Draw Something Data Usage

[Beaverman3001]

Lets face it, a ton of people play this game. And frankly I'm wondering/worried about how much data it potentially uses. I'm deciding which data plan to go with (Either 1GB/20$ or 2GB/30$ on Verizon), my usage will be incredibly light on the go, mostly email and web browsing, no video. But I do worry how much data this game could chew through due to how it sends a video of each play. Any guesses/estimates of how much data a round of this game takes?

 

[DS3]

I'd be shocked if its significant. Its not recording movies its recording the math of the pen strokes and then re-rendering them.

Like replays from full fledged games of starcraft/halo/call of duty, they can record 20 minutes of a bunch of players running around killing eachother and be tiny.

 

[Beaverman3001]

I'd be shocked if its significant. Its not recording movies its recording the math of the pen strokes and then re-rendering them.

Like replays from full fledged games of starcraft/halo/call of duty, they can record 20 minutes of a bunch of players running around killing eachother and be tiny.

Makes sense, maybe I'll go 2GB for the first month just to be safe and get a idea of usage. Have unlimited on my phone so I haven't ever kept up with it.

 

[flindet]

Suspect Usage Is High

My apologies if it turns out that I don't know what I'm talking about, but I suspect Draw Something's data usage is high. I installed it just a few days ago on my LTE iPad and started screwing around with it playing some games with friends. I exhausted my 1 GB that day!

Now, 1 GB isn't much, but normally it's plenty for me. And, yes, I should have been on wifi. Wasn't paying enough attention. So, whatever, called Verizon and had them throw on some more space.

I have absolutely NOT played Draw Something today off wi-fi. However, I have received alerts over cellular that friends have played and it's my turn. I've not used my cellular connection for much today, and it's already at 188 MB doing just about nothing! (This is after having Verizon activate the cellular again last night. Cellular was disabled until this morning.)

For me, that seems like a lot. I don't know for sure yet it's Draw Something. It could just be a coincidence that I noticed the problem right after installing that app. But I will say that app is what I'm most suspicious of.

I definitely think the game uses a lot, especially if the image has a lot going on in the animation. But I suspect even when not actively using Draw Something, it may have a heavy backend process. Is it doing something crazy like downloading the move of other players when it notifies me it's my turn? I don't know, but it seems like it might. So far I've found no setting to instruct it to do this only when on Wi-Fi.

So, anyway, yes, until we know more about this app, I would recommend to keep a careful eye on data usage. If anyone knows more about it, I'm interested.

Again, apologies if this turns out to just be a coincidence.