Back in December, Epic Games won its case against Google, which began all the way back in 2020 when Epic launched its own store on Apple and Google phones and was subsequently banned from their app stores. Epic mostly lost against Apple, but things on the Google front went way better for the company. Yesterday, the judge handed down his final ruling, ordering Google to change its policies in some major ways. Also Tim Sweeney made a groan-worthy joke about it.
As The Verge summarizes, Judge James Donato ordered Google to open up its app store for three years, letting alternate stores like Epic’s mobile Games Store app onto Google Play proper. These stores also aren’t obligated to use Google Play Billing, and can point users to other download and payment options (a big sticking point during both trials). Additionally, Google can’t incentivize developers to launch their apps on the Play store or not to launch on other stores or on their own, practices we learned it engaged in during the trial to the tune of eye-watering sums.
Google has, of course, appealed the ruling. In its statement, it cites the Apple ruling, writing that “Apple and Google compete directly” for customers and developers, and that “The initial decision and today’s Epic-requested changes… undercut Android’s ability to compete with Apple’s iOS.”
On Twitter, Epic CEO Tim Sweeney cheered the ruling, writing that “all app developers, store makers, carriers, and manufacturers have 3 years to build a vibrant and competitive Android ecosystem with such critical mass that Google can't stop it.” Then, when Google appealed, he wrote, “Google has announced it will a peel” and tweeted a picture of Fortnite nightmare fuel character, and Apple trial hot topic, Peely.
Whatever, it’s a tweet, but I will always be fascinated by watching Epic try to figure out who it’s playing to with this fight. Its Apple approach, aimed at weaponizing players, could be called a failure, though it gave us some laughs. Its Google approach, aimed at being adults in front of the adults on the jury, was far more successful, at the cost of, well, being a bit less fun for regular folks following along at home, though it remains fuel for the "sir" school of reply guys under Sweeney's tweets.
Sweeney and Epic can never resist the urge to inflate the whole thing a bit too much, but at the same time, it kind of is a big deal. The Google trial jury ruled that Google has a monopoly in app stores and billing on its phones, and through the judge’s ruling yesterday the remedy for that is that it… doesn’t get to have a monopoly anymore, at least temporarily. It’s a big win against big tech, part of growing pushback to these practices. When I talk about these cases with my non-gaming friends, I feel a little bad for myself as I bang the table excitedly and they say, “Wait, you mean the game with the dances?..” Explaining the ways this could actually be good for game developers and players feels a little like carrying water for Epic’s ultimate crusade to make more money.
As a journalist, I at least have a professional excuse to care about this stuff a bit too much; I will never forget how, early on in the saga, I fell asleep waiting for a filing and had a nightmare that I missed it, only to wake up in a panic and realize I had missed it. My entire relationship to Fortnite has been a bit like this, an obligation leading to actual interest and a lot of early mornings and a grudging, growing respect for the things Epic is using its tentpole game to do, even if not all of it is good.
Epic recently launched another lawsuit against Google and Samsung, aimed at how hard it is to download its store on their phones. It feels ridiculous–another one, really?--but also it is in fact notably difficult to get the store working on your phone! We’ll see how those cases play out.
