Privacy Policy
Last updated 2 September 2026
The short version: this website collects an email address if — and only if — you type one into the signup box. It is stored on our own server, it is used for exactly one message (“Hireling is out”), and it is never sold, shared or handed to an advertiser. There are no cookies, no analytics and no third-party scripts of any kind on this site. The game itself collects nothing at all.
This policy covers the website at hireling.smugfacegaming.com (also reachable at smugfacegaming.com/hireling) and the Hireling game. The data controller is Smug Face Gaming, contactable at admin@smugfacegaming.com.
The website
The signup list
If you submit the form, we store your email address and the date you submitted it. Nothing else — no name, no IP address alongside it, no marketing profile.
- What it is used for: one email, when the game is released. There is no newsletter and no second message.
- Where it lives: a single database file on our own server, readable only by the account that runs the signup service. It is not sent to a mailing-list provider, an analytics tool or any other company.
- Lawful basis: your consent, given by submitting the form. You can withdraw it at any time (see below), and we delete the record when we do.
- How long: until the launch email goes out, or until you ask us to remove it — whichever comes first. The list is deleted after launch.
There is deliberately no page or API that reads the list back, and a repeat signup gets exactly the same response as a new one — so the form cannot be used to test whether a given address is on the list. Email addresses are never written to the web server's logs.
Server logs
Like every web server, ours records ordinary request logs: the IP address that made a request, the time, the page asked for, and the browser's user-agent string. These are kept for a short period for security and troubleshooting (spotting someone hammering the signup endpoint, mostly), and they are not used to build any profile of you. The lawful basis is our legitimate interest in keeping the site running and unabused.
Cookies and tracking
None. This site sets no cookies, uses no local storage, and loads no fonts, scripts, frames or images from anybody else's server — everything the page needs is served from this domain. There is no analytics package, no tag manager, no advertising pixel and no “share” button phoning home. That is why there is no cookie banner: there is nothing to consent to.
The game
Hireling is a single-player game with no account, no login and no network features. It does not collect, transmit or upload anything. Your progress — your certificates, your record and any run in flight — is saved to a file on your own computer and stays there.
The one thing the game talks to is Discord, and only if Discord is already running on the same machine: it can show what you are currently doing as your Discord status. That conversation happens locally between the game and the Discord application on your own computer; nothing is sent to us, and what Discord then does with your status is covered by Discord's own privacy policy. If you would rather it did not, close Discord or turn off its activity status — the game neither knows nor cares.
If a future release adds anything that leaves your machine, this policy will say so before that release ships.
Your rights
Under UK GDPR you can ask us to give you a copy of what we hold about you, correct it, delete it, or stop using it. In practice, for this site, that is one email address, and the answer to any of those requests is quick.
Email admin@smugfacegaming.com and say which address to remove — no account verification hoops, because there is no account. If you are unhappy with how we have handled it, you can complain to the Information Commissioner's Office at ico.org.uk.
Changes
If this policy changes, the “last updated” date at the top changes with it. If a change is significant — if we ever start collecting something new — anyone on the signup list will be told before it takes effect.
Smug Face Gaming — admin@smugfacegaming.com