Advice needed fast - re the date trick

Target Platforms Mobile
1

Hi,

I know I already posted about this before, but I need an answer fast, so I figured a new thread might be in order.

I just woke up (it’s 8am in Belgium) and received a mail from apple that my game has been approved - at 2am local time.

So this means it was approved at 8pm yesterday evening in the US. I can’t find it in the store yet, even though my contracts are in effect. But I guess that’s normal. Right?

So now I need to set my release date. I’m guessing I need to set it to today (Fri Sept 18)? But I’m not entirely sure. Or did it have to be the date it was approved (yesterday), and did I miss my window?

Thanks!

2

After doing some reading, it seems like I’m sort of screwed, just because I was already sleeping at 2am local time.

The only reliable way to make sure you’ll get the dates right seems to be to set the availability date every day while your game is in review. That way, when the mail arrives at night, the date will already be correct.

3

I got to iTunes Connect 14 minutes after my email notification for Pogg being available. The release date I set was about 4 days away from what it actually ended up as, with the plan to change it to the current day once I was approved.

So, I jumped into iTuenes Connect (14 minutes after app was approved), changed my release date, waited a few minutes and checked the App Store. …nothing.
Waited a bit more … nothing.

It ended up taking about 15 hours for my app to finally appear on the store.

I think it’s generally meant to be a bit quicker though.

4

could you please post with what is happening with this and what you have had to do to fix the issue.

I’ll be submitting my very first app within the next couple of days, so any additional info would be greatly received.

Cheers,
Matt.

5

I couldn’t fix the issue. I’ll have to release an update and hope that will show up in the new releases.

I’ll also make a lite version. Maybe I’ll have more luck with that

I’m getting a few sales (about 20 a day), most of them probably from the toucharcade forums, but that won’t last.

6

You can just set the date to the day that the app was approved. Typically it takes 24 hours to show up on the list. In this case, your app won’t be listed exactly at the top of the list, because it will have a release date from the previous day, but it’ll still be up there. There is also some sort of caching that goes on with iTunes. It will show up sooner for some than others.

To get listed day of. Have the release date set in the future. You can go into itunes connect and set it to be available the next day, every day. Then once it’s been approved, you don’t have to do anything, just wait and it should be listed properly. You can also set the release date for far into the future, then upon approval, drop the date back to the next calendar day. You should give it a date that is 24 hours after approval, to get it listed at the top.

7

The next day? I’ve read numerous times it has to be the same day. Because they take the oldest of the actual release date and the approval date. So if you set it to the next day, the app will only be available the next day, but it will be sorted as released the previous day, so down in the list.

Or am I missing something?

8

Correct. Setting it to the next day will remove it from the app store, if it’s an update. Even if it’s a new app, setting it to a date in the future (even a day) is futile, because the release date is the date of approval, or the date set by the developer, whichever is earlier. The only thing setting the date to the future does is prevent the app from being downloaded until that date.

–Eric

9

I kind of wish apple would automate this stupid process.

10

That would be nice. Better yet, come up with a system that’s useful; right now it’s basically pointless.

–Eric