question

Hi vertexarts, thanks for giving your valuable suggestion regarding app submission and live process. We understand your concern and we will forward this to the concerned team. Thanks again.

This issue is very important to our company as well. We currently have several games on the iOS and Google Play stores. Our most successful title has client and server components that require simultaneous updates (at least within the span of a couple hours) when we add critical features. Without this kind of control, we run the risk of incompatibility between the client version available to our users and the servers that need to provide multi-platform support. We would like to make our most successful app available on the Amazon App Store but have not yet been able to do so because of this limitation. Is this issue on Amazon's road map for inclusion in the developer controls in the distribution portal? If so, are there any estimates on when such control might be provided?

Hi Jason, Thank you for your post. We generally do not answer questions about future products or services, which this falls under. Please stay tuned on Mobile App Distribution Portal or Blogs ( https://developer.amazon.com/blog/index.html) for any updates related to this. But I have a query regarding this, If we provide that option in the portal so that developer can bring the app live, that time also you have to bring your server down during your back end update and you have to show some message (e.g. "We are updating our server") to the users who are using the client currently live. Why don't you do that before submission of new version of your client to the App Store? If you do that, when the new version would be live automatically after it passes through our verification process and user would start using the new version, your back end would be ready and live to get interacted from new version of client. Any way you have to maintain your back end compatible for all the versions of client. Providing a control to developer to bring the app live after review is done, how it's going to help you for better maintainability?

Thank you for your response. I think the primary issue here is that we cannot maintain backend compatibility for all versions of our client. The application in question is a mobile MMORPG. Because of the multiplayer nature of the game, its dependence on strongly-linked social groups (i.e. guilds), and the periodic introduction or modification of core features, we often require the user to update the client to maintain compatibility. For instance, if we alter combat mechanics in the game, we cannot support two users actively playing with incompatible combat rules. We perform many of our game updates via changes to data files, which do not require client updates and often do not require server downtime. However, when we do make major feature additions or engine changes that are not compatible with the existing clients, we try to ensure the smallest downtime possible. With Google Play and the Apple App Store, we are typically able to keep this system update period to less than two hours. A typical update process is the following: 1. Deactivate the service. This causes clients to receive an appropriate maintenance message. 2. Update the server software and/or apply database updates. 3. Activate the new client versions for Apple and Google Play. The time between us choosing to activate the version and it being available for download is typically 15-30 minutes for Apple and 60-90 minutes for Google Play. 4. Activate the updated service. This causes older clients to present a dialog prompting the user to update to the latest version of the client. The current Amazon system of pre-setting an availability date would potentially be more useful if we able to set a specific time (instead of just day) or edit the desired release time during or after the app review. The ability to set a "wait for developer" option and then click "release now" at some point after review would still be preferable, though.