Name: What Epic Games’ Legal Win Means for the Videogame Industry
Uploaded: 2023-12-20T20:08:00Z
Duration: 5 min 43 s

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Videogame company Epic Games has been waging a legal battle against Google and Apple, alleging that their app stores have monopolistic control over mobile game transactions. After a recent victory against Google, Epic and its founder and CEO Tim Sweeney are casting an eye towards the future. WSJ tech reporter Sarah Needleman joins host Alex Ossola to talk about Epic’s lawsuit and what these legal challenges mean for the videogame industry. Photo: Zuma Press

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What Epic Games’ Legal Win Means for the Videogame Industry

Alex: Welcome to Tech News Briefing. It's Wednesday, December 20th. I'm Alex Ossola for The Wall Street Journal. Tech Giants like Google and Apple run app stores that some challengers say operate as monopolies that stifle competition. One of those challengers is Tim Sweeney, the founder and CEO of Epic Games, the company behind the popular video game Fortnite. Last week, Epic defeated Google in court. The video game company alleged that Google used its dominant position to squeeze excess profits from app developers. In a separate lawsuit settled this week, Google agreed to pay $700 million and make certain changes to its app store after a coalition of states claimed its App Store functioned as an illegal monopoly. What does all of this mean for Epic and for the video game industry as a whole? WSJ tech reporter, Sarah Needleman is here to tell us. Sarah, what made Fortnite different from other games when it was first released in 2017?

Sarah: It was a totally new property for an industry that's dominated by well-known franchises like Call of Duty, and it came out free. Most of the games that you would have at this high level of quality for consoles were not free at the time. So that was different and the battle royale style of gameplay was still relatively new at that time. And notably, Epic released Fortnite on every platform it possibly could. And then it really lobbied to enable game cross-play between those platforms. So the different companies that make consoles like Microsoft and Sony and Nintendo, as well as at the time the app stores like Apple and Google, they all had to sort of work together in a way to make it possible for cross-play. And that's something that was championed by Tim Sweeney, the founder and CEO of Epic. And that was the first, and we've seen other games do it since then.

Alex: How has Fortnite popularity changed over the years?

Sarah: It was wildly popular when the battle royale version came out in 2018. Within a year, it had more than 250 million registered players. At one point in 2020, 15.3 million people were playing simultaneously. It has fallen out of favor to some extent, not a total drop off, but we've seen a bit of a decline in people watching it on Twitch and just, there's so many chapters, so many seasons, people got a little bit tired of it. There were competitors that put out similar games and then, you know, it was booted from the app stores, which is a big part of what's led to the conversation around the game today. But we did see the game made a really big comeback in November and we'll see if it sticks.

Alex: Sarah, you mentioned that Fortnite was booted from app stores. What happened and what was Epic's response?

Sarah: What happened is both Apple and Google kicked Fortnite off their app stores because Epic inserted its own payment systems into Fortnite for their platforms, and that went against their rules. Subsequently, Epic sued them and Epic had somewhat of a victory last week when a judge ruled in Epic's favor against Google. And so that was a big win. Epic hasn't been as fortunate with its legal battle against Apple, but that case is not totally over either. Apple and Epic both approached the Supreme Court, requesting the court take a look at the case and so we may see that live on as well.

Alex: So as of today, could you find Fortnite on the Google Play Store as a result of the conclusion of this lawsuit?

Sarah: No, not yet. Google is appealing and in order for that to happen, we'll have to see how exactly the judge rules in terms of compliance because Epic isn't asking for a payout, it's looking for changes in the way the app store operates. But there was a new development, a judge ruled against Google and in that case, Alphabet's agreed to pay $700 million to make changes to the app store. And we'll see some of those changes will align with what Epic has been seeking.

Alex: The new development that you're referring to relates to Google's settlement this week that resolves claims by a group of states that Google operated its app store as an illegal monopoly. This is not the same suit brought by Epic, but what does this settlement mean for Epic?

Sarah: We don't know exactly yet, but this settlement forces Google to make some of the changes that Epic was also asking for. Those changes were developers will now be allowed to use an alternative billing system to Google Play's billing option. And the settlement requires that Alphabet simplify the process of downloading apps directly from developers' websites without using an online source such as Google Play.

Alex: Let's circle back to Epic founder and CEO, Tim Sweeney. What's the significance of his campaign to challenge these tech giants, Google and Apple? Like what does this mean for the video game industry?

Sarah: It's a little bit of a David versus Goliath kind of story. Even though Epic is a relatively large company, it's still a fraction of the size of Google and it's also a lot smaller than other video game companies that make big blockbuster type games. And so what we're seeing here is a guy who's started out as a programmer himself and still is. He's been a true hardcore gamer since his youth and has really fought for the small guy. And at least that's the narrative he has definitely made clear.

Alex: That was our reporter, Sarah Needleman. And that's it for Tech News Briefing. Today's show was produced by Julie Chang with supervising producer Katherine Milsap. I'm Alex Ossola for the Wall Street Journal. Thanks for listening.

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