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This has nothing to do with CPU architecture.

It's a little related. The languages typically used for iOS programming encourage the use of data types whose size matches the CPU architecture's bitness. Thus, careless programmers will end up using 32-bit integer types on 32-bit devices, and 64-bit types on 64-bit devices.

I really doubt this is in any way linked to Apple's reasons for dropping 32-bit, though.

"The reason that some iOS devices are unable to connect to live chess games is because of a limit in 32bit devices which cannot handle gameIDs above 2,147,483,647."

That is a combination of code and architecture, not architecture alone.

This is simply because they're taking an integer from their database as an auto incrementing ID and converting it directly into a native integer on the iOS device thus breaking it. They could work around this any number of ways.

It's a pretty lame bug, to be honest and certainly something easily foreseeable as this wasn't an overnight occurrence.

How so? A 32 bit platform doesn't mean you're limited to 32 bit ints....