Generating PlayStream events

This tutorial provides an overview of automatic and custom PlayStream events in PlayFab.

Automatic event overview

As the name implies, an automatic event is one that occurs automatically with a normal API method call. Most existing API methods will generate PlayStream events.

Sometimes, however, you will need to capture events that are very specific for your game, and are not provided by PlayFab out of the box.

For that purpose, consider using a custom event (as described in the next section, Custom Event Overview).

Example

If an email and password pair is valid, the following API call will sign in a player with email and password.

PlayFabClientAPI.LoginWithEmailAddress(new LoginWithEmailAddressRequest() {
    Email = "my@email.com",
    Password = "qwerty"
},
result=> Debug.Log(result.PlayFabId),
error=> Debug.LogError(error.GenerateErrorReport()));

As a side effect, PlayFab will record a player_logged_in event.

Custom event overview

While PlayFab records a lot of events automatically, sometimes you need events that are very specific for your game.

The concept of custom events allows you to post events with an arbitrary type and name.

Similar to automatic events, custom events are fully reflected through real-time analytics tools. Unlike automatic events, you need a little bit of custom code to post custom events.

Custom events can be classified by entity. A custom event can be bound to a player, character, or title. An event entity reference is specified using these two fields:

1. EntityType
2. EntityID

Relevant API Calls

• WritePlayerEvent
• WriteCharacterEvent
• WriteTitleEvent

Example: Post your own custom event

You want to aggregate information about players opening various chests. Along with standard event information, you want to record ChestType and LevelID.

Unfortunately, PlayFab does not provide a corresponding Automatic Event out of the box. Use a custom player event to solve the problem.

Prerequisites

Your player is already logged in. In your code, you have a callback OnChestOpen, LevelID, and ChestType are passed into that callback.

Solution

Once executed, the following code will post your custom player event.

private void OnChestOpened(string chestType, int levelId) {
    PlayFabClientAPI.WritePlayerEvent(new WriteClientPlayerEventRequest() {
        Body = new Dictionary<string, object>() {
            { "ChestType", chestType },
            { "LevelId", levelId }
        },
        EventName = "player_chest_opened"
    },
    result => Debug.Log("Success"),
    error => Debug.LogError(error.GenerateErrorReport()));
}

1. The method receives ChestType and LevelId.
2. Use the WritePlayerEvent API call for posting a custom event bound to a player.
3. Provide a body, specific for your events and your needs. In this case we provide the ChestType and LevelId fields.
4. Provide an event name identifying your custom event. In this case we use the player_chest_opened event type name.