UE4 does not save it’s data in the program’s data folder. Instead it stores it in a folder in the root directory separate from the game.
Should store data in:
/Android/data/com.[comany].[project_name]/
Actually stores it in:
/UE4Game/[name_of_uproject_file]/
There are many problems with doing this:
- It requires an extra permission. (Makes customers suspicious and rightly so.)
- It doesn’t clean up on uninstall. The files stay there and you have to use a file manager to remove them. I discovered >2000 files in that folder from games that have been uninstalled.
- Problems persist even after reinstall. Side effect of #2. Asking a customer to install a file browser to remove a corrupted save file is not ideal. (Actual problem that I am facing)
- Other apps can access the files. This may or may not be desired but should not be the default because it’s insecure and prone to error if they are unexpectedly modified.
This is essentially the same as asking for nearly full admin privileges on windows just to run a game.
The addition of runtime permissions in 4.16 sounds like a step in the right direction. Hopefully it means that you have already fixed this as well but if not it would be an opportune time to fix this since you are already making changes.