Google's Role To Play In Epic Games' Battle Over 'Fortnite' On Smart Devices

Since the start of Epic Games' legal battles with Apple and Google over “Fortnite,” much of the focus has been directed at Apple. The attention seemed justified, as Apple remains a tech behemoth with its fingers in almost any pie it can touch, whether it’s smart devices, computers, smart cars, or in this particular case - digital marketplaces.

Epic Games and its CEO Tim Sweeney have repeatedly criticized Apple for the 30% revenue cut developers must pay to have their app on its store. Sweeney has stated that Apple's cut stifles competition and limits the growth of independent game developers.

Highlighting the issue, Epic in December 2018 launched the Epic Games Store to compete on PC with Steam, a video game distribution service owned by Valve Software. Epic Games Store took just a 12% cut of game revenue compared to Steam’s 30%.

“Why 12%? We chose this number to provide a super-competitive deal for partners while building an enduring and profitable store business for Epic,” Sweeney posted on Twitter in April 2019. “From that 12%, we net around 5% after direct costs and that could grow to 6-7% with greater economies of scale.”

In the case of Google, Epic has made similar arguments against the Google Play Store that it has against Apple’s App Store. Sweeney argued that the 30% revenue cut limited developers and attempted to circumvent this by requesting an exemption on the platform when “Fortnite” launched on Android. Epic and Sweeney argued that while an exemption didn’t seem possible on iOS because there were no apparent alternative means to download apps, those means were available on Android.

“Epic doesn’t seek a special exception for ourselves; rather we expect to see a general change to smartphone industry practices in this regard,” Epic said in a 2018 press release. “We have asked that Google not enforce its publicly stated expectation that products distributed through Google Play use Google’s payment service for in-app purchase.”

When Google refused, “Fortnite” was pulled outright from the Play Store in August 2018. However, “Fortnite” returned to the Play Store in April 2020 after 18 months off the platform.

“After 18 months of operating Fortnite on Android outside of the Google Play Store, we’ve come to a basic realization,” Epic said in an April press release. “Google puts software downloadable outside of Google Play at a disadvantage, through technical and business measures such as scary, repetitive security pop-ups for downloaded and updated software, restrictive manufacturer and carrier agreements and dealings, Google public relations characterizing third party software sources as malware, and new efforts such as Google Play Protect to outright block software obtained outside the Google Play store.”

This may be an important factor in both Epic’s lawsuit against Google after “Fortnite” was pulled from the Play Store, but also in antitrust investigations looming over Google, Apple, Amazon and Facebook. Opponents like Epic may argue that Google, which has a larger share than Apple on devices, has intentionally undermined competition.

Google continues to insist that anything involving its platform fees or apparent limitations is purely to ensure the continued safety and operation of the apps available to download.

“For game developers who choose to use the Play Store, we have consistent policies that are fair to developers and keep the store safe for users,” Google said in a press release Thursday following the removal of "Fortnite."