Building a Video Games API with The Product API: A Complete Guide

Introduction to Video Games

Video games have become one of the most popular forms of entertainment worldwide, with millions of titles available across various platforms. From action-packed adventures to immersive role-playing games, finding the right video game for your platform and preferences is essential. Whether you're running a game store, building an e-commerce platform, or creating a recommendation service, having structured video game product data is crucial.

Imagine being able to search for video games and instantly get detailed information about each game - from platform compatibility to genre. This is exactly what a specialized Video Games Product API can provide.

What Makes a Video Games API Special?

A Video Games Product API goes beyond basic product listings. It understands the unique characteristics that matter to gamers:

• Platform: The gaming platform or console - PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, PC, Steam Deck, or mobile

With this structured data, you can build powerful features like filtering by platform, comparing games across different consoles, or recommending games based on platform availability.

Try It Out: Search for Video Games

Use the search bar below to search for video games. Try queries like "video games Elden Ring PlayStation 5", "video games Zelda Nintendo Switch", or "video games Cyberpunk PC". The results will include detailed specifications automatically extracted from product information across the web.

How It Works: Technical Implementation

Now that you've seen the API in action, let's dive into how it's implemented. This specialized Video Games API is built on top of The Product API which is an AI-based product search API that works with any product and any type of query. It responds with structured JSON and supports custom structured responses, allowing you to build specialized APIs for any product category.

The Product API's powerful custom_data_schema feature allows you to define additional structured fields specific to your product category, enabling you to create category-specific APIs like this Video Games API. For more details on how the API works, see the full documentation.

Understanding APIs for Product Data

An API (Application Programming Interface) enables different software applications to communicate. For product data:

• Input: You send a search query (e.g., "video games Elden Ring PlayStation 5")
• Processing: The API searches across multiple sources and uses AI to extract relevant information
• Output: You receive structured product data in JSON format

The flexibility of a product API means you can customize it for specific categories by defining additional data fields through JSON Schema.

Creating a Video Games-Specific JSON Schema to pass as custom_data_schema of search request

Here's the JSON Schema we use for video game products:

{
  "type": "object",
  "properties": {
    "platform": {
      "type": "string",
      "enum": ["PlayStation 5", "PlayStation 4", "Xbox Series X", "Xbox Series S", "Xbox One", "Nintendo Switch", "PC", "Steam Deck", "mobile"],
      "description": "Gaming platform or console"
    }
  },
  "required": ["platform"]
}

Using the Category Prefix

When searching for video games, we prefix the search query with "video games" to help the AI understand the context and return more relevant results.

Example Search Queries:

• video games Elden Ring PlayStation 5
• video games The Legend of Zelda Nintendo Switch
• video games Cyberpunk 2077 PC
• video games Call of Duty Xbox Series X

The prefix "video games" ensures the API understands you're looking specifically for video games and not other products.

Complete Example: Making a Request

Here's how to make a request to The Product API with a video games-specific schema. For complete API reference including authentication, endpoints, and all parameters, see the documentation:

const response = await fetch('https://api.example.com/api?search=video%20games%20Elden%20Ring%20PlayStation%205&with_image=true', {
  method: 'POST',
  headers: {
    'Content-Type': 'application/json',
    'Authorization': 'Bearer YOUR_API_KEY'
  },
  body: JSON.stringify({
    custom_data_schema: {
      type: "object",
      properties: {
        platform: {
          type: "string",
          enum: ["PlayStation 5", "PlayStation 4", "Xbox Series X", "Xbox Series S", "Xbox One", "Nintendo Switch", "PC", "Steam Deck", "mobile"],
          description: "Gaming platform or console"
        }
      },
      required: ["platform"]
    }
  })
});

const data = await response.json();
console.log(data.products);
Show more (23 lines)

Expected Response

The API will return products with standard fields plus your custom custom_data field:

{
  "status": "success",
  "products": [
    {
      "name": "Elden Ring - PlayStation 5",
      "description": "Elden Ring is an action role-playing game developed by FromSoftware...",
      "brand": "Bandai Namco",
      "image": "https://example.com/image.jpg",
      "custom_data": {
        "platform": "PlayStation 5"
      }
    }
  ]
}

Conclusion

By combining the flexible Product API with a video games-specific JSON Schema, you can create a powerful, specialized API for video game products. The key is:

1. Define your schema based on what video game data matters to your application
2. Use category prefixes in search queries for better context
3. Leverage the custom_data field to build rich, category-specific features

The same approach works for any product category - you just need to define the right schema for your needs!

Ready to get started? Create your own product API on The Product API and start building your own category-specific APIs today!

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Ready to build your own category-specific API? Check out our other API preset guides for chainsaws, sanders, hammers, and more!