviews it and makes a decision within 24 hours. No account is closed automatically: that's always somebody's call.

6. What happens if you break the rules

Depending on what it is and how many times it's happened:

• The message or the note is taken down.
• You get a warning.
• Your account is suspended temporarily.
• Your account is closed for good.

In serious cases —above all where minors, credible threats or crimes are involved— we also report it to the authorities and keep whatever is needed for that.

If your account is closed you lose your progress, and there are no refunds of anything.

7. What you write is yours, but you let us use it to run the game

What you write is still yours. By sending it you give us permission to store it, show it to the players it's meant for and check it with the moderation system — only for that, and only for as long as it takes.

We aren't going to use your messages for advertising and we aren't going to sell them to anyone.

8. What we can't promise you

The game is offered as is. We do what we can to keep it running and to keep people behaving, but:

• There can be outages, bugs or lost progress.
• We aren't answerable for what other players write, though we are for taking it down when you report it.
• The game can change, and one day it may shut down. If it does, we'll give notice.

And one thing that matters more than everything above: this game makes you walk out on the street. Watch where you're going. Don't play crossing the road, or driving, or at night in places you wouldn't go without the game. No item on the map is worth getting hurt over.

9. Your data

What we do with your data is in the Privacy Policy, which is a separate document.

10. If we change these terms

If anything important changes we'll tell you inside the app, rather than changing the text quietly. If you don't agree with the changes, you can stop using the chat or close your account.

11. Which law applies

These terms are governed by Spanish law. If you're a consumer, you can bring a claim before the courts where you live.