Tim Sweeney, the headstrong founder and CEO of Fortnite maker Epic Games, has hinted that the game may return to the iOS platform in 2023.
On the last day of 2022, Sweeney posted a tweet that simply read, “Next year on iOS!”
He then replied to the tweet with an image of a screenshot or mockup of the game, featuring a player (equipped with the Jellie skin, if we’re being specific) looking up at the sky to see the New Year appear in fireworks.
There are different interpretations, of course, but the obvious conclusion – and the one drawn by most commentators – is that Fortnite, banned from iOS after a legal battle with Apple from 2020, will return to the platform in some form in 2023 Given the popularity of the game and the size of the iPhone user base, this is potentially huge, far-reaching news.
But how could this happen? Given the bad blood between the companies, it seems unlikely that Apple would reinstate Epic’s developer account and allow the game back into the official App Store. However, it’s clear that Apple plans to allow alternative app stores on the iPhone from the launch of iOS 17 this year, and Epic would love to release its own store/app launcher… revenue it brings.
We suspect, mind you, that Apple will do its best to make alternative app stores difficult and awkward to use. But Epic really has nothing to lose and a huge amount of revenue to gain.
Paradoxically, the seemingly imminent presence of third-party app stores on iOS would make Apple more likely to restore Fortnite to the official one. If iPhone owners are going to start playing Fortnite, the company might reason, we might as well get some money for it. Not to mention the fact that a game as big as Fortnite is available but limited to a third-party store could encourage more users to venture outside the walled garden, which is the worst outcome as far as Apple is concerned. Fortnite on the official store (which will probably remain the destination of choice for the vast majority of users), with credit somehow satisfied on all sides, would be a win-win situation for the companies.
In any case, if Fortnite is ready to make an iOS comeback, it would be a stunning conclusion to a long-running and ill-tempered saga. At the turn of the decade, Epic was one of the loudest voices complaining about Apple’s arguably monopolistic management of the App Store, questioning, among other things, the legitimacy of Cupertino’s 30 percent revenue cut and demanding that app developers be allowed to use alternative payment systems they bypass it. Indeed, the developer went ahead and unilaterally implemented its own payment system, which violated the store’s terms and conditions, leading to Apple removing the game and closing Epic’s account.
At the time, many observers sided with Apple, reasoning that Epic had knowingly broken the rules to provoke a backlash, and the judge in the companies’ lawsuit backed Cupertino on nine counts out of 10. (Apple called this a “clear victory” as it appealed the lone lost count.) But opinions have changed somewhat since then, with growing commercial and political pressure on Apple to relax its rules. Alternative payment systems are allowed in several areas, while the revenue cut has dropped to 15 percent in many cases. The plausible report from alternative app stores in iOS 17 gives an idea of how much the ground has shifted under the feet of the two firms since they started fighting, and we suspect Apple would like to find a way out of this conflict and at the same time to save face. If Sweeney can go a few months without tweeting anything rude, expect a thawing of relations later in 2023.
In the meantime, here’s how to play Fortnite on iPhone despite the ban.
