Apple has informed Epic, the creator of Fortnite, that all of its developer accounts will be terminated on August 28, and the game publisher will be cut off from iOS and Mac development tools, according to Epic’s court filing from Monday.
Last week, Apple removed Fortnite from its App Store, followed by its removal from Android’s Play Store, after Epic released a direct payment option in-game that bypassed the respective app store’s billing policy. Apple and Google enjoy a 30% commission on sales made through their respective app stores and Fortnite’s decision made a dent in their prospective revenues, which led to retaliation.
Epic had planned to pass on the savings to the gamers by lowering the prices of items across its in-game store.
“When Epic gave users of its app Fortnite a choice of how they wanted to make purchases, Apple retaliated by removing Fortnite from its App Store. Then when Epic sued Apple to break its monopoly on app stores and in-app payments, Apple retaliated ferociously,” Epic stated in its court filing.
Epic also says that Apple is restricting access to all of their development tools that are needed to create software for Apple’s platform, which means the development of the game publisher’s Unreal Engine that it offers to third-party developers will take a hit, although it hasn’t violated any of Apple’s policies..
If Apple cuts off Epic from supporting the Unreal Engine, the developers using it will likely move over to a competitor.
“Not content simply to remove Fortnite from the App Store, Apple is attacking Epic’s entire business in unrelated areas. Left unchecked, Apple’s actions will irreparably damage Epic’s reputation among Fortnite users and be catastrophic for the future of the separate Unreal Engine business.”
Epic has asked the courts to issue a restraining order against the Cupertino-based tech titan’s decision to cut them off from iOS and Mac dev tools.
The game is still available on PS4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, PC, Mac and GeForce Now.
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