In a strategic move, Epic Games has announced its plans to bring back Fortnite to the iPhone and iPad through AltStore, a third-party app store, in the European Union. The return marks a turning point in the relationship between Epic Games and app distribution platforms, and will soon allow us to play Fortnite on our iPhone or iPad while we wait for the launch of their own app store.
A partial turn, but definitely good news
Yesterday, AltStore announced that it will allow the arrival of third-party apps, including that now we can use Torrent apps on the iPhone. One of the first third-party stores in Europe will be, at least for now, the home of Fortnite. For now, because Epic Games has already announced plans to bring its own app store to the iPhone and iPad. A store that, undoubtedly, will be led by marketing Fortnite itself.
Although it is expected that access to the game is free, let’s remember that installing AltStore requires a payment of 1.82 euros per year, including taxes.
Beyond reintroducing Fortnite on mobile devices through AltStore, Epic Games has announced its intention to expand its presence in mobile app stores that ‘offer all developers a fair deal.’ In line with this policy, Epic has decided to remove Fortnite and other titles from the Samsung Galaxy Store in protest of Samsung’s decision to block the installation of apps from external sources on their devices, calling it an ‘anticompetitive decision.’
In the rest of the world, the legal actions taken by Epic against Apple (and also against Google) do not seem to indicate that the game will return soon to the main app store in the market. Since then, the relationship between Epic Games and the stores that provided the platform for its success has deteriorated. While Metallica arrives on Fortnite, we won’t be seeing a change in this dynamic any time soon, but in the meantime, the first steps are being taken for the return of Fortnite.
