Epic games escalated his Fourteen days Litigation with Apple over the weekend accusing the iPhone maker of posing an unfair threat to the game developer community. The indictment, which appears in a file filed in federal court in Northern California on Sunday, centers on Apple's threat to ban the Unreal Engine code it offers to outside game developers to help them create their own apps.
The legal battle between the two companies resulted from a dispute over collecting revenue from in-app purchases, which resulted in Apple - and Google - removing the game from their app stores. Epic sued Apple, accusing them of revoking developer access to their tools. It also asked the court for an injunction on its pending litigation with Apple, which essentially allowed Fortnite to be back on the App Store pending court proceedings.
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Apple responded to the lawsuit with his words on Friday Actions are contractually approved, a claim that Epic disagrees with.
"Apple has only alleged one violation of such an agreement. This agreement does not govern Epic's access to Unreal Engine developer tools, distribution of apps used by Unreal Engine licensees or various other Epic Developer Program accounts for development purposes Epic's complaint states that Apple's actions are having an unjustified impact on developers who are not involved in the case.
"The breadth of Apple's retaliatory measures is itself an unlawful effort to maintain its monopoly and to cool any action of others who might dare to oppose Apple," said Epic's complaint.
Epic's argument that developers would be unduly affected was supported by Microsoft.
"If Epic is denied access to the Apple SDK and other development tools, Epic will no longer be able to support Unreal Engine iOS and macOS, and will build Unreal Engine and those game developers who have built, build, and build games on, at a significant disadvantage, "said Kevin Gammill, Microsoft's general manager for game developer experiences, in an accompanying statement filed with the court on Sunday .
At the heart of the dispute is whether Epic has the right to add a direct payment service to its Fortnite app to bypass Apple and Google's payment systems, and the Apple and Google levy of up to 30% on every transaction.
The iPhone maker responded and launched Fortnite and its more than 250 million players from its app store, prompting Epic to file a lawsuit. Since then, iPhone and iPad users with Fortnite installed on their phones can still play, but everyone else can no longer download the app.
According to Apple, the commission is fair and on par with the fees charged by other companies like Google with its Play Store. But companies big and small increasingly disagree. And it gets regulators to look into the issue.
Regulators in the US are investigating Apple and lawmakers on Capitol Hill are considering action. In a congressional hearing on antitrust law in July, Apple CEO Tim Cook was asked whether his company treats developers fairly and whether it is taking revenge on developers it doesn't like. "We don't avenge or harass people," Cook said. "It's strongly against our corporate culture."
Apple did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Sunday's filing.