Post by Synokoria in Halloween Otome comments

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It's quite common for Ren'Py (and other) games to get flagged as false positives by certain antivirus software. More information on this can be found on the lemmasoft forums (The official Ren'Py support).

We're not really sure what to say about it "screwing up" your computer as the version we've uploaded has tested fine with others.

We have a few questions to determine what could have caused such a thing:

How did you download the game?
- Direct Download from itch.io
- Downloaded via the itch.io app
- The mediafire link
- Desura (currently defunct)
- Another location that we are not aware of
In what way was your computer "screwed up"?
What operating system are you using?
What antivirus software are you using?
What exactly happened when you attempted to run the game?

tigress7 years ago

I downloaded the app directly from itch.io.

I use Windows 10 and Norton Antivirus. When I tried to open the .exe file after extracting the files in the zip file, it loaded for a long time on my computer. It never opened and it caused my screen to go black and only the cursor and dock was seen. I tried to log out and it would not, I had to manually shut off the computer. When I turned it on again it was extremely slow, Norton Power Eraser did not run correctly and would not close after giving an error. My antivirus was, for the most part, disabled. The virus scans seemed to get stuck on a temp file somewhere.

After giving it a few days, it seems my computer is working as normal. Not sure what happened but my guess is that there was a virus somewhere.

I have the rKill script on my computer somewhere if that would be useful.

Synokoria7 years ago

Ah, that would be it. Norton is notoriously bad when it comes to flagging anything it hasn't seen as a virus. As seen in below links for games by other developers (including notable ones such as Hanako Games and Cheritz) and the Ren'Py engine itself:

http://hanakoforum.nfshost.com/community/viewtopic.php?t=1190

http://dl.cheritz.com/en/questions/view_question/2132

https://lemmasoft.renai.us/forums/viewtopic.php?p=155072#p155072

https://lemmasoft.renai.us/forums/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=38117

https://lemmasoft.renai.us/forums///viewtopic.php?f=13&t=43468

This is the virustotal results of scanning the .exe that is uploaded on itch.io ( you can try it for yourself as well ). only 1 out of 60 antivirus engines flags it as possibly malicious and that's actually remarkably good ( You usually expect at least 2-3 for lesser known files).

Based on your description it seems more likely that it was Norton itself had an error that caused it to hang on checking/quarantining the file than that it was a virus. Forcing the shutdown in the middle of Norton's scan would have been what caused Norton to behave strangely afterwards. My guess is that Norton was able to update/repair itself in those days after. As Norton is the only antivirus that seems to have such an issue with t his game (and this is an isolated case), it may be worth reporting to Norton so they can fix it.

Simply put, the PC would not have recovered had it been a virus (most antivirus software is only good at preventing an infection, not clearing it up. They can isolate files but any damage that is already done, is done. It's like slapping a bandaid on a gunshot wound)

tigress7 years ago

Thank you for the concise and clear explanation! That sounds like what happened to my computer. I guess all that's left for me to do is enjoy the full game!