Hi guys, My new project has a user generated content element; users can create their own levels and share them. Ideally I'd like to be able to do this semi-automatically over the internet; ie, players can press a button and view levels others have created, and rate them. What pitfalls will I run into with passing submission doing this? Is loading user generated levels (not executable code) over the network ok? Can I allow users to name their levels? (will there be issues with the possibility of "bad" words? If so, would a restricted word list be enough?) Anything else to consider?
Loading user generated levels is totally fine. We have this in our game (Chalkboard Stunts) and surprisingly there were no issues from an Apple approval perspective, even on updates, where we've had questionable levels uploaded by players. Before sending a level up, we bring up a disclaimer telling the user that it will be downloadable by other users (duh), and they have the option to cancel out. I think this aspect of it is important for approval. In the past, we've had games not pass submission if they sent a high score to our server without informing the user and allowing them to cancel.. not sure if they still enforce this or not. In our game we made the mistake of not having a login/authentication. This means that anyone can freely upload whatever the heck they want, and some users abuse this by using inappropriate titles, inappropriate usernames, and in some cases even inappropriate artwork in the level design! In our case, we recently instituted in-game moderators who monitor the incoming levels and delete anything that's inappropriate, which keeps things relatively clean.
I'm sorry for an additional question butÂ… It seems to me that this kind of feature opens a gate for a free update of the real game's content (like a real level/characters/etc.) - what do you think? Maybe there are any restrictions for this "solution" but if we show an additional message for "free update of the real game's content" users will be able to update their game without any additional procedure by Apple for developers (like full game's certs)? BTW - assuming that the real game's content is marked as a content made by user(s) and it is available to download (/update inside an app/ a game) when we release the app/game Best!
