01 — Acceptance of these terms
These Terms & Conditions (the "Terms") form a binding agreement between you and Hookvale Games Pty Ltd, a proprietary limited company registered in Australia ("Hookvale," "we," "us," or "our"). They govern your access to and use of hookvalegames.com and any subdomains, pages, and features we operate (collectively, the "Site"), as well as any games, prototypes, demos, beta builds, or related services we make available through or alongside the Site (collectively, the "Services").
By accessing the Site, submitting an email address to one of our mailing lists, downloading a game, joining a playtest, or otherwise using the Services, you confirm that you have read, understood, and agreed to be bound by these Terms and by our Privacy Policy, which is incorporated here by reference. If you do not agree, you must not use the Site or the Services.
02 — Definitions
- Content — any text, graphics, audio, video, code, data, or other material made available on or through the Site or Services, including the Hookvale wordmark and the Hookvale "hook" device.
- User Content — any material you submit to us, including emails, messages, playtest feedback, bug reports, survey responses, and suggestions.
- Feedback — any idea, comment, or suggestion concerning the Site, the Services, or any Hookvale game, whether labelled as such or not.
- You / your — the natural person accessing the Site or Services, or the entity on whose behalf you act if you are acting on behalf of an organisation.
03 — Eligibility
You must be at least 13 years old (or the minimum age required by data-protection law in your country, whichever is higher) to use the Site. If you are under the age of legal majority where you live, you may use the Site only with the involvement of a parent or guardian who agrees to these Terms on your behalf.
You also confirm that you are not located in, ordinarily resident in, or subject to any embargo or trade restriction that would make your use of the Site unlawful, and that you are not listed on any sanctions list applicable to us.
04 — Permitted use of the site
We grant you a limited, personal, non-exclusive, non-transferable, revocable licence to access and view the Site for your own personal, non-commercial use, subject to these Terms. All other rights are reserved.
You may:
- Browse the Site and read its publicly available pages;
- Save or print a reasonable number of pages for your own reference;
- Share links to the Site on social media or by email;
- Quote short excerpts of our public copy for review, news, or commentary, with attribution.
05 — Prohibited conduct
You agree that you will not, and will not permit anyone else to:
- Use the Site or Services for any unlawful, fraudulent, harmful, threatening, harassing, defamatory, or obscene purpose;
- Attempt to gain unauthorised access to any part of the Site, our systems, or any account that is not yours;
- Probe, scan, or test the vulnerability of any system or network without our prior written permission;
- Interfere with the proper working of the Site, including by introducing malware, denial-of-service attacks, or excessive automated requests;
- Use any robot, spider, scraper, or other automated means to access the Site, except for well-behaved search-engine crawlers obeying our
robots.txt; - Reverse-engineer, decompile, or disassemble any part of the Services, except where the law expressly permits;
- Copy, reproduce, distribute, modify, create derivative works of, publicly display, or commercially exploit any Content without our prior written consent;
- Remove or obscure any copyright, trademark, or other proprietary notices;
- Impersonate any person or entity, or misrepresent your affiliation with any person or entity;
- Use the Site to collect personal data about other users.
06 — Accounts, mailing lists & playtests
The Site does not currently require an account. When you opt in to a mailing list (for example, our playtest list) or contact us by email, you are responsible for the accuracy of the information you provide and for keeping your inbox accessible so we can reach you.
You may unsubscribe from any list at any time using the link in our emails or by writing to support@hookvalegames.com. We may remove you from a list at our discretion if you breach these Terms or behave in a way that is harmful to other testers or to us.
Beta and playtest builds are confidential. Unless we say otherwise in writing, you agree not to publicly stream, record, screenshot, share, or describe a playtest build without our prior written consent.
07 — Our intellectual property
The Site, the Services, and all Content (other than User Content) are owned by Hookvale, our licensors, or other rights-holders, and are protected by copyright, trademark, design, database, and other intellectual-property laws. No rights are granted to you other than the limited licence in section 04.
"Hookvale," "Hookvale Games," "Hookvale Games Pty Ltd," and the Hookvale "hook" device are trademarks of Hookvale Games Pty Ltd, whether or not they are registered. You may not use them in a way that suggests sponsorship, endorsement, or partnership without our prior written consent.
08 — Your content & feedback
You retain ownership of any User Content you submit. You are solely responsible for that content and confirm that you have all rights necessary to submit it, and that doing so does not violate any law or any third party's rights.
By submitting User Content, you grant Hookvale a worldwide, royalty-free, sublicensable, transferable, non-exclusive licence to host, store, reproduce, adapt, translate, and use that content to the extent reasonably necessary to operate the Site and Services, communicate with you, and improve our games.
Specifically with respect to Feedback: you understand that any idea, suggestion, or improvement you share with us about the Site or our games may already be under independent development by us, and that we are free to use, implement, modify, or distribute that Feedback in any of our products without obligation, attribution, or compensation to you. If you do not want us to have these rights, do not send the Feedback.
09 — Games & services
Information shown on the Site about Hookvale games — including names, art, mechanics, features, screenshots, platforms, regions, prices, and release windows — is provided for general information only and may change without notice. Anything described as a "working title," "concept," "in development," or similar is, by definition, not final.
Specific games and services may be governed by separate end-user license agreements ("EULAs"), platform terms (for example, those of the App Store or Google Play), or in-game terms. Where there is a conflict between these Terms and a game-specific EULA, the EULA prevails for that game.
We do not currently sell anything through the Site. If we begin to sell products or services directly, additional terms (including consumer-rights, refund, and tax terms) will be presented to you before purchase and will be incorporated into these Terms by reference.
10 — Third-party links & services
The Site may link to third-party websites, services, or platforms (for example, social networks, app stores, or our email provider). We do not control those third parties and are not responsible for their content, practices, or policies. Your use of them is at your own risk and subject to their own terms.
11 — Disclaimers
The Site and Services are provided "as is" and "as available" without warranties of any kind, whether express, implied, or statutory, including warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, accuracy, non-infringement, and freedom from defects or interruption. To the maximum extent permitted by law, we disclaim all such warranties.
Without limiting that, we do not warrant that the Site will be uninterrupted, error-free, secure, or free of viruses; that any information on the Site is complete, accurate, or current; or that any game or feature shown on the Site will be released, released in any particular form, or remain available.
Some jurisdictions do not allow the exclusion of certain warranties. To the extent any warranty cannot be excluded, that warranty is limited to the minimum permitted by law.
12 — Limitation of liability
To the maximum extent permitted by law, Hookvale, its officers, employees, contractors, and agents will not be liable for any indirect, incidental, special, consequential, exemplary, or punitive damages, or for any loss of profits, revenue, data, goodwill, or business opportunity, arising out of or in connection with your use of, or inability to use, the Site or Services — even if we have been advised of the possibility of such damages.
Nothing in these Terms excludes or limits our liability for death or personal injury caused by our negligence, for fraud or fraudulent misrepresentation, for any breach of the consumer guarantees in the Australian Consumer Law that cannot lawfully be excluded, or for any other liability that cannot lawfully be excluded or limited.
13 — Indemnification
You agree to indemnify, defend, and hold harmless Hookvale and its officers, employees, contractors, and agents from and against any claims, damages, losses, liabilities, costs, and expenses (including reasonable legal fees) arising out of or in connection with: (a) your use or misuse of the Site or Services; (b) your breach of these Terms; (c) your User Content; or (d) your violation of any law or any third-party right.
14 — Suspension & termination
We may suspend, restrict, or terminate your access to the Site or Services, in whole or in part, at any time and without notice, if we reasonably believe you have breached these Terms or that your use poses a risk to us or to other users. You may stop using the Site at any time.
Sections that by their nature should survive termination — including sections 07, 08, 11, 12, 13, 15, 16, and 18 — will continue to apply after termination.
15 — Disputes & informal resolution
If you have a complaint about the Site or Services, please email us at support@hookvalegames.com first. We will try in good faith to resolve the matter informally within a reasonable time.
If we cannot resolve a dispute informally within sixty (60) days, the dispute will be referred to and finally resolved by the competent courts of the jurisdiction identified in section 16, unless mandatory consumer law in your country gives you the right to bring the dispute in your local courts (in which case that right is preserved).
16 — Governing law & jurisdiction
These Terms are governed by, and construed in accordance with, the laws of the Commonwealth of Australia and, where applicable, the State in which Hookvale Games Pty Ltd is registered, without regard to conflict-of-laws principles. The courts of that jurisdiction have exclusive jurisdiction over any dispute arising out of or in connection with these Terms, subject to any non-waivable rights you have as a consumer under the law of your country of residence (including, where applicable, rights under the Australian Consumer Law).
17 — Changes to these terms
We may update these Terms from time to time. When we make a material change, we will update the "Effective" date at the top of this page and, where appropriate, give notice through the Site or by email. Your continued use of the Site after the change takes effect constitutes acceptance of the updated Terms. If you do not agree to a change, you must stop using the Site.
18 — Miscellaneous
- Entire agreement. These Terms, together with our Privacy Policy and any EULA referenced in section 09, are the entire agreement between you and Hookvale on the subjects covered.
- Severability. If any part of these Terms is found unenforceable, the remainder will continue in full force.
- No waiver. Our failure to enforce a provision is not a waiver of our right to do so later.
- Assignment. You may not assign or transfer these Terms without our consent. We may assign them to an affiliate or to a successor in connection with a merger, acquisition, or sale of assets.
- Force majeure. We are not liable for any delay or failure to perform caused by events outside our reasonable control, including natural events, internet outages, third-party platform failures, or governmental action.
- Headings. Section headings are for convenience and have no legal effect.
- Language. The authoritative language of these Terms is English. Any translation is provided for convenience only.
19 — Contact
Questions about these Terms, or want to report a violation? Email support@hookvalegames.com with "Terms" in the subject line.
Hookvale Games Pty Ltd · Australia · Established 2026
ACN & registered address available on request to support@hookvalegames.com.