Since the first announcement of the Apple Game Center earlier this year, Apple has been pretty tight lipped about what elements would be available and how it would work… until now. They just turned on the feature that allows players to log in, and it offers a profile system, tournaments, matchmaking and more. The platform is available to game developers and will definitely standardize social and competitive elements across Apple’s iDevice games.

AppleInsider broke the news and released a series of screenshots of how users can log in, see their latest games played and add friends. You can also view the profiles of friends and more.

The more I look at the screenshots and proposed functionality, the more I realize that this is a gaming focused social network. It has more features than I actually expected, and draws from platform services like XBox Live, PSN and others. While it was rumored to be closer to the Facebook Games Dashboard, and certainly does have some similarities in the ‘games recently played’ area, overall this looks to be an ambitious platform that will allow Apple to own the user in a way they didn’t before.

In fact, you can even post status updates on this Game Center, giving it a Twitter feel. Having worked on social gaming platforms in the past, I can tell you that having profiles, friends lists, status updates and more immediately lends itself to a series of potential problems, and while it may seem easy on the surface, Apple is now going to have to start solving problems about fake users, inappropriate content, flagging and reporting abuse and other issues. The fact that these features are being implemented in the Game Center means Apple is serious about being part of the games development cycle.