Google Play "Security Alert: You are using a highly vulnerable version of OpenSSL"!

Seriously, the Gmail message with this title "Security Alert: You are using a highly vulnerable version of OpenSSL" freaked me out yesterday. Below shows the details of the message:

Hello,
One or more of your apps is running an outdated version of OpenSSL, which has multiple security vulnerabilities. You should update OpenSSL as soon as possible. For more information about the most recent security vulnerability in OpenSSL, please see http://www.openssl.org/news/secadv_20140605.txt.
Please note, while it's unclear whether these specific issues affect your application, applications with vulnerabilities that expose users to risk of compromise may be considered “dangerous products” and subject to removal from Google Play.
Regards,
Google Play Team

I am sure I am not the only one suffering from this 'threatening' message. A quick search brings me to this Adobe AIR forum thread. From my understanding of the discussion in the forum, it is the inconsistency of the OpenSSL version in the apps that triggers this unfavorable announcement. As noticed,

OpenSSL 1.0.1 SSL/TLS users (client and/or server) should upgrade to 1.0.1h.

However, at the time of writing, the Adobe AIR 14 only deploys the OpenSSL 1.0.1g, which is still potentially not the qualifying version. Meaning? Most of the Adobe AIR developers are affected.

What is worse is that, Google Play doesn't provide any timeline info about how long the buffer is before taking any action. Meanwhile, the Adobe AIR staffs couldn't promise an exact date for another stable and problem-free release. THAT MAKES THE CHAOS!

We realize the potential harms due to the outdated OpenSSL applied, and the urgency to update the apps as soon as possible. However, at the same time, we hope the Google Play could be more polite and transparent in conveying the message to us. For example, which apps are affected? And what is more disturbing is that, we have no idea whether the OpenSSL issue could be be caused by other dependencies such as the third-party Adobe ANE.

What to do now? Let's keep our finger crossed and hope the Adobe AIR could update us as soon as possible...

Update on 2014-06-20 
The latest Adobe AIR 14.0.0.125 with the updated OpenSSL 1.0.1h is available NOW. Although it is a beta version, it has at least solved the "Security Alert" issue.

Why the ratings of the Android Games/Apps are so extreme?

I am not sure how's the situation in the Apple App Store. But i am pretty sure that Android Games/Apps generally have an extreme record of ratings, a.k.a you would observe the peaks on both 1 star and 5 stars rating. For example:

We notice that out of the total of 7000 ratings of this Android Game, the 5-star-bar occupies 40+ percent, and the 1-star-bar is about 30+ percent.

According to my personal academic experiences, this situation is rare for any statistics distribution. Usually, the result would be Gaussian/Normal distribution with a peak almost at the 3-star-rating, with possibly left or right skewed. But the picture displays a completely different output. Why?

I have no absolute answers. But there are few possibilities to these scenarios:

In-compatible framework/tools used

Personally i experienced this as a developer. As mentioned before, there are a number of frameworks available to your needs in order to create an Android Game. However, the fact is that, Android devices vary too much, such that there isn't a standard for the implementation of the device testings. Seriously, there are hundreds of Android devices out there, with myriads of hardware designs and different Android versions. Have you really ensured that your Android Game is working on All devices first before uploaded to the Google Play Store? It would be considered sufficient if you could fulfill the needs of about 80%. Then? Right, you will get 1-star-rating from the remaining 20% as your games keep crashing on theirs. The xml configuration would help reduce some, but surely not all.

A disastrous update / design of your framework/tools

Adobe AIR IDE features 2 ways of packaging your games: Captive Runtime and Shared Runtime. The former is fine but with much larger apk file size. The latter consumes much smaller file size, but at the cost of the requirement to install another Adobe AIR plug-in. Say if you switch from the former to the latter, the users would be irked as they are required to make an additional move installing another app that they are so unfamiliar with. Hence, the stats of the uninstall rates will increase sharply. Despite the facts that the updates are actually coming with great features, the awareness of the users are desperately lacking. This only adds to their dissatisfaction, which results in 1 star rating (some even curse to rate worse than that).

Competitors

Google Play Store requires a relatively much lower threshold of the cost of development. With only $35 and no annual fees, it attracts a lot of competitors. The world of competition could be merciless. It is not surprising to see that no matter how outstanding your games are, they are still some rating them so badly in order to spoil your fame. Furthermore, the increasing availability and the affordability of the Android devices do enable those competitors to engage in these unhealthy activities so rampantly. Too bad this is the realistic world.

They are actually many more. But probably these are the main points.

Running Man Rock Scissors Paper Game is in the Google Play Store Now!

Yay! The Running Man Rock Scissors Paper Game is now available in the Google Play Store!

As the RM maniacs, we all know that there are 2 types of Rock Scissors Paper Games which are popular in the Running Man Variety Show:
a) Ka-wi Ba-wi Bo (가위 바위 보)

• A normal Rock Scissors Paper Game. Ka-wi (scissor), Ba-wi (rock), Bo (paper). 

b) Muk-jji-ppa (묵찌빠) 

• This is a Korean modified Rock Scissors Paper Game (eg: Refer Episode 147).
• To play this Muk-jji-ppa game, there are at least 2 rounds.
• In the first round, it is a normal Rock Scissors Paper.
• The winner of the first Round has to make the opponent's hand same as him/her in the second round in order to win the Muk-jji-ppa
• If there isn't a winner in the second round, the process is repeated.
  

In the Running Man Rock Scissors Paper Game, the game has been designed such that the winner of either the Ka-wi Ba-wi Bo or Muk-jji-ppa has to 'attack' his opponent (which is actually the Running Man Members) with the toy hammer (refer Episode 166). Meanwhile, the loser of the RSP has to protect himself from being attacked by using the pot shield. In order to defeat the RM member and unlock the stronger one, you need at least hit the opponent 3 times.

Something to note is that, this Running Man Rock Scissors Paper Game has no offense to any RM member. The stats is simply based on personal opinion.

Also, since a number of users don't like the Adobe AIR 4.0 plugin, this game is using the Adobe AIR 3.7. Before the awareness of the Adobe AIR 4.0 is getting popular, we would only use the lower version.

List of Google Play Store alternatives sorted by Alexa Ranking

Once you know the importance of the Google Play Store alternatives, you must be impatient to know what are the lists of the alternatives available. A quick search from the Google and Wiki could provide you the answers. Here are some of the app stores listed down according to the Alexa Traffic Ranking at the time of writing:

Index	App Store	Alexa Ranking
1	Amazon Appstore	6
2	Opera Mobile Store	1137
3	Appbrain	9861
4	Samsung App Store	24680
5	Getjar	27146
6	Baidu Store	5
7	Taobao Store	10
8	Appchina	7559
9	Wandoujia	7669
10	Tencent myapp	21495

Notes:

• The Alexa Traffic Ranking is assessed based on the 'domain name' instead of the App Store. Hence, the ranking of the already-popular sites such as Amazon, Opera, Baidu, etc might be a bit misleading. However, since they have a strong and resourceful background, their future prospect could be optimistic.
• The market in China is potentially huge. If you are able to translate your games / apps into Mandarin, you might want to penetrate into the Chinese markets.
• Here shows another clean list of the Google Play Store alternatives apart from the Wiki.

Why Google Play Store alternatives are important?

After having your android applications ready in the format of .apk extension, you are now ready to let your android games accessible by anyone around the world (or your preferred audience).

Usually, most of the Android games developers would consider Google Play Store as the main market to reach the public. It is undoubtedly to say that, indeed, Google Play Store is the most gigantic market on Earth due to its high availability. Its existence in the Western countries and the Europe is simply dominating. Except China (at the time writing), the Play Store really achieves a remarkable result in other developed countries in Asia (Japan, Korea, Southeast Asia, etc). Android games developers love Google Play Store not only because of the 'Google' brand, but also the 'smart' business model. From time to time, the Google Play Store keeps coming out with the helpful tools and services which boost the game development process (eg: Google Play Game Services, Google+ Circles, Cloud Saves, etc).

However, despite the outstanding performance from the Google Play Store, it is also important for the Android Games developers to be aware of other alternatives. The reasons are shown below:

1. Diversification

Different app stores might have different audience. Although the other app stores may only occupy around 20% - 30% of the total players that download in the Google Play Store, the fact is, the more the merrier. The higher number of the audience being exposed means a higher number of games downloads. The revenue is proportional to the number of the game downloads. You do the math.

2. Avoid plagarism

This is a critical point. For those who have been all the while ONLY considering Google Play Store as the silver bullet but not the alternatives, this is a reminder, as it happens to some of my fellow games developers. The thing is, if you do not perform the diversification (as in the 1st point) yourself, the stealthy spammers will do on behalf of you. It means that, people could easily have your .apk file from the Google Play Store. Then, with some trivial efforts of registration on the other app stores, they could have your games up serving for their purposes (by uploading your apk files). This situation is indeed quite rampant. For example, go to 1mobile, do you see your own apk up there? Oops. Or you could easily search for others' apk file and 're-publish' on the other app stores (it is illegal and could face lawsuits).

3. Monetization

If you are doing Android Apps / Games for a living, monetization could be a crucial factor. Unfortunately, Google Play Store only allows the games developers from certain countries to sell apps and in-app products. Fret not, the Google Play Store alternatives (such as Amazon app store and Opera app store) do not have such a discrimination. If you are confident about your games value and they deserve a purchase before the players can enjoy the premium edition, you may attempt to publish a Pro version of the game on the alternatives while a Lite one in the Google Play Store.

In a nutshell, it is important for the apps / games developers to realize the impacts if they do / do not publish their apps on the Google Play Store alternatives.