Hadlee Simons / Android Authority
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TL;DR
- Samsung is working on integrating Gaming Hub inside Contacts.
- Users will be able to add Gaming Hub friends, join guilds, and chat right from the app.
- The features would appear in One UI 9.5.
The Samsung Contacts app is a straightforward way to manage your contacts, but an APK teardown has revealed that it might gain a fun new element to it with gaming-related integration that will let users connect with friends and manage gaming relationships without leaving the app.
APK teardown
This reporting is based on work-in-progress code. These features may not ship.
While looking at the Contacts app from a One UI 9.5 build, we found strings that suggest users would be able to link games through Samsung Gaming Hub, though it’s not yet clear which games will be supported. Users would also be able to access related social features like sending friend requests, inviting people to guilds, viewing gaming profiles and checking the online status of other players.
Code
Turn on linked games in %s settings to use them with Samsung apps.
No active games
Game info
%s settings For the feature to work, users would have to install Gaming Hub and enable linked games in their settings.
One of the more interesting aspects of the integration could be the ability to send friend requests for games directly through Contacts. There’s also a one-on-one chat option:
Code
Add friend
Friend request sent. The other person can accept it after they sign in to the game.
Friend
1:1 chat Guilds get a particular focus, with Samsung preparing support for users to invite their contacts to a guild, identify guild leaders and members, and access guild-specific chats:
Code
Invite to %s
%s invitation sent. The other person can accept it after they sign in to the game.
%s chat
Guild member
Guild leader
%s master
%s member We also find some new icons that appear related to these changes, including one for guild chat.
AssembleDebug / Android Authority
The app includes strings for displaying gaming presence, with separate online and offline statuses. A “Game status” label and an option to view a gaming profile further suggest that Contacts could display information about a person’s gaming activity.
Code
Game status
Online
Offline
View profile
This character has been deleted. Samsung has been expanding Gaming Hub beyond its original game-launching experience, with a greater focus on game discovery and social interactions. Bringing some of these capabilities into Contacts could make it easier for Galaxy users to connect with people they play games with.
