Breaking

Fortnite parent Epic dares Apple to block its game on iPhones - Vox.com
Aug 13, 2020 1 min, 47 secs

Epic Games, the North Carolina-based developer behind Fortnite and other games, announced on Thursday morning that players who want to buy Fortnite’s virtual currency no longer have to buy it via Apple’s App Store.

The difference for players, however, is that Epic will charge them 20 percent less if they buy the currency from Epic instead of Apple.

Apple sells its music service, for instance, for $10 a month; if a rival music service sold subscriptions via Apple’s store for the same price, it would have to fork over as much as $3 of that to Apple.

So, over time, some big players, including Netflix and Spotify, have stopped selling subscriptions to their services from the Apple App Store altogether.

And in the past few weeks, Apple’s App Store policies have also generated conflict with both Facebook and Microsoft, who complained that Apple was barring gaming services they wanted to distribute through the App Store.

For the time being, if you try to buy 1,000 “V Bucks” in Fornite, Epic will ask you whether you want to spend $10 to do so via Apple’s store or $8 to do it from Epic:.

Epic explained the move to its users by describing it as new “discount pricing.” But in a post aimed at the media, the company went out of its way to point out that it was defying Apple’s 30 percent tax, as well as a similar one that Google’s app store also charges.

While Epic’s move affects both Apple’s and Google’s app stores, Apple is the company that clearly rankles Epic CEO Tim Sweeney, who has been complaining about the company on Twitter for weeks:.

While Epic doesn’t have the same kind of awareness of big tech players like Facebook and Amazon, the company certainly has the capacity to fight Apple.

The move also happens on the same day that Apple’s plans to sell even more of its own digital services have come into focus.

Bloomberg reports that Apple plans to sell bundles of Apple subscriptions to products like its music, video, and gaming services — later this fall, at a discount.

RECENT NEWS

SUBSCRIBE

Get monthly updates and free resources.

CONNECT WITH US

© Copyright 2024 365NEWSX - All RIGHTS RESERVED