Fortnite is a battle royale game created by Epic Games, and recently, Epic has decided to release its own transaction method that bypassed the Apple App Store and Google Play, Google’s app vendor, due to large fees being charged by Apple and Google – what some customers have called the “Apple Tax”. In retaliation, Apple banned Epic games from the App Store. Google has also banned Fortnite from the Play store, but the game is still accessible through APKs or Android Packages (files Android OS use to store app data and can also be downloaded online), and downloaded directly.

Fortnite is a very popular game among both children and adults. Despite the number of people that think the game is dumb, there are also a lot of people that are fans of it, and the #FreeFortnite event is gaining more momentum, causing some big companies a lot of trouble.

What is #FreeFortnite?

If you have been on social media in the past few months, chances are that you have seen the hashtag #FreeFortnite posted everywhere. Epic Games started the #FreeFortnite event when Apple and Google banned Fortnite from their app stores.

Why was Fortnite Banned?

Both Google and Apple allow game publishers to include “in-app purchases” in their games, which are microtransactions where you spend a sum of money for an in-game item or currency – in this case, V-Bucks, the currency of Fortnite, used to buy emotes, character skins, and other cosmetics.

However, Apple and Google demand a 30 percent cut out of every transaction, which is a huge amount. For reference, most credit cards take about three percent out of every transaction. Epic Games, the creator of Fortnite, thought this was outrageous and introduced a new method of paying for V-Bucks, ensuring the company makes all of the money and offering a 20 percent discount to players.

As expected, Apple and Google were not very happy about losing their sweet sweet cut from those V-Bucks transactions, so they removed Fortnite from their stores, which made it impossible for players to download the game or install updates, although Android users can still download the game through Epic’s own App Store and other less secure platforms.

#FreeFortnite Event

After being removed from the app store, Epic retaliated by releasing a short video named “Nineteen Eighty-Fortnite” based on Apple’s 1984 Macintosh commercial and a 60-page long lawsuit that accused Apple and Google of being monopolistic a-holes that have total control over the market.

This event might allow content creators to give users a better experience because there would be fewer restraints. If Epic wins, they will get to launch their own App Store on all iOS and Android phones, posing a competitor to both the Google and Apple App stores.

Fortnite should be allowed back on the app store

Fortnite is one of the best games in the world and banning it was already hurting Apple a lot, but now that Epic has whipped out its own app store, Apple should let Fortnite back and hope that Epic decides to let the matter drop.

Why Apple did itself an Epic fail by banning Fortnite

Fortnite has millions of fans, and many people support Epic in its efforts to cut out the middleman of the major app stores. By banning the game, Apple is now facing a huge movement with thousands retweeting #FreeFortnite, and all this attention is also getting some other companies to rise up against Apple. For example, Spotify lost a ton of money in premium subscriptions because Apple took a cut of that too, and Spotify claims that Apple launched its own music streaming service, Apple Music, after seeing Spotify’s success. Several other companies, including Facebook and Xbox, have decided to come out and say that the lack of an app store alternative means Apple was effectively creating a monopoly and driving up prices.

Epic has been trying to get their App Store on Android and iOS devices for some time now, they were thwarted every turn by Google and Apple because they didn’t want there to be another competitor, but if Fortnite wins this war and prove that this is causing a monopoly, they could force Google and Apple to let the App Store onto their devices.

Apple better get this under control quick or a lot of other companies are gonna come mess Apple up

These complaints are only the beginning of what could possibly be a huge war between all the big companies. Epic, along with Facebook, Microsoft, Spotify, and numerous angry app creators and masses of customers, seems to be on the winning side. If Apple doesn’t find some way to get the situation under control, either by accepting Epic’s deal and letting them get their own launcher or unbanning Fortnite, more companies might decide to pile on and Apple might have a real crisis in front of them.

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In conclusion, this huge mess that Epic created for Apple might actually end up working and allow them to launch their own app store. If not, it would probably be good enough to take a good cut out of Apple, especially with all the big companies like Facebook, Spotify, and Xbox complaining about how unfair Apple’s 30 percent tax is.