We’re pleased to announce the availability of brainCloud 1.9.0!

New features in this release include:

API Features

• Unity Client – now sends user language, region, and timezone to brainCloud server on login.
• Windows Phone IAP support – now able to verify windows phone IAP receipts
• Misc fixes and improvements

Portal Features

• Multiple Language Notifications – notifications will now be sent according to the user’s language preference
• Scheduled Promotions – promotions can be scheduled for a specific time range and can apply based on user segments. Allows dynamic pricing adjustments to be made.
• Segments – new criteria added to segments
• Misc fixes and improvements

We’re pleased to announce the availability of brainCloud 1.8.3!

New features in this release include:

API Features

• Google Play Store IAP Receipt Validation – clients can now validate IAP receipts from the Google Play Store.
• Misc fixes and improvements

Portal Features

• One Way Match Multiplayer Monitoring – new page to view the multiplayer match state and logs. Super useful for debugging!
• Global Monitoring – added a number of handy ways to sort/filter logs.
• Import/Export – now includes all cloud scripts and S3 files for the game.
• Cloud Scripts – can now define test parameters per script
• Player Monitoring Log – got a facelift!
• Game Config – added a max concurrent sessions parameter to control how many concurrent sessions a user can have running
• Notifications – now able to define templates and send to users
• Segments – added additional criteria
• Misc fixes and improvements

Game companies can no longer focus solely on designing fun – today’s studios are adapting the free-to-play business model and with it the increased focus on accessibility, monetization, conversion rates, social acquisition, and constant evolution.

With the new models and platforms of today, large developers are increasingly building and integrating cloud services into their games, to better tap into and maximize the Free-to-Play business model.

Given the essential nature of these systems, it is no wonder that many companies choose to implement their own back-end. In fact, as of August 2014, 49 of the top 50 Top Grossing iOS games were all utilizing custom backend solutions that cost millions of dollars to build.

Which is fine if you are a top tier developer who’s already had your big hit in the market. But what if you’re not?

A better way

Over the years, we at brainCloud have built our fair share of these back-ends — for everything from online casinos and arena shooters, to top-tier mobile games like Simpsons: Tapped Out.

We know from experience that there is a ton of common features in all of these back-ends, and that every custom solution ends up having game-specific logic and often significant compromises in it’s implementation. (And, without exception, extreme gaps in their tools support).

We realized that there had to be a better way. A way to design a system that could be used out-of-the-box by a huge variety of game types, customized where necessary, and deployed in a rapid fashion to support the tight development schedules and budgets of today’s gaming market.

Presenting brainCloud – a Backend for Gaming

And so, we’re pleased to present brainCloud – the result of three years of development, countless years of experience in the industry, and all our best thinking. We call it a “Backend in a Box” – and it’s so much more than the competing solutions out there.

We start with all the key gaming features you need —multiplayer, matchmaking, cloud data, leaderboards,achievements, identity management, social integration, in-app purchase support, push notifications — we’ve got you covered.

Add the confidence of knowing that if there’s something that we don’t yet do – you can implement it yourself using our Cloud Code feature (server-based scripting in JavaScript).

To keep you productive, we provide native libraries for all the major platforms and game engines (Unity, Cocos2d-x, Unreal) – so you won’t mucking about making your own http/rest calls (unless you want to).

And we’ve paired those libraries up with the most feature-rich tools in the business – that support your entire team through the design, development, testing+support andproduct management cycles of your product.

And finally, the best for last – we’ve built upon this platform a set of advanced Promotions features that enable you to identify and target key segments of your player base and engaged them in individualized promotions – providing you the means to increase conversion, retention, and engagement – igniting your game’s monetization to new levels.

I look forward to taking a deeper dive into brainCloud with you in the coming weeks – stay tuned – and happy coding!

We’re pleased to announce the availability of brainCloud 1.8.2!

New features in this release include:

API Features

• Update Shared Entities – clients can now make updates to shared player entities.
• Misc fixes and improvements

Portal Features

• API Explorer – The API explorer now automatically uses your email address for authentication. As well navigating away from the page and back again will save your session state.
• Misc fixes and improvements

We’re pleased to announce the availability of brainCloud 1.8.1!

New features in this release include

API Features

• Global Entity Count – new API to request Global Entity Counts from the portal before fetching the data itself.
• Misc fixes and improvements

Portal Features

• New Leaderboard Type – now you can define a leaderboard that always takes the last score posted. In the portal, use the “LAST_VALUE” type.
• Global Entity Improvements – the portal provides options to filter and delete Global Entities displayed in the Global Monitoring section.
• Misc Fixes

We’re pleased to announce the availability of brainCloud 1.8 – and along with that announce that from here on out we’ll be updating brainCloud every two weeks!

New features in this release include:

API Features

• Misc fixes and improvements

Portal Features

• Online Support – we’ve integrated with intercom.io to give you the best support experience possible. If you need assistance, just click on the green [?] in the bottom-right-hand corner of the screen, and we’ll help!  Note – you can also e-mail support@18.220.113.13.
• Product + Pricing revamp – we’ve totally re-designed our product and pricing management system to make it easier to use (and to pave the way for more powerful features coming soon!)
• Forgot Password support – now if you forget your brainCloud password, you won’t need another administrator to reset it for you!
• New leaderboard configuration screen – better, more intuitive layout!

We’re pleased to announce the release of brainCloud 1.7.0!

This brainCloud update brings the following new features:

API Features

• Singleton support added to Global Entities API
• Expiry support added to Global Entities API

Portal Features

• Analytics – basic analytics support with Dashboard!
• Display of Async Turn-by-Turn matches in the Portal (Player Monitoring)
• Custom file support – upload files to be available for client download
• Added MatchMaking to API Tester
• Improved Quest creation/management screens
• New Pacer configuration

We’re pleased to announce that we have released brainCloud version 1.6 to the world! Included in this version of brainCloud are many key features including:

• Windows 8 Support
• Windows Store In-app Purchase Support
• Global Entities API
• Shared Data API
• OneWay Multiplayer Support
• Matchmaking API
• New API Explorer
• Support for Real-time Facebook Payments and disputes
• And much, much more!

brainCloud platform 1.6 is compatible with older versions of our client libraries, but we recommend that you all upgrade to the latest SDKs to take advantage of the new features!

Hi folks

As you may have noticed, we’ve kicked our web portal development into high gear!  We’ve recently expanded our web team, and are moving mountains to get brainCloud ready for it’s upcoming beta and 2.0 release!

We apologize ahead-of-time if things get a bit confusing while we move the feature-set around to improve the brainCloud experience.

Be sure to notify your account rep if you find you are blocked or confused – and we’ll jump in right away to help!

Happy coding!

The brainCloud Team