Introduction to Third-party In-App Purchase

Last updated on April 29, 2024

Overview

The AccelByte Gaming Services In-app Purchase (IAP) integration enables you to sync player purchases from third-party platforms, such as PlayStation to AccelByte. That way, any in-app items that are sold and granted to the player from a third-party platform, will also be transferred to our platform, as long as our platform has the proper ID for the item. Items that can be sold include coins, bundles, loot boxes, option boxes, and in-game items. These items can be consumable or durable.

Key Concepts

• Third-party Store Integrations: you will need to use this feature to configure the IAP service, so that AccelByte can make connections with stores from third-party platforms, and sync purchases your players make on them.
• Item mapping: use this feature to map Items (including Virtual Currencies) created in your AccelByte Store, to items on third-party platforms. In-game character skins should be considered as durable items, while in-game virtual currencies, or potions, should be treated as consumable items.
• DLC Setting: use this feature to map downloaded content (DLC) on the AccelByte platform, to DLC on third-party platforms.

Details

Entitlements on AccelByte Gaming Services (AGS) can be divided into two categories: durable item entitlement and consumable item entitlement. Items synced from third-party platforms are also normally mapped to these two categories.

Synchronize durable item entitlement from third-party platforms

AccelByte provides DLC Settings to map the player-owned durable item to AccelByte's platform via DLC Reward configurations and DLC Item Mapping, then by using Durable-item Sync endpoints, the DLC is synced to AccelByte entitlements on the player's account.

Synchronize consumable item Entitlement from third-party platforms

AccelByte uses Item Mapping to connect the Oculus Items to AccelByte Items. Since these items are usually considered as consumable items, Consumable-item sync endpoints will be used and the sync process will consume the entitlements on third-party platforms and transfer the entitlements to AccelByte.

Service architecture

Best practices

When integrating third-party in-app purchases, we recommend focusing on adding only AccelByte Durable items to purchasable DLC. While we support automatic revocation of durable items in the event of refunds or third-party revocations, revocation of virtual currencies and consumable items requires careful consideration:

1. Durable Items: Automatically revoked upon refund or third-party revocation when synced with AccelByte.
2. Virtual Currency and Consumables:
   • If included as part of a durable item bundle in DLC Mapping, they can be revoked upon refund.
   • If mapped as standalone consumables, they are not automatically revoked and may require manual intervention unless specific revocation rules are established.