Who is responsible
Slamships Ltd, which makes and publishes Golf: The Journey, decides why and how your information is used, so under data protection law (the UK GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018) it is the controller.
Slamships Ltd
Registered in England and Wales, company number 15064090.
Registered office: 11 Evans Avenue, Broughton Astley, LE9 6AE.
hello@golfthejourney.com
Part 1: the website
What it collects
The site has two forms, and each collects only what it needs.
- The launch list. Your email address, when you join the launch list, ask to be a beta tester or ask to be told the news. If you ask to be a beta tester, we note that against your address. We use it to email you about the game: launch updates, beta invitations, the Steam wishlist link and launch news. Nothing else, and nothing on anyone else’s behalf.
- The optional question, and the launch offer. After you join, we ask one question you do not have to answer: which devices you would play on, what matters most to you about the game, and a line of your own if you want to leave one. If you answer, we store those choices and that line against your address at MailerLite, together with a note that you asked for a place in the free beta and that the launch discount applies to you, and we add you to the beta testers group so the invitations reach you. A copy can also go to our own team by email and to a private chat channel, and your note, without your address, to a private task board, so we can read it. We use it to decide what to build next and to send you the beta invitation and the launch discount when they are ready. Ask us at hello@golfthejourney.com and we will remove it, and unsubscribing removes it with the rest of your record.
- Feedback. What you write, the category you chose, your email address if you choose to give one, your browser’s name and version, the time, and any details the game added to the link that brought you here (the platform, the game’s version, the screen, the career date, the event, the in-game prompt, and any text you had already written in the game).
The site sets no cookies unless you accept advertising measurement in the banner (see the cookies page and the Advertising section below). To spot automated abuse, each form has a hidden field a person never fills in and notes how long the form was open before it was sent; neither is stored.
Measurement
We measure how the site is used: which pages are visited, which site or link a visit came from, whether the trailer is played, which buttons are pressed, and whether a form succeeds. This is cookieless: nothing is written to your device, there is no visitor id that survives closing the tab, and we do not build a profile of you or follow you across other sites. If your browser sends Do Not Track or has Global Privacy Control switched on, we do not measure your visit at all. The processor is PostHog, on its European hosting, acting for us under its own privacy policy. We never send your email address, name or any free text you type to it.
Advertising
If you press Accept on the cookie banner, Meta’s Pixel loads on the site. It sets the cookies _fbp and _fbc and sends Meta the pages you view, your IP address and your browser and device details, so we can measure our adverts on Facebook and Instagram and reach people likely to be interested. Meta acts as an independent controller of that data under its own privacy policy. If you decline, do nothing, or your browser sends Do Not Track or Global Privacy Control, the Pixel never loads. You can withdraw consent at any time with Cookie choices in the footer, which stops the Pixel and clears its cookies.
Why we may do this, and our legal basis
- The launch list: your consent. You give it when you send the form, after being told what joining means. You can withdraw it at any time by using the unsubscribe link in any email, or by writing to us. Withdrawing does not affect anything done before.
- Feedback: our legitimate interests in hearing what is wrong with the game and making it better, which we weigh against your privacy and think is proportionate for a message you chose to send. Giving an email address is optional, and when you do, you are asking us to reply, and we treat that as your consent to being written to about that message only.
- Advertising measurement (Meta Pixel): your consent, given by pressing Accept on the banner and withdrawn with Cookie choices in the footer.
- Measurement: our legitimate interests in understanding whether the site is working, which we think is proportionate because nothing personal is collected, nothing is stored on your device and you can opt out with your browser’s own Do Not Track or Global Privacy Control setting.
Who handles it
- PostHog, on its European hosting, receives the measurement events described above. It never receives your email address, your name, or anything you type into a form.
- Meta Platforms, only if you accept the banner, receives the Pixel data described under Advertising.
- MailerLite, our email provider, holds the launch list and sends the emails. It acts for us as a processor, under its own privacy policy. Your address goes from your browser to our server and on to MailerLite.
- Vercel hosts the site. Our server code runs in London; pages are delivered from Vercel’s network, which may be outside the UK. Like any host, Vercel keeps request logs that include the network address (IP address) and browser details of each visit, for a short period set by Vercel and under Vercel’s own policy. We do not add your feedback or email address to them.
- A private team chat channel. Each feedback message is passed from our server, by a private webhook, to a channel that only the team can read (on Slack or Discord). It is not added to the mailing list, and we use an email address given with feedback only to reply about it. If a message cannot be delivered we tell you on the page and ask you to email us instead; we log only its category and length, never your words or address.
- Our server also keeps your network address in memory for about a minute, to limit floods of requests. It is not written anywhere.
We do not sell your information, and we do not share it except with these providers and where the law requires it.
How long we keep it
| What | How long |
|---|---|
| The launch list | Until you unsubscribe or ask us to remove you, after which it is deleted. |
| Feedback | For as long as it is useful in improving the game. We review it at least once a year and clear out what is no longer needed, and we delete a message, or an address given with it, if you ask. |
| Hosting logs | For the short period Vercel keeps them. |
| Measurement events | Under PostHog’s standard retention, currently one year. |
Part 2: the game on Steam
The desktop game, including the free beta on Steam Playtest, collects nothing about you and makes no network calls in the released builds, unless you choose to sign in to an account (see Part 4). It does not need an internet connection to play, and the free Steam demo has no account at all.
- Your saves stay on your computer, in the game’s own data folder, unless you sign in and back them up (Part 4). So does a diagnostics log the game keeps to help find problems. We cannot see that log.
- “Copy diagnostics”, in the game’s settings, only puts that log on your clipboard. It goes nowhere unless you paste it into a message to us yourself, and you can read it first.
- Steam itself handles your purchase, your account, and any Steam features you use such as Steam Cloud, under Valve’s privacy policy. We do not receive that information.
- Giving feedback opens this website’s feedback page in your browser. The details the game adds to the link (see above) are in the address of that page, so our host sees them in its request log when the page loads. Nothing is sent to our team until you press send.
Part 3: the mobile apps
This part covers the iPhone, iPad and Android apps: what they send, to whom, and only when you agree. If that changes, this page changes first.
Usage and crash data, only if you opt in
The apps ask before sending anything. If you agree, they send anonymous product usage (for example that a tournament was started or finished) to PostHog, on its European host, and crash reports (the error, the device model and the system version) to Sentry. Both are tied to an anonymous identifier made on your device, not to your name or email. There is no advertising identifier, no tracking across other apps or sites, and no ads. You can change your mind in the game’s settings. Our legal basis is your consent. We keep crash reports for up to 90 days and usage data for up to 12 months.
Purchases
Payment is handled entirely by the App Store or Google Play; we never see your card or payment details. We use RevenueCat, a purchase service, to check whether the full game has been unlocked. It receives the store’s purchase record and an anonymous app identifier. Our legal basis is the contract you make when you buy, and our legitimate interest in preventing fraud.
Optional accounts and cloud saves
You can play without an account. If you choose one, what it holds and why is set out in Part 4, below.
Sharing a card
When you share a result, a round or a season, the image is made on your device and handed to your phone’s own share sheet. Where it goes from there is your choice; nothing is sent to us.
Photos
The “use my photo” portrait feature is not offered, and the apps do not ask for your camera or photo library. If it is ever added, it will ask for its own consent first and this policy will change before it does.
Part 4: accounts, cloud saves and Online play
This part covers the game on a computer and on a phone. An account is optional: the whole career plays without one, and nothing in this part happens until you choose to sign in. It is not offered in the free Steam demo. If you never sign in, nothing in this part applies to you.
What an account is for
Signing in does two things. It backs up your careers to the cloud, so you can carry one career between your own phone and computer. And it is the way into the Online Circuit, the weekly and monthly challenges you play against other golfers. You will find both in the game under Settings, then Account.
What we collect
- Your email address, to send you a six digit code. There is no password: you type the code into the game to sign in. The game also asks you to confirm that you are 13 or older each time you ask for a code, and we do not keep your answer.
- Your careers, as the game saved them: the golfer’s name, appearance and signature, every result and the whole history of the career, with when it was last played and from which device. One copy of each career is kept, and it is replaced as you play on.
- A sign-in session, kept on your device so that you stay signed in, until you sign out.
If you play Online
The first time you open the Online Circuit you choose a display name and a country. More is shared than with cloud saves, so it is worth knowing what:
- Your display name and country are public. Other Online players see them next to your scores, your place on the boards, your honours, and the leagues and societies you belong to. The name is checked when you set it (its length, its characters and a list of words that are not allowed), but it does not have to be your own name, and you can change it. Choose one you are happy for strangers to see.
- Each round you play Online sends us the choices you made on every shot, such as the club, the target and the style, not only your score. Our server plays the round again from those choices to check that the score is real, and refuses one that does not match.
- Leagues and societies have a name that their creator chooses and a list of members, and people join with an invite code.
- Nudges are chosen from a short fixed list of phrases. You cannot send another player free text.
- Blocking and reporting. You can block a golfer, which hides them from you, and report one. A report holds the golfer it is about, your account number and up to 200 characters you write, and it is kept so we can review it.
Why we may do this, and our legal basis
- The contract for what you asked for: backing up your careers, carrying them between your devices and playing Online.
- Our legitimate interests in keeping Online fair and safe: checking a round’s score, filtering display names and reviewing reports, and keeping the service secure. We think this proportionate because it is limited to those things.
We do not use any of this for advertising, and we do not sell it.
Who handles it
- Supabase, our account and database provider, holds the account, the careers and the Online records, and runs the code that checks a round. The project is hosted in Ireland. It acts for us as a processor.
- Resend sends the email that carries your sign-in code. It sees your email address and the message. It acts for us as a processor, under its own privacy policy.
How long we keep it
| What | How long |
|---|---|
| Your account and the careers backed up to it | Until you delete the account. |
| Your Online profile, rounds, results, honours, nudges, blocks, and your place in leagues and societies | Until you delete the account. Deleting it removes them. |
| Reports you made | Until you delete the account. |
| Reports other golfers made about you | Not removed when you delete your account, because they may be needed to keep someone who was reported from coming back. They hold an account number and not your email address. We review them at least once a year and delete the ones we no longer need. |
| A sign-in code | It stops working after an hour. |
Deleting it
In the game, go to Settings, then Account, and choose “Delete account and cloud data”, or follow the delete your account page. Careers on your own devices stay.
International transfers
Some of the providers named here, such as MailerLite, Vercel, Slack or Discord, PostHog, Sentry, RevenueCat, Supabase and Resend, may process information outside the UK. When they do, we rely on the safeguards the law allows: a decision that the country protects data adequately, or the UK’s international data transfer agreement or addendum to the standard contractual clauses.
Your rights
You can ask us, free of charge, to:
- tell you what we hold about you, and give you a copy (access and portability);
- correct anything that is wrong;
- delete it;
- stop using it in ways that rely on our legitimate interests (objection), or restrict how we use it;
- and, where you gave your consent, withdraw it at any time.
Write to hello@golfthejourney.com from the address we hold and we will answer within one month. We may need to check it is you. Anonymous data (such as opted-in usage data tied only to a random identifier) cannot be traced back to you, so we cannot look it up.
Complaints
If you think we have handled your information wrongly, please tell us first so we can put it right. You also have the right to complain to the UK Information Commissioner’s Office at ico.org.uk.
Children
The game and this site are for players aged 13 and over. Creating an account asks you to confirm that you are, and we do not knowingly keep information from anyone younger. If you think we have, write to us and we will delete it.
Changes
When this policy changes, the date at the top changes with it. If a change matters (a new kind of information, or a new use), we will say so on this page and, where we hold your email address for the launch list or an account, tell you by email before it takes effect.
Contact
Slamships Ltd
Registered in England and Wales, company number 15064090.
Registered office: 11 Evans Avenue, Broughton Astley, LE9 6AE.
hello@golfthejourney.com