Epic Games Aiming to Recruit 'Coalition of Apple Critics' to Fight App Store Policies

[robertcoogan]

Epic is sad and laughable. Apple is indiscriminate.

 

[mariusignorello]

Yeah, they can kiss that dev account goodbye. Apple might as well terminate them now. This is getting extremely childish.

No matter what happens from this case, I think I would have a hard time doing business with them moving forward given the tactics they’ve chosen to use.

 

[mrcloaked]

Remind me.

 

[sirozha]

I have little to no sympathy for Tim Sweeney and Epic Games. Mr. Sweeney has an estimated net worth of $5.3 billion and the company has estimated revenues of $5 billion for 2020. I'm not complaining that he is rich and I am not. I am thinking much of what Epic wants is to make more more without investing anything and they are well rewarded in their current model. Mr Sweeney has turned childish and taken to arms to save us, the consumer. Balderdash, it does not smell good in that pity party room.

During the pandemic quaratines, players logged billion of hours of usage and the company was taking in $400 million per month. Did Epic help out anyone with a temporary cost reduction? They did give some games away for free, but that is mostly a non-event since in-game purchases are where their money is made in most of their games. The company'sjustification was the you can play for free. Clearly players put out lots of money for new skins and other visual enhancements. How much of those revenues might have helped families in need from losing their jobs?

Assume the IAP cost never existed. Would Epic really be charging $8 instead of $10 for in-game currency. No. Simple human economic visuals would say pricing would never be $8. Who pays $8? It would have been $10 and Epic would be making even more. The argument that they would only charge $8 (or $7, or $6) is only being made as a red herring to throw off the focus from their revenues. The company would work to make as much as they can, and people will pay $10 to get in game cash regardless of how much Epic makes.

I am sure if you ask people, 99% will say they want to pay less for something. The entire application market for mobile games demonstrates the "make it seem free since no one will pay". But once hooked, many people will pay whatever it takes to keep up with the Jones in the game, whether that is $7, $8 or $10. For Epic that means billions in revenue.

My gut reaction is Tim Sweeney is a rich and now spoiled developer who has a burr up his butt that he is willing to spend countless millions to bring satisfaction that he attack his Goliath. He is not setting out to save the developer world. It is his vendetta. His childish video is cute, many will like it, but it certainly paints him in a bad light. Other folks want in on the fight too. Hey Netflix...why don't you invest billions in building out an internet delivery platform....you certainly use enough bandwidth in my neighborhood to impact my video production. But they too complain about IAP costs while benefitting from the delivery systems build by many players. That seems equally disingenuous to me.

It's easy to complain about a strong App Store and a ton of users that a company is working to make money off of. Isn't Epic selling a game a ton of people want and they are looking to create an in-game monopoly to make money off of it. Epic already gave up the build you own approach to stores...it is hard, costly, time consuming, fraught with issues of risk, fraud, malware, review, protection, and much more. Epic is making billions taking advantage of all the distribution options that have take 10 years or more to develop. They invested nothing in it.

So Epic, and others, build something big and win, or work within the system that provides your success and keep building things rather than slaying your enemy by divine righteousness.

Let’s not forget that the App Store was created by Apple almost a year after the first iPhone was released with one reason only: to sell more iPhones. Originally Apple wasn’t planning to allow third-party apps on the iPhone platform. It took almost a year to realize that the jailbraiking and running unauthorized apps was happening because there was a huge demand for third-party apps.

Apple didn’t set off to create a platform to let the simple guy make some serious money. Apple created the App Store because they suddenly realized that millions of apps would sell hundreds of millions of phones.

So, In this epic battle between Epic and Apple, the loser may not be Epic after all. If this anti-Apple movement gains steam, it will blow up in Apple’s face big time. After all, Android is now caught up with the iPhone. Those who can’t get their favorite apps on the iPhone will get an Android phone and realize that they are not missing anything at all on the new platform.

 

[CthuluLemon]

You can be the most careful person in the world, until a trusted website gets served malicious ads.

Okay, so let's just let a company decide what is best, on the chance we run into a bad actor online. What's a little freedom in return for safety, right? Plus, nobody has ever found exploits in Apple's code, so we are totally safe with them. They've never slipped up and let bad actors gleam things like clipboard data every 10 seconds, or anything.

 

[unchecked]

At the end of the day Epic Games not simply pushing to get their own products on Apple's App Store and Google's Play Store, it's trying to forcibly open up their own store inside Apple's and Google's stores. They would have a case on the former, but they lost me on the latter.

 

[unQuestionable]

You want Apple to close the App Store for everyone? This is how you get Apple to close the App Store for everyone. This is what I would do, and I’m sure Steve would urge the company to do the same.

 

[fmillion]

Yeah, Epic is acting very immature about this whole thing. There is a right way to question Apple's system and a wrong way. Epic did the very very wrong way. You break the rules, you app gets removed. Its that simple.

I disagree.

Apple is threatening to revoke all of Epic's involvement with iOS. Like the article says, this could potentially impact the Unreal engine, which is used by many game devs. This may become far more of a big deal than just Fortnite being pulled. Apple certainly has every right to fight this battle their way, but there's the very real possibility that iOS will lose tons of game developers if they hold tight to this, and in turn could breed much ill will with customers of iOS devices who find their favorite games suddenly pulled from the store or at the least not being updated anymore.

I think Epic knows full well what's going on here. I don't see this as immature. I see it as Epic declaring a challenge. Apple has set forth its policies, and Epic is challenging them. As a matter of fact their behavior is quite "Apple" - they're the "crazy ones" - they're not fond of the rules, they have no respect for the status quo, and they're "crazy enough to think they can change [Apple's policies], and [might be] the ones who do". Arguing with Apple behind closed doors will likely yield nothing - I'm sure many companies have tried to negotiate with Apple and been told "no, we treat all devs equally". They weren't being immature to break Apple's rules, they were challenging them, and Apple responded as was expected, but in so doing Apple just made the problem far bigger. Just think of Rosa Parks - she knew what she was doing, challenged the rules, and willingly allowed herself to be arrested, which sparked public awareness and fueled the civil rights movement. Who's to say Epic isn't doing something similar?

The thing that makes this interesting is this is the first time that Apple actually stands to lose a lot in the battle if they hold their ground. The issue with Spotify is quite low-key - thus far, Spotify remains fully available on iOS. But Apple is actually pulling Epic titles off of the store, and threatening to ban them from iOS altogether. Epic has been a star player in many of Apple's gaming advances on iOS, and has been headlined in many keynotes. This is not some little indie dev who's annoyed that Apple changed the rules to block their product from being viable on iOS. This is a major company with a major product portfolio. Your opinion of Fortnite is irrelevant - it's one of the top games, and Apple is actually playing with fire here. Each side here actually has a lot of leverage to play with.

I'm not a hardcore gamer, so admittedly I don't hold much stake in the battle (I refuse to play games with consumable IAPs for one thing, and I'm also much more of a sandbox gamer than a competitive one - Minecraft creative mode, Universe Sandbox 2, etc. are my types of go-tos for gaming.) But the outcome of this decision has the potential to drastically change things in either direction - either Apple rethinking their policies, or Epic relenting - both of these will set a precedent. I'll be watching with intense interest.

 

[pacalis]

That's a totally different issue. You need room 10 which is the digital right of ownership, or should I say, lack of ownership. In relation to the past.

It’s quite interesting, really. Amazon has a class action on this point because of their sale of content through their digital Store.

I just went to the EPIC end-user license. Makes you wonder exactly Epic is selling and whether is these business models are fundamentally deceptive, either directly or through omission. Amount other things it states “Neither Epic nor any other person or entity has any obligation to exchange Game Currency or Content for anything of value, including, but not limited to, real currency. You agree that Epic may engage in actions that may impact the perceived value or purchase price, if applicable, of Game Currency and Content at any time, except as prohibited by applicable law.”

That said, that Epic was desiging a strategy and campaign to violate Apple’s terms of service, the result of which prevented an Apple customer from realizing any value from their purchase, seems like something that was omitted from sales that occurred in the period before Epic executed their cute little stunt.

 

[Ethosik]

I disagree.

Apple is threatening to revoke all of Epic's involvement with iOS. Like the article says, this could potentially impact the Unreal engine, which is used by many game devs. This may become far more of a big deal than just Fortnite being pulled. Apple certainly has every right to fight this battle their way, but there's the very real possibility that iOS will lose tons of game developers if they hold tight to this, and in turn could breed much ill will with customers of iOS devices who find their favorite games suddenly pulled from the store or at the least not being updated anymore.

I think Epic knows full well what's going on here. I don't see this as immature. I see it as Epic declaring a challenge. Apple has set forth its policies, and Epic is challenging them. The thing that makes this interesting is this is the first time that Apple actually stands to lose a lot in the battle if they hold their ground. The issue with Spotify is quite low-key - thus far, Spotify remains fully available on iOS. Epic also has been a star player in many of Apple's gaming advances on iOS, and has been headlined in many keynotes. This is no longer some little indie dev who's annoyed that Apple changed the rules to block their product from being viable on iOS. This is a major company with a major product portfolio. Each side here actually has a lot of leverage to play with.

I'm not a hardcore gamer, so admittedly I don't hold much stake in the battle (I refuse to play games with consumable IAPs for one thing, and I'm also much more of a sandbox gamer than a competitive one - Minecraft creative mode, Universe Sandbox 2, etc. are my types of go-tos for gaming.) But the outcome of this decision has the potential to drastically change things in either direction - either Apple rethinking their policies, or Epic relenting - both of these will set a precedent. I'll be watching with intense interest.

Epic did a shady thing. They intentionally broke the rules and were prepared for it and are fighting. If it was an accident, this would not have happened.

Mistakes can happen. Even at businesses where if you accidentally delete something important. Sure you get a talking to. If you intentionally do something like this, you get treated differently. Probably get fired on the spot.

 

[CthuluLemon]

Epic did a shady thing. They intentionally broke the rules and were prepared for it and are fighting. If it was an accident, this would not have happened.

Mistakes can happen. Even at businesses where if you accidentally delete something important. Sure you get a talking to. If you intentionally do something like this, you get treated differently. Probably get fired on the spot.

Epic absolutely did this on purpose, it's almost like they have a strategy. You can call them shady, but the post you are replying to still stands. Apple has a lot to lose here, and they seem to be more reactive right now than pro-active. It could come back to bite them, or they could successfully stave off Epic. Epic is accusing Apples of being ruthlessly Anti-competitive, and Apple has so far responded by being ruthless. They are giving Epic ammo with each passing hour. Not to mention, Epic wasn't called before Congress last month. And isn't facing high-profile regulatory scrutiny the world over. Apple was digging themselves into a hole with poor excuses for policies long before Epic sued. All Epic is doing is riding the wave of discontent. If Apple lets them keep doing it, Apple will lose in the court of public opinion.

 

[DocMultimedia]

Fort Who?

Whatever. If they want to avoid running through the app store, just write good clean code that will run on a webpage. Either through a VM/steam or JS. You don't need the app store at all if you don't want it. If you do want it, pay. So simple. Apple originally touted the iPhone as letting you run "apps" that ran in HTML5 with no app store. Go back to that if you have issues.

 

[Ethosik]

Epic absolutely did this on purpose, it's almost like they have a strategy. You can call them shady, but the post you are replying to still stands. Apple has a lot to lose here, and they seem to be more reactive right now than pro-active. It could come back to bite them, or they could successfully stave off Epic. Epic is accusing Apples of being ruthlessly Anti-competitive, and Apple has so far responded by being ruthless. They are giving Epic ammo with each passing hour.

And that is why they are being treated this way. Epic knew the rules, thought about it, prepared a lawsuit and video, and intentionally broke them.

Again, you get treated differently if you do this kind of stuff. Of course Apple is being ruthless, and no its not giving Epic more ammo. Epic did the bad thing here. You intentionally broke a contract, you get the boot. You accidentally do something, you get treated differently.

 

[frownface]

Honestly, this just feels like a proxy war between china and the US

 

[michaelsviews]

Fort Who?

Apples going to win hands down. There platform, there rules, and EPIC agreed to the rules. I don't see a reason for concern.

 

[cpfoto2005]

If enough developers pull their app in protest and more people move to Android - absolutely Apple will listen.

I suspect that’s a very big “if.”

 

[Ethosik]

I suspect that’s a very big “if.”

Then maybe its not a big deal for 30%.

 

[mariusignorello]

And that is why they are being treated this way. Epic knew the rules, thought about it, prepared a lawsuit and video, and intentionally broke them.

Again, you get treated differently if you do this kind of stuff. Of course Apple is being ruthless, and no its not giving Epic more ammo. Epic did the bad thing here. You intentionally broke a contract, you get the boot. You accidentally do something, you get treated differently.

Not only did Epic do this on purpose, but they also spit in Apple’s face on top of it by having that lawsuit and video ready to go and now recruiting a mob to fight Apple. Apple might as well revoke their account now. Epic has no intention of making good over this.

 

[CthuluLemon]

Fort Who?

Whatever. If they want to avoid running through the app store, just write good clean code that will run on a webpage. Either through a VM/steam or JS. You don't need the app store at all if you don't want it. If you do want it, pay. So simple. Apple originally touted the iPhone as letting you run "apps" that ran in HTML5 with no app store. Go back to that if you have issues.

The real world isn’t a playground, people don’t have to be satisfied with taking their ball and going home.

 

[bushman4]

Epic taking on Apple in this manner is a loss for everyone. Litigation could go on for years.
Epic CEO make nice to Apple before they close your account.

 

[trusso]

Whatever your opinions on Epic, I think you have to be sycophantic not to see at least a little bit of the problematic road Apple has been on, and continues to go down.

As an Apple customer since the 1990s, and an engineer myself, it has been slowly heartbreaking. Similar to the sociopolitical sphere in many countries, the steering wheel seems to have been hijacked by elements seeking to use the constructs of power for their own ends, to the detriment of many. As I have said in other posts, I'll be moving to Linux. (I don't expect my little act of rebellion to make any difference in the grand scheme of things - but it makes a difference to me, and in the end, that's what counts.)

Wake up, folks. Stop giving these corporations your silent and obedient consent. Fight back, in whatever small way seems best to you.

 

[jgdeschamps]

So the parents who buy their sons and daughters a phone, won't want to buy Apple anymore since it doesn't come with their favourite games (not just Fortnite). Therefore, the backlash is a lower number of sales. I'm not talking about verbal backlash which there obviously already is currently.

As a parent, I rather buy a console to my daughter/son rather than a phone. And to tell you the truth, I bought a PS4 for my daughter to play games there (including Fortnite) because she was playing on her iPod, she is turning into her teen years and she realized games are lousy and limited as hell on iOS. And it was expected and not a surprise at all. Casual, free or cheap games is where is at on iOS, and we all know that since the early days of iPhone. If you want more intricate games, that's what dedicated consoles or PCs are for.
Facts of life: Macs are not included in that PC gaming category. They can handle 8K videos streams in real time video editing for Spielberg's latest and greatest; they can handle 250+ tracks of audio and virtual instruments for Trent Reznor without a hiccup... but AAA games are a no-go.

 

[topdrawer]

this would make a more interesting show than most of the stuff on TV+

 

[4jasontv]

I disagree.

Apple is threatening to revoke all of Epic's involvement with iOS. Like the article says, this could potentially impact the Unreal engine, which is used by many game devs. This may become far more of a big deal than just Fortnite being pulled. Apple certainly has every right to fight this battle their way, but there's the very real possibility that iOS will lose tons of game developers if they hold tight to this, and in turn could breed much ill will with customers of iOS devices who find their favorite games suddenly pulled from the store or at the least not being updated anymore.

I think Epic knows full well what's going on here. I don't see this as immature. I see it as Epic declaring a challenge. Apple has set forth its policies, and Epic is challenging them. As a matter of fact their behavior is quite "Apple" - they're the "crazy ones" - they're not fond of the rules, they have no respect for the status quo, and they're "crazy enough to think they can change [Apple's policies], and [might be] the ones who do". Arguing with Apple behind closed doors will likely yield nothing - I'm sure many companies have tried to negotiate with Apple and been told "no, we treat all devs equally". They weren't being immature to break Apple's rules, they were challenging them, and Apple responded as was expected, but in so doing Apple just made the problem far bigger. Just think of Rosa Parks - she knew what she was doing, challenged the rules, and willingly allowed herself to be arrested, which sparked public awareness and fueled the civil rights movement. Who's to say Epic isn't doing something similar?

The thing that makes this interesting is this is the first time that Apple actually stands to lose a lot in the battle if they hold their ground. The issue with Spotify is quite low-key - thus far, Spotify remains fully available on iOS. But Apple is actually pulling Epic titles off of the store, and threatening to ban them from iOS altogether. Epic has been a star player in many of Apple's gaming advances on iOS, and has been headlined in many keynotes. This is not some little indie dev who's annoyed that Apple changed the rules to block their product from being viable on iOS. This is a major company with a major product portfolio. Your opinion of Fortnite is irrelevant - it's one of the top games, and Apple is actually playing with fire here. Each side here actually has a lot of leverage to play with.

I'm not a hardcore gamer, so admittedly I don't hold much stake in the battle (I refuse to play games with consumable IAPs for one thing, and I'm also much more of a sandbox gamer than a competitive one - Minecraft creative mode, Universe Sandbox 2, etc. are my types of go-tos for gaming.) But the outcome of this decision has the potential to drastically change things in either direction - either Apple rethinking their policies, or Epic relenting - both of these will set a precedent. I'll be watching with intense interest.

This was to long so I didn’t read it. All I know is that developers who used epic to build their games should be looking to recoup their losses by suing Epic.

 

[4jasontv]

As a parent, I rather buy a console to my daughter/son rather than a phone. And to tell you the truth, I bought a PS4 for my daughter to play games there (including Fortnite) because she was playing on her iPod, she is turning into her teen years and she realized games are lousy and limited as hell on iOS. And it was expected and not a surprise at all. Casual, free or cheap games is where is at on iOS, and we all know that since the early days of iPhone. If you want more intricate games, that's what dedicated consoles or PCs are for.
Facts of life: Macs are not included in that PC gaming category. They can handle 8K videos streams in real time video editing for Spielberg's latest and greatest; they can handle 250+ tracks of audio and virtual instruments for Trent Reznor without a hiccup... but AAA games are a no-go.

I disagree with your tech assessment but I applaud your parenting. Edit: after rereading I agree with both.