Fortnite and Epic Games are having an incredibly busy month. As many players know, Fortnite started its Season 4 Marvel event very recently and it comes with a lot of new content.
However, Epic Games and Apple are also in the midst of a legal dispute, with Fortnite at the center of it. Now, Fortnite players on the iOS version of the game are hanging on to the app despite it not being supported by Apple anymore.
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For those who haven’t heard about this up to now, Apple removed Fortnite from the iOS store earlier this month because Epic Games had apparently violated Apple’s App Store guidelines. Epic Games seemingly attempted to circumnavigate Apple’s in-app purchases fee on Fortnite by offering players the ability to purchase V-Bucks directly from Epic Games on the Fortnite app. Subsequently, Apple announced it would not continue to support the game on iOS, and players on the Fortnite app are now seeing the fallout from that decision.
Following the lawsuit Epic Games filed against Apple recently, Apple cut off Epic Games’ developer accounts on iOS. Now, the Fortnite app has no way of seeing new updates, and players are sharing screenshots of what the app and in-game lobbies look like now. One user shared a post on Reddit titled, “So this is what iOS Fortnite looks like now. Depressingly empty.” It’s true, as the lobby simply shows an empty blue lobby with one player character in the middle.
Other players are sharing screenshots of error messages stating that the game needs to be updated and restarted to play the game. Obviously, there’s no way for players to actually do that so players are simply barred from playing Fortnite on iOS now. This is just one part of Apple’s overall retaliation against Epic Games and it’s certainly starting to have an effect. With players unable to access the game in any meaningful way, it’s essentially a useless application taking up space.
Though as people have seen before with apps like Flappy Bird or PS4 users with P.T., hardware with discontinued applications on them are sort of a novelty. As a result, many previous owners of the app will likely hold on to it for that exact reason. It’s important to note that Epic is giving Android users another option despite the Google Play ban on Fortnite. Epic is actually emailing Android users who downloaded the game with a couple of ways to update the app and continue playing, but no such option for Apple exists as of yet.
Fortnite is out now for PC, PS4, Switch, and Xbox One, with PS5 and Xbox Series X versions also in development.
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