So I watched the 2016 session 'What's New in Game Center' a great update on the 2011 and 2013 Game Center sessions. Moving from a restricted Game Center approach to a more Cloud Based approach.
What I liked about the GKGameSession framework:
- Larger player count limits. 2-16 Real-Time players opposed to 2-4 in GKMatch. 2-100 players Turn Based instead of 2-16 players with GKTurnedBasedMatch. Opening the door for more real time party type of games.
- Combine Turn Based with Real-Time (This is amazing).
- No specific structure. In GKTurnBasedMatch it was very specific in which order the messages were being sent, you had all the freedom in GKGameSession which opened the door to all kinds of use cases.
- Easy way to get people into your game by sharing the URL.
I got so excited after watching that video (from 2016) I wanted to make all sorts of cool things with it only to find out now in iOS13 it is totally deprecated. Did they ever mention why? I am so dissapointed!!!
I know it didn't have Match Making, but that was limited anyways to "whoever wanted to play a game". I saw potential to have a public Cloud Kit database that holds the ELO-ranking of Game Kit players playing my game, then when a player likes to play a game you could retrieve the players marked with wanting to play a game and do your own algoritm to see if it's a match and if so fetch the URL and join the game. Or have a closed session where you shared the URL with your friends over iMessage or WhatsApp. GKGameSession had so much potential especially in the bridge between Turn Based and Real Time. Hopefully they will give it some love soon.
So, again, my question.. What happened to GKGameSession?
