It was a matter of time before a complaint against Apple by Epic Games reached Europe, a complaint that has already been filed and that can make things quite difficult for Apple, considering that antitrust complaints are taken very seriously. the European Union, above all when it comes to American companies.
The most curious thing about this complaint is that only Apple is mentioned and not Google, which also withdrew the game from the Play Store when, after a minor update, Fortnite added its payment platform skipping the App Store and Play Store, skipping their guidelines.
According to Tim Sweeny, CEO and founder of Epic Games:
What is at stake here is the future of mobile platforms. Consumers have the right to install applications from the sources of their choice and developers have the right to compete in a fair market.
We will not sit idly by and allow Apple to use its dominance of the platform to control what should be a balanced digital playing field. It is bad for consumers who are paying inflated prices due to the complete lack of competition between stores.
What's more, it's also bad for developers, whose livelihoods often depend on Apple's decisions about which apps can hit the App Store and under what conditions.
In the same entry that Sweeny has published on his blog, he states that the company has been hurt by Apple's anti-competitive restrictions and that the removal of Fortnite from the App Store was in retaliation for Epic Games giving users a way to pay the company directly.
The trial between Apple and Epic Games in the United States it is set for May of this year.