Privacy Policy

Who We Are

Shiverbug Studios Ltd, an independent game development studio based in North East England, UK. We are the data controller for the information described on this page. You can reach us any time at contact@shiverbugstudios.com.

Shiverbug Studios Ltd is registered in England and Wales, company no. 16485763. Registered office: Victoria Building, Victoria Road, Middlesbrough, TS1 3AP, United Kingdom.

What We Collect, and Why

The contact form. If you use it, we receive what you type: the topic you pick, your name, your email address, your message, a link if you add one, and the project details if you're asking about co-development. It's delivered to us by Formspree, who process it on our behalf. We use it to reply to you, and for nothing else. Our lawful basis is legitimate interests: you've asked us a question and we'd like to answer it.

Getting in touch about work. The contact form has an option for freelance, internships and joining the studio, and it deliberately asks for a link to your portfolio rather than a CV or any other attachment. That keeps a speculative hello the same kind of thing as every other message here: a name, an email address and what you wrote, rather than a candidate database, which is not something we run. Applications for our Teesside University intake go through the university, not through this site.

The newsletter. If you sign up, your email address is held by Buttondown, who send our emails for us. You'll confirm your address before you're subscribed, every email includes an unsubscribe link, and unsubscribing removes you from the list. Our lawful basis is your consent, which you can withdraw at any time by unsubscribing or emailing us.

Hosting. The site is hosted by GitHub Pages, which, like almost all web hosting, keeps standard server logs (such as IP addresses) for security. We don't see or use those.

Fonts. Our typefaces are served by Google Fonts. Loading them means your browser requests files from Google's servers, so Google receives your IP address and basic request information as part of that. Google states that Google Fonts sets no cookies and doesn't use these requests to build advertising profiles. We use them under legitimate interests, for a site that looks the way it should.

Visitor counts. We use GoatCounter to count page views, so we know which pages are worth our time. We also count a few plain actions the same way: a form sent, a press kit or trailer downloaded, an email link opened. Those are counts against a label, never anything you typed and never anything tied to you. It sets no cookies, doesn't track you between sites, and doesn't collect anything that identifies you. It records the page you viewed, roughly where in the world the request came from, your browser and screen size, and which site you arrived from. Your IP address is used only momentarily to work that out and is never stored. Our lawful basis is legitimate interests, and because nothing is stored on or read from your device, that's why you don't see a cookie banner here.

Where Your Data Goes

Formspree, Buttondown, GitHub and Google are based in the United States, and GoatCounter is in the Netherlands, so a contact message or newsletter signup is processed outside the UK. Where that happens, the transfer is covered by the UK's International Data Transfer Addendum, the UK Extension to the EU-US Data Privacy Framework, or an adequacy decision, depending on the provider. Nobody else receives your details.

What We Don't Do

No cookies. No advertising. No cross-site tracking, no profiles, no fingerprinting. No selling, renting, or sharing your details with anyone beyond the services named above. If that ever changes, this page will say so before it does.

How Long We Keep Things

Contact messages: as long as we need to deal with your enquiry, then they live in our inbox like everyone else's email. If you wrote to us about freelance work or joining the studio, we'll hang on to it for up to twelve months in case something suitable comes up, and you can ask us to delete it sooner at any point. Newsletter addresses: until you unsubscribe.

Your Rights

Under UK data protection law you can ask us for a copy of what we hold about you, ask us to correct it, ask us to delete it, ask us to restrict what we do with it, object to us using it, or ask for it in a portable format. Where we rely on your consent, you can withdraw it at any time without affecting anything we did before you did. Email contact@shiverbugstudios.com and we'll sort it, normally within a month and at no charge.

If you're unhappy with how we've handled something, please tell us first so we can put it right. You also have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner's Office at ico.org.uk.

Changes

If this policy changes, the new version appears here. Last updated: 19 August 2026 (described the contact form as it now stands, added how we handle messages about freelance work and joining the studio, and gave those a retention period). Before that, 26 July 2026 (added company details, lawful bases, international transfers, the full list of your rights, and a note about Google Fonts).