Current game network developers comment on Apple's Game Center

This is definitely a big move by Apple. Game Center is going to streamline the user experience significantly, which is always beneficial in building a platform. Social communities such as OpenFeint and Plus+ seemed to be mentioned alongside this Apple announcement due to the redundancy of many of their services, but it seems like the major aspect of "Xbox Live for the iPhone" is being ignored: Multiplayer.

While Z2Live offers many advanced community tools even beyond what Game Center will, we've also put heavy emphasis into the multiplayer arena; an area that has been historically ignored by other game communities in the iPhone space. Looking back at the progression of PC and console gaming, we can see that the gravitational pull away from solely single player experiences towards multiplayer is inevitable. While Apple has been a little vague on the extent of their multiplayer involvement, our SDK and backend services are allowing developers to build real-time game sessions today, host them on our servers, and engage in voice chat from device-to-device.

For those developers anxious to check out how multiplayer can change their strategy for gamebuilding, check out z2live.com and play around with the SDK.

If only they could get Dungeons and Dragons online working with Snow Leapord...... I would like to see some really great RPG's available for the Mac.

I don't care. I want my iPad 3G now !

"By Apple supporting it, it will then be relevant to people."

This says EVERYTHING you need to know.

I have quite a few apps from Ngmoco's Plus+ and OpenFeint but could never care less about tracking stats. With Apple's Game Center - this will all change.

I'm not overly impressed with OpenFeint. Though it could be how it's been implemented in the 1 or 2 games i've seen it in. (it feels like it was an after thought and coded from a DB guys perspective not the gamers.)

for example, I couldn't care less about world wide leader boards. 9 times out of 10 they end up with ridiculous (impossible) high scores from people who clearly hacked the phone (and probably stole the game) or cracked the game and got it to report whatever scores they want...

I only care to see how I did vs my friends who have the game. and I want a way to make that my default choice, not have to click through 10 screens to find it every time.

I'm open to Apple making something built into the SDK. Here is hoping it's design will take into account what the gamer wants to see at a given moment.

I think at best, Apples Game Network will help connect with Games on other Apple hardware. That is not really the issue; although Apples offering helps matters considerably.

You need a platform that networks with Games on OTHER Platforms. There are plenty of iPhone apps, for instance that 'try' to connect with their Facebook counterparts, but really do not in many cases. Many of those apps couldn't update the data on servers and existing accounts for the facebook flash based games at all.

Almost all gaming networks are walled gardens; very few cross the barrier of actually allowing one platform to talk to another, and friends from the real world? They do not always have the same hardware as you. They cannot always connect.

i think it would be Awesome if the implemented this into Mac OS X. for games like Modern Warfare for mac multiplying. like xbox live for macs. They kinda already have this for windows games, why not macs?

sounds awesome.
but then again, its apple....and apple doesnt like giving away scoops of icecream for free.

i think a perfect move would be to link points to itunes. imagine if you could not only compete against your friends in games but you could earn free downloads of music etc. the credit card company they work with does this one their card so there's probably some kind of structure in place.
if they don't want to make your game id your apple id out of privacy concerns they could always issue gift numbers like you use for itunes cards.

or allow you to earn free levels within games.

or even both as user options.