Privacy Policy

Short version: we collect your email address only if you type it into the signup form, we use it only to email you about Blade Baes, we never sell it, and analytics stay off unless you accept them.

1. Who is responsible

Barely Playable Games is the data controller for this site. Contact: hello@bladebaes.com.

2. What we collect

• Email signups. Your email address, whether you ticked the “test the Closed Alpha” box, and the time you submitted. That's all the form sends.
• Analytics, if you accept them. Pages visited, referrer, approximate region, device and browser type, and how you interact with the page. See section 5.
• Server logs. Our host records standard request logs, including IP address, for security and reliability. We don't use these to build a profile of you.

We don't ask for your name, address, date of birth or payment details, and the site takes no payments.

3. Why we use it, and our lawful basis

• To email you about the game — because you asked us to (consent). Every email includes an unsubscribe link, and you can withdraw consent at any time.
• To understand how the site is used — only with your consent, via the cookie banner.
• To keep the site up and secure — our legitimate interest in operating it.

4. Who we share it with

We do not sell your data or share it for advertising. We use a small number of processors to run the site: our hosting provider, our automation platform for storing signups, and — only if you accept them — the analytics processors named in section 5. Each processes data on our instructions.

5. Cookies and analytics

The site sets no advertising cookies and runs no advertising or personalisation tags. Analytics load only after you accept them in the cookie banner. Decline, and the analytics code is never downloaded, no analytics cookies or storage are created, and no request is made to any analytics provider. If you accept, Google Analytics sets first-party cookies (_ga and _ga_…) to recognise a repeat visit; these are removed again if you withdraw consent. Your choice itself is remembered in your browser's local storage, not in a cookie sent to us.

If you accept, we use two analytics processors:

• PostHog (PostHog Inc., United States) — product and web analytics, session replay, feature flags, surveys and error reporting. It records pages visited, referrer, approximate region derived from your IP, device and browser type, and how you interact with the page. Session replay records interactions with the page; text you type into form fields is masked and is not recorded.
• Google Analytics 4 (Google Ireland Limited / Google LLC) — website analytics: pages visited, referrer, approximate region, device and browser type, and a small number of events such as clicking a link out to itch.io or completing the signup form. We run it with Google's advertising features switched off. Advertising storage, advertising user data and ad personalisation are set to “denied” permanently and are never granted, Google Signals is disabled, and your data is not used to build advertising audiences. We do not run Google Ads.

We do not send your email address, your name, anything you type into a form, error message text, or any identifier from a link you followed to either provider. Web addresses are stripped of anything except basic campaign tags before being recorded, so unsubscribe links and similar one-off links are never passed on. Analytics also stay off entirely on our own test and preview builds.

If your browser sends a “Do Not Track” signal, we honour it and analytics stay off even if you accepted them.

You can change your mind at any time. Withdrawing consent takes effect immediately — we stop collecting, stop any session recording, discard the anonymous id used to group your visit, and delete the Google Analytics cookies from your browser, without needing to reload the page.

Analytics preference — change

6. How long we keep it

Signup addresses are kept until you unsubscribe or ask us to delete them, or until the project ends. Analytics data is retained according to each provider's default retention period. Server logs are short-lived.

7. Your rights

Depending on where you live, you may have the right to access, correct, delete, export or restrict the use of your personal data, and to object to processing. Email hello@bladebaes.com and we'll action it. You can also complain to your local data protection authority.

8. International transfers

Our hosting and processors may store or process data outside your country, including in the United States. Where required, transfers rely on appropriate safeguards such as the European Commission's standard contractual clauses.

9. Children

The site isn't directed at children under 13, and we don't knowingly collect their data. If you believe a child has given us their email address, contact us and we'll delete it.

10. Changes

We'll update this page as the project grows and change the date above. See also our Terms & Conditions.