Fortnite, which had earlier made its debut in 2018 alongside the Galaxy Note 9 was reportedly going to make its way t the play store even before its release. But as of now, one still has to download it off the Epic Games website or from the Galaxy Store.
Tim Sweeny, CEO of Epic Games had stated that the idea of staying off Play Store was due to the high charges levied by Google on all in-app purchases, which was around 30%. But in recent times with the popularity of Fortnite, the game is making some serious money and Epic Games had in its own way made the right decision to not share its profit with Google.
This scheme might prove advantageous to Fortnite for a while but not having an app on the Play Store has its own repercussions. That being said, there are several Android users who depend on the Play Store for their apps, and for them, it’s difficult to use any other third-party source.
Although the official website is safe with bit-encryption there are some folks who still manage to spy and hijack players who seek to enjoy the games on their Android phones.
What seemed to be a long term plan for Epic Games came down crashing after Google went ahead to inform the android users that Fortnite is not going to be available on the Play Store.
According to a source that informed 9to5 Google the news came out as that reportedly the company has appealed to Google to host Fortnite, subtracting the 30% Google’s tax. The reason for this appeal was that Epic Games wanted to host their own payment gateway instead of Google pay.
Epic Games request to exempt Play Store billing system for Fortnite mobile was denied by Google. And Google has come up with an interesting reply to the scenario.
The company said that the Android ecosystem has several app stores and other platforms for the developers to distribute their apps. The business model and billing policy run by Google Pay allows the company to keep the focus and reinvest in their own platform and tools in order to empower the developers to build a successful business while at the same time keeping their users safe. Keeping that note in mind, the company wishes to welcome any developer that understands the value of Google Play and they also expect them to abide by the rules and regulations just as done by other developers.
Epic Games was optimistic in its approach to thinking that Google Play might at some point agree with them and allow them to bring in their payment portal. Several big game publishers like Tencent and Supercell had to agree to Google Play store rules so the news of Google not abiding by the rules set bu Epic Games was very much obvious.
Also, publishers or developers not using the Play Store’s billing system come under the direct violation of Google’s policies.
The best and the only step which Epic Game could possibly take are to negotiate its terms with Google to reduce the 30% to a lesser figure. Or, if they will stand against Google Play they can partner with a new OS and host their games on the new platform, which in turn can affect the whole industry.
Optimistically speaking both parties must come to a final agreement that would consider both the parties’ statements. But considering the amount which the players spend on Fortnite, it could be a hard deal to make it with Google.
