Party Button

The ability to deep link to a party on Bunch as described in this document is not yet available to developers. To learn more about which parts of the Bunch developer platform are already available and what's coming next check Our Roadmap

Starting a Party on Bunch

Just like Bunch can send players from a Bunch party into the same multiplayer session in your game (see Deep linking from Bunch to learn how); you can allow players who are connected to play your game together (for example in a friend multiplayer lobby) to easily join the same party on Bunch. Once in a Bunch party, players come back to your game and can enjoy enhanced experience of not only playing together but also chatting at the same time. In addition, joining a party typically notifies Bunch friends of everyone in the party, potentially brining more players to the game.

You can do this by simply adding a Bunch Party Button in your game, without having to integrate Bunch SDK.

How does it work?

The Party Button is a simple button in your game, which opens a deep link to Bunch app. The best button placement and design depends on the game so we're happy to work together to provide design guidelines (to ensure it's consistent with Bunch branding and fits your game's look & feel) and figure out the best placement.

The way Bunch handles the underlying deep link will ensure that all players who are in the same game session will be taken to the same Bunch party when tapping on the button - instantly providing voice and video chat to people playing together. As such tapping the button will open the Bunch app on the party screen and immediately suggest coming back to the game. If a player who taps on the button, doesn't have the Bunch mobile app installed yet, they will have an option to download it from the app store, and - if they do - will be taken through express onboarding process making the time to the expected experience of being in the party as short as possible.

Party Button link

The link you need to open when someone taps on the Party Button looks like this:

https://bunch.live/partyButton?gameKey={$gamekey}&sessionID={$sessionid}

where the {$gamekey} is a unique game identifier assigned to your game by Bunch during the Game Hub setup process and {$sessionid} is a unique identifier generated by your game for the multiplayer session the player is currently in. Bunch will use the combination of the two to create a unique Bunch party id and add the player to it.

⚠️

It's extremely important that the sessionid is dynamically set to reflect the multiplayer session (often call a room id, a team id, a match id, etc.) the player is in. Otherwise it may result in players having bad experience of being connected to strangers instead of people they expected to be in the party with.

The Party Button link can also include additional optional parameters as listed below:

https://bunch.live/partyButton?gameKey={$gamekey}&sessionID={$sessionid}&
								inviteLink={$invitelink}&
								playerID={$playerid}&
								source={$source}

{$invitelink}: if the game is optimized for Bunch and is handling Deep linking from Bunch, you can include the encoded url of the invite link for others to join the same session. If more people join the same party later, Bunch would use this link to send them to your game. Please note that if the game supports another optimization method (like using session id instead of a web link) - including this parameter is not necessary, as session id is already included in the Party Button link
{$playerid}: Gamer tag of the player inside your game. This helps us personalize the player's experience on Bunch, which is particularly important if they don't have the Bunch account set up yet.
{$source}: Unique string that identifies from where in your game the player opened a Bunch session. This helps us better track how your player cohorts perform on Bunch and work with you to optimize it.

Next steps

Bunch Party Button is the most powerful when used in a game which offers optimized experience for people coming from a Bunch party. Learn more about it in Optimizing your game section.

Chat Button offers similar functionality to the Party Button, but enables a group text chat experience instead of video and voice connection. This can be useful in different context like a clan inside the game.

Integrating Bunch SDK enables a similar experience to the Party Button, but one that's embedded in the game and doesn't require players to leave the game or even have the Bunch app installed, in order to start or join a Bunch party.