No amount of Marvel tie-ins or 1984 ad parodies could stymie Epic Games’ fate on the App store. As of today, Apple has confirmed that Epic Games’ developer account has been terminated for violating the company’s Terms of Service.
This means that now, if you search for any Epic Games products on the App store, whether it’s Fortnite or the Infinity Blade sticker set, you will not find them. In a statement provided to MacRumors, Apple says this removal is standard policy for the terms of service violations that kicked off this whole saga.
“We are disappointed that we have had to terminate the Epic Games account on the App Store,” Apple wrote. “We have worked with the team at Epic Games for many years on their launches and releases. The court recommended that Epic comply with the App Store guidelines while their case moves forward, guidelines they’ve followed for the past decade until they created this situation. Epic has refused.”
“Instead they repeatedly submit Fortnite updates designed to violate the guidelines of the App Store. This is not fair to all other developers on the App Store and is putting customers in the middle of their fight. We hope that we can work together again in the future, but unfortunately that is not possible today.”
Apple appears to be working its own public angle on this removal, as today the featured game in the Apple Store is PUBG Mobile, Fortnite’s major battle royale competitor.
However as Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney notes, Apple’s promotion of PUBG mobile comes with a dash of irony. After all, PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds and PUBG Mobile are developed using the Unreal Engine.
Epic Games is still free to develop the Unreal Engine for iOS, thanks to a restraining order issued by Judge Yvonne Gonzalez earlier this week.