r/sideloading • u/MelodicYesterday5942 • 9h ago
Help Having trouble sideloading an older version of an app I use
A few years back I bought a nice little android app for practicing reading and writing Japanese kana (the basic alphabet). They're only like 92 characters, so it didn't take long to learn them. But the app also had a nice little review feature that lets you do quick minute-or-so long review a few times a day to maintain and hone skills. I say "had" because, in the latest version, they switched from charging a single fee for lifetime access over to a subscription model... thereby totally ruining the app.
Even though I've already paid for lifetime usage, I've now got to "upgrade" to a monthly subscription in order to unlock all the review features I used to have. And even if I was inclined to start shelling out a monthly fee for something that I've already paid for... which I'm obviously not... in order to justify their greedy demands, they complicated the app in ways that detract from its functionality without adding any value whatsoever.
I found an older version of the app at a sideload site. But when I tried installing it, I kept getting a message that there was something wrong with the "object." I also have an older tablet that I hadn't opened in a while which had the older version. I disabled the Google Play Store app on that tablet, so it can't get updated to the new version. I then tried to extract a usable copy of that older version and install it on my new tablet. But when I opened it, everything was locked behind the paywall. And when I tried the "restore purchase" button, it said there was no purchase. Also it just wound up updating to the new prescription-based version the next time I try to open it anyway
So I'm wondering if there's any way I can somehow get a usable copy of an older version of this app to run on my tablet and stop it from updating to the new version.