Apple kills our hopes of Fortnite returning to iOS
Apple's war waged against Epic Games has been a brutal one to watch, especially as many fans are struggling to figure out the ins and outs of it all, but the bottom line seems clear - Apple isn't happy that Epic Games has its own internal currencies that they can't benefit from via downloads from the App Store.
As a result, Fortnite has been banished from iOS for some time. Although it seemed that hope was on the horizon at the end of these legal woes, it looks like we've suffered another setback.
Apple has once again terminated the Epic Games developer account on its App Store, making it impossible for Fortnite to return to iPhone as it had once hoped to.
Epic Games has been banned from Apple's App Store again
Click to enlargeThe announcement was made by Epic Games on its site, stating that "We intended to use that account to bring the Epic Games Store and Fortnite to iOS devices in Europe thanks to the Digital Markets Act (DMA). To our surprise, Apple has terminated that account and now we cannot develop the Epic Games Store for iOS.
"This is a serious violation of the DMA and shows Apple has no intention of allowing true competition on iOS devices." The statement continues, "In terminating Epic’s developer account, Apple is taking out one of the largest potential competitors to the Apple App Store.
"They are undermining our ability to be a viable competitor and they are showing other developers what happens when you try to compete with Apple or are critical of their unfair practices.
"If Apple maintains its power to kick a third party marketplace off iOS at its sole discretion, no reasonable developer would be willing to utilize a third party app store, because they could be permanently separated from their audience at any time."
What's next for Fortnite on Apple devices?
Click to enlargeEpic doesn't quite go into detail about its next steps, but it does outline a list of things that Epic Games has done to benefit Apple despite its pushback in recent years, including shipping an experimental build of support for Fortnite on Apple Vision Pro.
We don't yet know if this means that the game will come to the headset, as Apple has been continuously pushing back against Epic Games on their platforms.
It seems as though Epic Games intends to fight back against this ruling as it has before, but this is another significant roadblock keeping fans of Apple devices from getting involved with the game. The legal spat between Apple and Epic Games clearly isn't over yet.
