Ingress

Ingress Teardown [1.45.1]

10 years ago 4 min read

This is my third teardown of Ingress: 1.45.1. To get an understanding of how this works, I'd recommend looking over my first and second teardown of this game for more information.

With that, here is my 3rd teardown of Ingress

Fonts for Glphys

It appears the fonts for the expected glyphs have arrived. These named coda orange and coda red come in the form of .fnt files. These appear to be the expected format for fonts to come in when utilizing libgdx.

glyph-translate-success: {
  a: 1,
  b: 0.765,
  g: 0.906,
  r: 0.431,
},
glyph-translate-fail: {
  a: 1,
  b: 0.333,
  g: 0.333,
  r: 1,
},

.field public static final GLYPH_TRANSLATE_FAIL:Ljava/lang/String; = "glyph-translate-fail"
.field public static final GLYPH_POPUP_TITLE:Ljava/lang/String; = "glyph-popup-title"
.field public static final GLYPH_TRANSLATE_SUCCESS:Ljava/lang/String; = "glyph-translate-success"

Tons of files related to artifacts named "frozen amar" were added. I don't remember anything related to "amar" in the story. So this must be related to the unreleased glyphs. (I tried to view these .obj models, but could not succeed). Next version, I will try and demo a libgdx application so we can possibly view new object files.

Also in the "GlyphResponse" files were the following.

const-string/jumbo v1, "timeBonusBoostInMillion"
const-string/jumbo v1, "displayNames"
const-string/jumbo v1, "bonusGuids"

My understanding from the above code is you get items / bonuses and something called a "TimeBonusBoost" if you get the Glyph decoded correctly. This must mean there are multiple Glyph's to decode in a certain amount of time, with each correct Glyph earning you more time towards the next one.

It appears after 3 consecutive versions relating to Glyphs we are nearing the end of its development and moving into its deployment. We are probably looking at a server-sided check for this feature, or maybe it will launch in the next version.

SMS Verification & Unverified Limits

We first spotted this sms verification way back in our first teardown. Now, I've spotted many calls to "disclaimers" and "VerificationReminderDialog". So we might get a persistent pop-up to users who don't verify along with a set of limitations.

verification-disclaimer-color: {
   a: 1.0,
   b: 0.5,
   g: 0.53,
   r: 0.0,
},

This is also an interesting change to game play, because it seems being unverified will limit you somehow (maybe in terms of max level or max XM collected). The actual values and things of what will be limited is server sided, but the logic and resulting messages are present now.

This will hopefully stop spoofers and cheaters, because once their verified account is banned their newly created unverified account won't be as much as a threat (because their verified phone number is now banned), thus slowly killing the damage spoofers can cause.

Strange Portal/Player references

.field public static final PORTAL_KEY_CHOOSER_NAME:Ljava/lang/String; = "portal-key-chooser-name"
.field public static final PORTAL_KEY_CHOOSER_ADDRESS:Ljava/lang/String; = "portal-key-chooser-address"
.field public static final PLAYER_DAMAGE:Ljava/lang/String; = "player-damage"

I'm not exactly sure what this means or how a player can have "damage". Unless they are referring to their XM level.

Really confused on the portal_key variables. Unless this is a new display field to see who "submitted" the portal, rather than see who took the picture for it. Or it probably might have to do with showing a bit more information when choosing a portal to link to.

It seems the above changes also have an associated UI change. (which is shown below)

portal-key-chooser-handle: {
   down: portal-key-chooser-handle-down,
   up: portal-key-chooser-handle
},
portal-key-chooser-name: {
   font: small-font,
   fontColor: buttonblue
},
portal-key-chooser-address: {
   font: x-small-font,
   fontColor: buttonblue
},
player-damage: {
   font: coda-outline-red-medium-font,
   fontColor: white
},

The subtle references to the coda font, makes me think that it might be related to Glyphs

Rewards, Promotions?

When you enter a passcode. You are given a certain amount of AP and XM. Along with a handful of inventory. We now have an new field called "additionalAwards". As you can see from the below new call.

const-string/jumbo v0, "apAward: %d, xmAward: %d, inventoryAward: %s, additionalAwards: %s"

I discovered very tiny hints towards micro-transactions in 1.43.1. There has been nothing related to that since then, so hopefully I've was wrong on that front. (Since no one should like microtransactions).

The Obvious Changes

New graphics on the mod screen (uses the new graphics as seen in 1.44.0)
SMS Validation for a "Verified" badge
All the coordinates for the layouts changed. Probably has to do with the addition of "Immersive Mode"
The widget will update colors based on your faction either winning or loosing.
All sounds updated again. (probably to align with iOS standards would be my guess)
See DecodeIngress for more of the visual changes
There are new sound files for "captured and destroyed" portals.
- If you have HTML5 support -> see below.

Sounds

Capture Portal

Destroy Portal

With that, I leave you my third teardown. Enjoy.

If any of this is interesting to you and you want to help out. Add me on Plus and send me a hangout. I enjoy a second set of eyes when doing this, to make sure I don't miss anything.