- Credits
- 56,039
The Epic v. Apple trial will be ongoing over the next three weeks, and aside from the Sony leaks there have been numerous other weird or fascinating tidbits mined from the examinations and court documents.
New documents presented as part of the Epic Games vs Apple court case have revealed new details about the cloud gaming streaming service that Walmart had been developing, which it pitched to Epic Games in 2019.
An email thread from April 2019 confirms reports from the same year that Walmart was talking to developers about a streaming service for games. The service, known as Project Storm, was designed to be an "open ecosystem" that allowed users to stream from the cloud or download games to a Windows PC and play locally. Documents attached to the email thread show that Walmart had been pitching this system to publishers such as Epic, and was planned to support for third-party launchers such as Steam, Uplay, Epic Games Store, Origin, Battle.net and the Bethesda Launcher.
Epic has provided new documents to help its case against Apple. one of these is a slideshow from an internal Epic presentation that lays out the different experiences Epic is working on or trying to develop.
Thanks to documents acquired by The Verge, Epic has seemingly looked into Fortnite skins for characters like:
We knew Fortnite was making Epic Games a boatload of money, now we have an idea of how much. Across all platforms, Fortnite made over $9 billion in 2018 and 2019 combined: $5.5 billion in 2018 and $3.7 billion in 2019.
This is according to court documents that dropped today as part of the Epic vs. Apple anti-trust suit. The documents was filed in January 2020, so before there was any data for how much Fortnite would make in 2020. At the time Epic was projecting it would bring in a decreased $2.8 billion in 2020 due to market saturation, players falling off over time, and fewer players wanting to buy cosmetic upgrades.
Though we don't have actual numbers, mobile analytics firm Sensor Tower has projected that Fortnite on iOS alone brought in about $1.2 billion in revenue before it was removed from the App Store.
One of the strategies Epic Games uses to get users onto the Epic Games Store is by offering free games every month. Now, thanks to the legal battle between Epic Games and Apple, we have a sense of how much Epic has paid to offer these free games.
According to documents released during the trial, Epic Games has shared the price it paid to offer games like Subnautica and the Batman Arkham series for free on the Epic Games Store. All-in-all, Epic has spent over $11.5 million on games to offer through the Epic Games Store.
The most expensive game Epic licensed is the Batman Arkham games, which Epic paid $1.5 million for. A close second is Subnautica which Epic paid $1.4 million for. According to Epic's internal numbers, Batman and Subnautica brought in 613,912 and 804,052 new Epic users respectively.
As part of the proceedings, Nintendo provided documents that include a publisher contract—though honestly, “include” might be a stretch.
Nintendo submitted 25 pages of nearly-nothing, blacking out the overwhelming majority of a Nintendo Switch content license and distribution agreement. As Kotaku’s Ethan Gach put it, “Nintendo’s Epic versus Apple court filings are more redacted than the Mueller report.” But Nintendo did leave one notable detail visible—namely, a stipulation that bars Japanese developers and publishers from working with the yakuza.
The agreement requires Nintendo partners to guarantee that neither they nor their employees are “Anti-Social Forces,” nor are they providing money or favors to said forces. Nintendo goes on to define “Anti-Social Force” by repeatedly using the term “Boryokudan,” which is what Japanese police and media call members of organized crime syndicates.
More updates are sure to come on this.
New documents presented as part of the Epic Games vs Apple court case have revealed new details about the cloud gaming streaming service that Walmart had been developing, which it pitched to Epic Games in 2019.
An email thread from April 2019 confirms reports from the same year that Walmart was talking to developers about a streaming service for games. The service, known as Project Storm, was designed to be an "open ecosystem" that allowed users to stream from the cloud or download games to a Windows PC and play locally. Documents attached to the email thread show that Walmart had been pitching this system to publishers such as Epic, and was planned to support for third-party launchers such as Steam, Uplay, Epic Games Store, Origin, Battle.net and the Bethesda Launcher.
Epic has provided new documents to help its case against Apple. one of these is a slideshow from an internal Epic presentation that lays out the different experiences Epic is working on or trying to develop.
Thanks to documents acquired by The Verge, Epic has seemingly looked into Fortnite skins for characters like:
- Samus Aran
- Naruto
- Katniss Everdeen
- The Bride (From Kill Bill)
- Snake Plissken
- John McClane
We knew Fortnite was making Epic Games a boatload of money, now we have an idea of how much. Across all platforms, Fortnite made over $9 billion in 2018 and 2019 combined: $5.5 billion in 2018 and $3.7 billion in 2019.
This is according to court documents that dropped today as part of the Epic vs. Apple anti-trust suit. The documents was filed in January 2020, so before there was any data for how much Fortnite would make in 2020. At the time Epic was projecting it would bring in a decreased $2.8 billion in 2020 due to market saturation, players falling off over time, and fewer players wanting to buy cosmetic upgrades.
Though we don't have actual numbers, mobile analytics firm Sensor Tower has projected that Fortnite on iOS alone brought in about $1.2 billion in revenue before it was removed from the App Store.
One of the strategies Epic Games uses to get users onto the Epic Games Store is by offering free games every month. Now, thanks to the legal battle between Epic Games and Apple, we have a sense of how much Epic has paid to offer these free games.
According to documents released during the trial, Epic Games has shared the price it paid to offer games like Subnautica and the Batman Arkham series for free on the Epic Games Store. All-in-all, Epic has spent over $11.5 million on games to offer through the Epic Games Store.
The most expensive game Epic licensed is the Batman Arkham games, which Epic paid $1.5 million for. A close second is Subnautica which Epic paid $1.4 million for. According to Epic's internal numbers, Batman and Subnautica brought in 613,912 and 804,052 new Epic users respectively.
As part of the proceedings, Nintendo provided documents that include a publisher contract—though honestly, “include” might be a stretch.
Nintendo submitted 25 pages of nearly-nothing, blacking out the overwhelming majority of a Nintendo Switch content license and distribution agreement. As Kotaku’s Ethan Gach put it, “Nintendo’s Epic versus Apple court filings are more redacted than the Mueller report.” But Nintendo did leave one notable detail visible—namely, a stipulation that bars Japanese developers and publishers from working with the yakuza.
The agreement requires Nintendo partners to guarantee that neither they nor their employees are “Anti-Social Forces,” nor are they providing money or favors to said forces. Nintendo goes on to define “Anti-Social Force” by repeatedly using the term “Boryokudan,” which is what Japanese police and media call members of organized crime syndicates.
More updates are sure to come on this.
