I own Stardew Valley but I am avoiding using the Google Play store when possible. While I could just sign into Aurora Store with my Google account I think I’d need to install Google Play Services so I am wondering if I could crack the game myself. I think in the past people used Lucky Patcher but I have tried it with other games that I own with no luck.

I’ve looked through the megathread and it seems like there are versions of Stardew Valley uploaded to Mobilism but a majority of them are modded for things like infinite stamina and money. The version without mods on Mobilism also appears to be re-uploaded from Apk Vision which isn’t in the megathread.

    • Cinner@lemmy.worldBEnglish
      5·
      9 months ago

      Ironically, GrapheneOS is pretty much that (minus the hardware) unless you want to get an iPhone or Windows phone. You’ll have to have Play Services to play the games you want to play; may as well use the only sandboxed version afaik. The reason the Pixel line was chosen is because it’s essentially what iPhone is for Apple… There will be no vendor add-ons or modifications, just stock android which can be modified into things like GrapheneOS. But it’s more for security and privacy than it sounds like you need. Just keep in mind whatever you choose, cracked apps have a much higher chance of containing malware unless you learn to crack them yourself, but then you’d have no time to game.

      https://grapheneos.org/usage#sandboxed-play-services

      Since the Play services apps are simply regular apps on GrapheneOS, you install them within a specific user or work profile and they’re only available within that profile. Only apps within the same profile can use it and they need to explicitly choose to use it. It works the same way as any other app and has no special capabilities. As with any other app, it can’t access data of other apps and requires explicit user consent to gain access to profile data or the standard permissions. Apps within the same profile can communicate with mutual consent and it’s no different for sandboxed Play services.

      ETA: It looks like there is a modified open source Play Services client called MicroG, which is basically a rewrite of Play Services that allows things to work, but things requiring payments or payments via NFC etc may not work.

      I think you just want to play games without play services, not actually learn apk reverse engineering (which is a very complex skill), so MicroG is probably what you want. https://microg.org/

      • Corroded@lemmy.dbzer0.comOPEnglish
        1·
        9 months ago

        What data would be sent off having Google Play services installed? I get that you can disable certain permissions and can also use profiles.

        Ideally I wouldn’t want to use profiles. I could use something like Shelter on a rooted device but that kind of slows down multitasking

        • Cinner@lemmy.worldBEnglish
          2·
          9 months ago

          Nothing, if you want. You can disable network permissions on play services. Google DDG first to make sure that won’t break the game. Depends on what the game uses play services for… if it’s some local functionality it will be fine, if it’s remote functionality then it will break.

          • Corroded@lemmy.dbzer0.comOPEnglish
            1·
            9 months ago

            Good point. I had forgotten about disabling network access. I think a majority of the games I paid for work off the idea that if you connect a few times or have a certain amount of plays times you can then play offline. Well the ones that check that is.

            Maybe I’ll give this a go. Thanks for the advice