Payment #

The Payment service in Pragma Engine manages the payment processes between third party providers and players which involve the exchange of real world currencies with items, in-game currency, and more. Studios using the Payment service take advantage of Pragma Engine’s content management system for validating the contents of the catalog.

Currently the Payment service is limited to purchasing items through Steam and operates as the “purchasing server” as defined in Steam’s How the Payment System Works.

Integration with Pragma Engine #

To use the Payment service in Pragma Engine, there are a few steps that need to be taken:

  1. Configure your Game and Social nodes with plugins. Add ItemBundle content.
    • An ItemBundle has a unique ID and defines a list of stackable and instanced items.
  2. Define your catalog. Add and apply ProductEntry content.
    • A ProductEntry defines the ItemBundle made available for in-game purchases.
  3. Use the SDK or API to retrieve product entries. When retrieving product entries, the in-game items are priced by the associated currency code and the product descriptions are referenced by localization.
  4. Use the SDK or API to initialize, finalize, cancel, and process in-progress orders.

In the following sections, we’ll detail how to get started with the Payment service for the specified third party providers.

Steam Microtransactions #

Studios utilizing Pragma Engine’s Payment service with Steam have control over their stores and orders, and support for processing and fraud prevention. For more information about in-game purchases with Steam, see Steam’s Microtransactions (In-Game Purchases).

To use this service, you must have set up the following:

  • A Steam account for your organization. You will need a Steam AppId and Steam API Key.
  • Login and Steam account syncing implemented using the Accounts service.
For more information on authenticating Pragma Engine on Steam, see Authentication Using Steam.