Require override for callbacks?

[gregmaletic]

Very naive question here, and sort of a philosophical one. Would it make sense for PlaydateGame callbacks (update(), gameWillPause(), etc.) to have nil implementations provided in PlaydateGame, thereby requiring the a dev to use an override keyword to implement them?

The benefits are largely the ones that that come from the override keyword in other contexts:

1. Clarity and intent: these methods are not just any method. They purposely need to conform to a specified signature.
2. Compiler safety: it becomes impossible to misspell the method names, or incorrectly specify their signatures.

[gregmaletic]

I should have looked at the implementation first: PlaydateGame is a protocol extension, not a class. It does define these callbacks, though the override keyword isn't needed for the developer's implementation.

I still kinda like having a keyword to override these implementations! But I get the possible benefits for making PlaydateGame a protocol.

[finnvoor]

I think this is a good point, I don't think there was any specific reason I chose a protocol over an open class. An open class is probably slightly more idiomatic in this case, and I like the benefit of override and also allowing you to instantiate an "empty" game.