Researching price ideas for project

[cainwarhard]

Hello!

I'm looking for some price ideas on a project I would like to have developed.
But before I go on about that I feel like I need to explain my situation so as not to be disregarded due to assumptions.
I've been researching and planning for a project involving motion capture for some time now, I can't really disclose more information about it than that, but I essentially have been making a lot of phonecalls and research to different companies trying to get a good idea of how much that project would cost me and how I would go about setting it up.
Originally this project were to be set in motion early next year, but lately I've been having some conflicting thoughts and have gotten another, albeit smaller and hopefully cheaper, project in mind.
Depending on how the research turns out for this new project, I might put the other one on hold for another year or so.

What I'm currently looking for is having a software developed for me for PRIVATE use only.
The software would not be distributed in any way or form, by either me nor the developer.
This software can be explained real short and simple by using it's common abbrevation/name used online; a gamebot.
It's essentially a software that automates gameplay for a computer game.
The most popular 'bots' online are designed for MMOs, which stands for Massive Multiplayer Online.

I'm not a programmer myself, however I'm currently picking up C# to try and get some grasp of it and to be able and make simple modifications to the software once it's done.
But from what I understand these softwares attaches to the game itself once loaded and reads the memory to see what is going on.
The purpose of the software is to automate gameplay (playing a character in the game) and to stay hidden while doing it.
Obviously this is something I cannot do on my own, however I'm hoping to be able and write some specific AI for the software once it's done (as in more speficially how to play the character).

Before anyone jumps to any conclusions despite my best efforts to explain everything as good as possible; using this software would violate most games End User Agreement and Terms of Service.
That however does not mean that it is in any way illegal to develop (nor to use really, we could argue details here but let's not).
However many people do frown upon this as their moral compasses points in another direction, I do sincerely hope though that this won't affect my potential answers here.
If you have any moral or ethical problem with what is described in this thread, please refrain from posting.
I realize that to be able and develop such a software quite some research is necessary on the developers end aswell to fully understand how the game in particular works and it's security measures.
I can also provide access to similiar softwares and accounts to the game in question so that it can be inspected and tried, to get a better grasp of what we're dealing with.

I would like to reiterate that this software would NOT be sold or distributed in any way, nor could the sourcecode be used again or altered slightly and then be distributed by the developer.
These things could be worked out with legal measures if needed so that both parties could feel secure about it.
So what I'm asking for now are some ideas from experienced developers here on what a project like this could cost to develop.
I'm not looking to hire a firm/company nor a freelancer, it would be treated as a hobby project by the developer and the timeframe would be very flexible and the pay could potentially be straight to his/her pocket.

All responses regarding my question are much appreciated!

Regards,
Cain

[toraj58]

i don't have any idea about the price....but technically i have hint for you.

you can use AForge.net framework it is really good for image processing, AI and with vast range of ready functins to manipulate images and capturing from several device like webcam.

you can find some article about it in the www.codeproject.com, one of them is inthis link:

http://www.codeproject.com/KB/recipes/aforge.aspx

please look for other articles in codeproject related to AForge.net i remeber that even there was a complete article about how to build a mothion detection system (with source) using AForge.net.

Touraj Ebrahimi [toraj_e] [at] [yahoo] [dot] [com]

[Mutant_Fruit]

You're talking either high hundreds or low thousands to get it done, assuming this is going to be developed from scratch and the guy who agrees to do it is actually competent.

If you're going to be screen-grabbing and making decisions based on objects you detect in the screenshots, you're talking a hell of a lot harder than if you had a proper scripting API within the game to allow you to control the character and interact with the environment. Whether it'd be possible to do it via screenshots, I don't even know. Assuming you have an API you can work with, a halfway decent bot will still take several weeks of full time work to implement. You could probably get a fairly crappy one done within a few days.

Of course, that's apart from the fact that using a bot will get your account permanently banned when it is discovered.

[cainwarhard]

Thanks for the answers so far!

As mentioned earlier I don't know a whole lot about the programming in detail, but what I do know is that the bots I've tried and know about are all doing it by memory.
It involves memory adresses/offsets and hooking functions, it's not done through images/screenshots at all.
I'm trying to read up on it as much as I can, but as you can probably imagine it's harder for me to grasp everything that I read about seeing as I don't possess the neccessary programming skills to fully understand it.

[darwen]

You're talking either high hundreds or low thousands to get it done, assuming this is going to be developed from scratch and the guy who agrees to do it is actually competent


I think you've just made two conflicting arguments. Anyone who is competent will be charging going rates.

And you'd need someone far more than just competent - you'd be talking about someone who's capable of reverse engineering the application and has enough in-depth knowledge of windows to make it possible.

Even if this took whoever a week you'd be talking in the UK of £2500 (that's pounds) I'd say. And I don't think it's going to take a week. Nor is it something most people would want on their CVs - so the legal risk would put the actual figure far higher than this.

In practice you're not looking at high hundreds, I'd say you're looking at mid-high thousands (of pounds).

Darwen.

[JonnyPoet]

In practice you're not looking at high hundreds, I'd say you're looking at mid-high thousands (of pounds).

Darwen.Yes I'm in the same thoughts. And additional IMHO this is notheing else then expensive cheating. Whats the fun of it when machines are playing games instead of people. Sure a cool electronic will react quicker then any machine could do. But I cannot see any benefit in this.

Long ago I created a simple program able to solve mid level Sudokus by different mathematical rules I figured out about it.
This has made some fun to code it and to test it, but the only fun wa sto see it working and to see where there are some Sudokus done in a way you need a more complex logic that I had implemented with simple understandable rules.
But the only fun was to develop, design and test it. Playing Sodoku since that time is totally out of my interest. Its boring me now.:rolleyes:
If I want to see action done where I dont need to interact I'm looking to a video or TV movies. :D


But there are technical restrictions too. If you do it for one special game it will not work for another one.
For checking memory you would need to know where the data in memory are stored and what they are meaning.

A really full skilled programmer would not be intersted in doing this soert of work IMHO and the costs would go up to the high end of thousends of $
Modern programs are done by teams and developed in years. Reversing that sort of code, studying it and then writing some code. Would anyone risk his job for this ?
So whats the idea behind all that ? I cannot see any sense in it to do it.

[cainwarhard]

Thank you very much for your answers!

This is indeed a case of reverse engineering, since I wrote this thread I've gained additional knowledge about how it works and it's by poking around the process memory which requires knowledge of reverse engineering and low level language ASM.
It can probably be done in other ways but this is the most efficient and there's quite some resources for it around the web, for this game specificially but also for other games and just RE in general.

What boggles my mind a bit is why both of you are writing about this as if it was an illegal act, when it's clearly not.
You use words like "legal risk" and "risk his job" etc, and I can't comprehend this completely.
Obviously this isn't something you put on your resumé and use as an example to get other jobs, that's why I said I would prefer someone who would take this on, on his/her spare time and treat is as such.
But it's not because it's illegal you don't want it on your CV, it's because in the general sense it's frowned upon and seen as amoral behaviour.
That aside however a software like this is completely legal to write and to use.

If you were to be thinking of the cases when it comes to bots that has gone to court/suits; those were not because the software in itself is illegal but because it is believed to have caused damage to the company behind the game in question, by being sold to hundreds of thousand of people and thus had a damaging effect on their game.
My project was however to be completely private and never distributed as mentioned before.

And clearly there are people that are good enough to do such a task that are interested in it, seeing as how there are a lot of bots for games out there.
Some better and more commercially known than others, but if you really take a look you'll quickly find that the grand total is quite a few.
Not to mention all the ones that most likely exist but are held private.

It is with that in mind I was hoping to find such a person, a lot of people that are programmers like games and some of them like to poke around with the games; that's the kind of person I would need.
As to why I would want to do this, the "idea behind it all"; I have my reasons. It's not that I'm a ignorant kid/teenager who likes games and thinks this would be cool and expects to get it done for a hundred dollars, and I hope that I have gotten that across by explaining things to the best of my ability.
But seeing as how I would want this project to completely private I don't want to disclose too much information about it publically on a forum, as you can probably understand.

EDIT: Also, just to clarify completely; when you guys talk about 'mid-high' and 'high end' of thousands (dollars or pounds), are we talking about singles, tens or hundreds?
I'm assuming it's not the latter of course and I probably already know, but I wanted to get it clarified since in theory we could go up to 999 thousand before it becomes a million.

[TheCPUWizard]

There ARE legal issues [all comment are based on United States laws and regulations, and may not apply in other countries]. Most EULA (end user license agreements) specifically prohibit any reverse engineering efforts, for any purpose. This is especially true if such an effort is done as a "work-for-hire".

Some game makers do provide API's for making Bots, others do not.

In terms of the effort, it is significant in two respects. First there is the reverse engineering (assuming no API) and the determination of where to intercept operations. Second there is the development of fairly sophisticated algorythms to effectly play the game.

In terms of cost (assuming you could find a person interested, and able to do the job, as well as have all of the legal issues resolved, you are probably looking at something in the $50K to $75K range (could go much higher, unlikely to be lower).

This means that you need a very strong motivation (or are a real addict of the game) such as commercial (probably illegal) distribution of the software.

It is very unlikely that you will find a reputable developer willing to take on this task.

ps: As a matter of background, I have been a professional developer for over 30 years, run my own consulting company for the last 24, have reverse engineered close to 100 applications (typically custom applications developed for a client where the original developer/company has gone out of business or is otherwise totally unavailable).

[cainwarhard]

TheCPUWizard:
Thank you very much for your reply!

Sure there are legal issues when it comes to the EULA and TOS, but not to the extent where anyone is risking their job (in the case of my project specifically).
Breaking the EULA is not illegal by itself, but it would potentially fall under Breach of Contract, which in turn results in a possibility for a civil lawsuit, which means that the plaintiff needs to provide sufficient proof of damages caused by the defendant.
This is the reason for the lawsuits that we have seen against some companies/individuals regarding this very topic; they have distributed their product to a lot of people and thus the companies feel that damages have been caused.
You've never seen or heard of a single individual getting sued by a gaming company simply for breaking their EULA, that offense results in a suspension of their gaming account.
In other words; a 'slap-on-the-wrist' type of offense.
Not to mention that all of this doesn't necesserily apply to the creator of the software in question (in this case) or that these legal measures are applicable where I am resided.

[TheCPUWizard]

TheCPUWizard:
Thank you very much for your reply!

Sure there are legal issues when it comes to the EULA and TOS, but not to the extent where anyone is risking their job (in the case of my project specifically).
Breaking the EULA is not illegal by itself, but it would potentially fall under Breach of Contract, which in turn results in a possibility for a civil lawsuit, which means that the plaintiff needs to provide sufficient proof of damages caused by the defendant.
This is the reason for the lawsuits that we have seen against some companies/individuals regarding this very topic; they have distributed their product to a lot of people and thus the companies feel that damages have been caused.
You've never seen or heard of a single individual getting sued by a gaming company simply for breaking their EULA, that offense results in a suspension of their gaming account.
In other words; a 'slap-on-the-wrist' type of offense.
Not to mention that all of this doesn't necesserily apply to the creator of the software in question (in this case) or that these legal measures are applicable where I am resided.

I have to disagree with you. I have been an expert witness in a number of cases. It is definately NOT a slap-on-the-wrist situation. I have seen fines of over $500K and one occurance of jail time (reduced to probation).

While the cases where my testimony was read into record, the software in question was not gaming software; I have also been retained in two gaming related cased (one a simple RPG the other an MMO). The first was settled out of court, the second died when the MMO went out of business.

The only way (again I am taking USA here) my firm would consider touching such a job would be with a formal agreement in place with the company owning the copyright to the game.

[cainwarhard]

I have to disagree with you. I have been an expert witness in a number of cases. It is definately NOT a slap-on-the-wrist situation. I have seen fines of over $500K and one occurance of jail time (reduced to probation).

While the cases where my testimony was read into record, the software in question was not gaming software; I have also been retained in two gaming related cased (one a simple RPG the other an MMO). The first was settled out of court, the second died when the MMO went out of business.

The only way (again I am taking USA here) my firm would consider touching such a job would be with a formal agreement in place with the company owning the copyright to the game.
Sure, MDY Industries are most likely (I haven't followed this case much at all so I'm not a 100% sure where they are at this very moment) paying a huge gaming company (Blizzard Entertainment) 6 million dollars in damages.
But this isn't a case of one person violating the EULA of their MMO, it's a case where Michael Donnelly, the creator of the software in question, has sold his software to at least 100,000 people.
In other words, if Michael Donnelly would have kept his software to himself; there wouldn't be a lawsuit from Blizzard Entertainment, they targetted him because his software happens to be the biggest commercial success out of all similiar products on the market for their game.
I can't argue your personal experiences obviously but I seriously doubt that those two gaming related cases were concerning a single person whos actions didn't extend to a lot of other people (such as distribution of software or information of sorts), it just isn't feasible to sue for actions that otherwise only warrants a suspension of your gaming account, seeing as how the legal fees alone will most likely vastly outweigh the amount of money they could ever get out of it.
Then again I'm not from the United States and I am not a lawyer, I'm speaking strictly from my own experiences and from what I've gathered from other cases pertaining to this very topic.

Also as you mentioned in the quoted post above; you're viewing this from the angle of your firm, which is not what I'm targeting to get the project done (by which I mean a firm, not your firm specifically).

[JonnyPoet]

...This is indeed a case of reverse engineering, ...
What boggles my mind a bit is why both of you are writing about this as if it was an illegal act, when it's clearly not.:lol: :lol: :lol:
Have you ever read licence agreements up to the end ?
I never have seen any software allowing reverse engineering. Not single one. You are allowed to use it as it is, nothing else.
So if some private person does other things, like students trying to find out how somthing works nobody will care about, but in all other cases it is as it is. And we are not talking about programs who share their code because if it woudbe a game based on codefree licence, you wouldn't need to do reverse engineering as you would have all the materials to exactly know, whats going on in the games core. And I also dont talk about products which intentionally share API's for doing bots in this discussion, thats a totally other point of view. )

But IMHO you already know in between that its an illegal act as I see some ideas points into that direction like senteces like this... as an example to get other jobs, that's why I said I would prefer someone who would take this on, on his/her spare time and treat is as such.
And also thisIf you were to be thinking of the cases when it comes to bots that has gone to court/suits; those were not because the software in itself is illegal but because it is believed to have caused damage to the company behind the game in question, by being sold to hundreds of thousand of people and thus had a damaging effect on their game.Are you able to grant if a program, as you wrote yourself pokes through the memory and doing actions as a result of poking, doesn't cause any damage in the game.
My project was however to be completely private and never distributed as mentioned before.Maybe, maybe not.
And clearly there are people that are good enough to do such a task that are interested in it, seeing as how there are a lot of bots for games out there.Yea,yea, there are also people creating viruses and speading them ut to the world. ...In most cases to do bots its cheating. And at minimum cheating of one person in a community results in reduced fun for all that ones, who are wanting to have fun together with others and trusting that all the others are also playing a fair game. Thats why people known to use bots are banned from games forums.
Another point which shows you are already knowing that this is some sort of illegal is.
As to why I would want to do this, the "idea behind it all"; I have my reasons. It's not that I'm a ignorant kid/teenager who likes games and thinks this would be cool and expects to get it done for a hundred dollars, ....
So why you dont name your personal reasons to spent some 100.000 Bucks or maybe Euros for such a 'only private personal 'project ?
BTW The EULA also is used in Europe.

When I talked about 'loosing the job' I talked about that small developer firms would go bankrupt by legal cases like that, which could happen, as nobody can grant what you really are doing with the endproduct.
Now you will answer maybe, that nobody will be able to know who has done it... This again shows that you know we arn't talking about a totally leagal effort, otherwise why to hide who I'm as a programmer.

So IMHO I would say there are two ways you wll have to get your product ( If you have and still want to spent that lot of money):

a) a hacker community
b) learn programming up to a point you are able to do it yourself :D
but when you have reached this point, you will have more fun to do better things I hope. (maybe then working yourself in a game creating community if you are good enough :) )

[cainwarhard]

Are you able to grant if a program, as you wrote yourself pokes through the memory and doing actions as a result of poking, doesn't cause any damage in the game.
No.
But I am able to say that it won't cause a major loss of revenue for the company in question and that's what the cases of lawsuits (that have become widely known) are about, pertaining to this topic.
If it were simply for the reason that a user using a software like this is breaking the EULA; every customer of these products could/would be targetted aswell; they're not.
The whole point is that the companies feel like they have endured a significant loss of revenue due to the product in question.

BTW The EULA also is used in Europe.
A EULA is not a law, it's simply an agreement between the user and the creator.
Breaking a EULA could fall under Breach of Contract and could potentially be cause of a civil lawsuit, if the plaintiff feel that they have been caused damages by the defendant and have sufficient proof (not a requirement per se but who sues someone knowing they'll most likely lose?).
Not to mention that a EULA could be partially disregarded in a case like this if it contains unreasonable material/demands, which surprisingly a lot of them do (many companies believe that they can put whatever they want in there, wether it's a scare tactic or not I don't know).
Seeing as how my project would not have its software distributed in any way; pretty much the only way they'll deal with it, if it comes to their attention in the first place, is by a suspension of the gaming account involved.
And regarding my statement of me being resided outside of the US, here's what I meant;
If the company behind the game is based in the United States, but their servers for the customers in Europe are stationed in Europe somewhere and I am then resided in a completely different country altogether; it becomes a matter of either international laws or laws pertaining to the country where the 'crime' was committed, thus the US laws does not apply.
This could potentially be a whole different ballgame then, or not.


This again shows that you know we arn't talking about a totally leagal effort, otherwise why to hide who I'm as a programmer.
I apologize, I should have formulated my sentence differently than I did.
What I meant was that developing a software like this for my project will not lead to any legal issues for the developer, certainly not a case of where someone would lose their job over it.
But then again, as I mentioned before and as you quoted me; I'm not targetting someone from a firm.
The perspective from a firm is obviously very different than an independent individual, not because I 'know this is illegal' but because I know it is considered shady and/or amoral, which is a big deal for any firm.


So IMHO I would say there are two ways you wll have to get your product ( If you have and still want to spent that lot of money):

a) a hacker community
b) learn programming up to a point you are able to do it yourself :D
but when you have reached this point, you will have more fun to do better things I hope. (maybe then working yourself in a game creating community if you are good enough :) )

Thank you very much for your reply! :)
It's not an issue of finance as my other project that were to be set in motion next year requires a much larger budget, but having accumulated more facts about this topic from this thread and from a lot of research through other places I am now considering what the next will be.
No matter what though I will be taking up programming, so maybe you'll see more of me. ;)
I deeply appreciate every reply I've gotten in this thread!

[TheCPUWizard]

<snip>
A EULA is not a law, it's simply an agreement between the user and the creator.</snip>


Theft is a crime, and this is where it gets ugly. Consider what would happen if I reverse engineer part of a game, purely for my own purposes, and tell no one about it.

A year later I am developing a completely different program. I recall that I saw somewhere a really cool implementation to achieve my goal. So I write the code based on the information I recall. Unfortunately that information came from the program I reversed engineered.

The original gaming company happens to notice my business product on the market, and it is apparant that the implementation is based on their codebase. A CRIMINAL case for theft can be made.

What becomes the issue is if it is reasonable to expect (given my experience) that I would have developed that specific implementation if I had never seen their code.

The cost of the legal battle alone could run into the 10's of thousands [USD] very quickly. Even if they lost the case, the impact on me would be (almost) fatal.

This is one reason why many development companies prohibit their employees from ever looking at OpenSource (esp GPL, LGPL licensed) code. Even on their own machines at home on their own time.

On an even broader (different but related) note, consultants who do "Work-For-Hire" contracts need to be extremely careful. NONE of the code that was developed for contract "A" can ever be used on a future contract. In a very short period of time, the consultant will either violate this or find themselves in a position where they can not legally accept a contract.

[funnyusername]

Judging from what you have said.....and I could be wrong...I'm guessing that your 'bot' is for beating an online poker game. You figure your not taking money from the business....only the poor people playing against you. You'll use the software privately and not distribute it to protect your own profits and line your own pockets. You figure the servers are probably based overseas, like many of these systems. You figure the writing of the program is not illegal for the programmer, just the use of it, a risk which you will bear for rewards a plenty. Your willing to pay, because the payback will be worth it. You know that you'll need someone of low moral standing to write the program, but are just feeling out the waters here. Sorry for not honouring your request to keep my opinion to myself, but you disgust me. If I'm wrong, I apologise.

[cainwarhard]

TheCPUWizard:
What you are saying is a 100% true and I agree with you.
And as I'm not a proficient programmer myself I can't explain this down to the very detail, but from what I know and understand of how what I want to do works; I'm not looking to steal anything.
In my case it's about reversing the application to the point where you can retrieve the information from it, that is otherwise available to any user actually playing the game (in some cases perhaps even a bit more) and then using algorythms to use that information to play the game by itself. In other words; reading the process memory.
And if you were referring to copying to the RAM; that's something that is under heavy debate and that some courts in the US have appearantly already ruled in favor of, as in it's not copyright infringement. From what I understand anti-virus softwares does it for example.
Also this would differ from court to court but also from country to country seeing as how Copyright Laws for example may be different.


funnyusername:
You're wrong. Apology accepted.

[nabeelisnabeel]

Spending your time and money on tasks which are not even 1% beneficial to this world is useless. What do you say?

[TheCPUWizard]

Spending your time and money on tasks which are not even 1% beneficial to this world is useless. What do you say?

Lets see....saving 1,000 lives could be considered only 0.000025% beneficial to the worlds....

Or....spending an hour sdoing somerthing I really enjoy would be beneficial to 0.000000025%

So I would say your statement is utterly false.

[cainwarhard]

Spending your time and money on tasks which are not even 1% beneficial to this world is useless. What do you say?
I'd say you set a fine example for your theory.

[funnyusername]

funnyusername:
You're wrong. Apology accepted.

Ok, I take it back. Sorry. :D

I hope your project works out well.....from another perspective it sounds quite interesting! ;)