After multiple years, most of which has been spent in and out of court, it seems Epic Games has finally won its spat with Apple. Fortnite is officially back in the App Store in the U.S., meaning it's available to download and play on iPhones and iPads right now.

Fortnite announced this news over on X, putting an end to a four year spell where the app was banned from Apple's platform.

Sadly the change only applies to the U.S. — EU users still have to download Fortnite from either AltStore or the Epic Game Store, while other regions are completely cut off from the game.

Unsurprisingly Fortnite shot to the top of the App Store charts, and is now the number 1 free game in the U.S.

The story so far

You may have heard this story a lot in the past few weeks, but let's recap. Apple and Epic's legal feud began back in 2020, when Epic decided it was tired of paying Apple and Google a 30% commission on all microtransactions made in Fortnite. Attempting to bypass the system by sending users straight to Epic's store on the web.

This made Apple and Google angry, with Fortnite being pulled from the App Store and Google Play. This wasn't so bad for Android, since sideloading is possible, but Apple's walled garden meant Fortnite was shut out from all Apple devices.

This led to lawsuits, and a 2021 court ruling against Apple that should have forced the company to allow off-app payment options in the U.S. Earlier this year the courts ruled Apple hadn't complied with this ruling.

The judge pointed out that taking a commission on off-app payments, and imposing measures designed to stop users reaching off-app payments were a violation of the previous injunction — and the company was told to cut it out. Apple said it would comply, but would appeal the ruling.

Meanwhile, over in Europe, Epic was able to take advantage of the EU's Digital Markets Act which forced Apple to open up to third party App Stores. While the way Apple implemented these app stores has been controversial, and Epic's EU developer account was briefly banned for being "verifiably untrustworthy," Fortnite has been available on iOS since last year — just not via the Apple App Store.

Apple doesn't seem to want Fortnite back

Epic Games was pretty happy when the courts ruled against Apple earlier this month. CEO Tim Sweeney announced that the company would be submitting Fortnite to Apple for U.S. App Store review that week, and it seemed pretty hopeful the game would return to the platform.

Unfortunately a week went by and Fortnite's review status was left in limbo, with Epic claiming there had been no communication from Apple. No approval or rejection, just stone-cold silence. Epic then had to pull the update and submit a new one, because Fortnite on other platforms had a pending content update — and the iOS version had to be the same.

Later it looked like Fortnite submissions had been blocked by Apple in the U.S. and EU, effectively taking the game down in both regions. Apple said this was not a deliberate action to remove Fortnite from the EU app stores, and that Epic simply needed to resubmit without the U.S. version of the app.

The company did not specify what was happening with the U.S. release at the time., and as late as yesterday Epic CEO Tim Sweeney still claimed that Apple was delaying the update. He claimed Apple's pulling of the U.S. version was "an obstructive legal maneuver."

But now, Fortnite is back. And hopefully Apple will keep on top of new updates as and when they arrive for review. Because, as Sweeney says, Fortnite can't operate without timely updates — and it's unlikely the company would stand by idly if it felt Apple was slighting it.

More from Tom's Guide

• Apple’s 20th Anniversary iPhone could use four-edge bending technology — here's what that means
• Apple could soon allow iPhone users to ditch Siri as the default assistant for ChatGPT or Gemini — if you’re in the EU
• iPhone 17 Air leak is concerning news for the battery — and it makes the Galaxy S25 Edge's look huge in comparison

Fortnite Chapter 6 Season 3 just landed , meaning that the extended downtime that began at 2 a.m. EDT / 11 p.m. PDT has officially ended. With that new season comes a fresh batch of content from a Galaxy far far away.

The new season kicks off a new Star Wars-centric update called Galactic Battle. This means there will be a brand new Battle Pass and map locations — not to mention new characters and skins. if you ever wanted to play as Darth Jar Jar (yes, really), this is your chance.

Here's our coverage of the launch as it happened, and what you can expect to find in the now-ongoing season of Fortnite.

Is Fortnite down?

Yes Fortnite is down right now, but don't worry too much — this is all planned. Fortnite Chapter 6 Season 3 is due to land later today (May 2), and that means the servers needed to go down to prepare.

Servers officially went offline at 2 am. EDT / 11 p.m. PDT / 7 a.m. BST this morning.

At this point we're unsure how long the outage will actually last. So far Epic Games hasn't said anything about the downtime, or when we can expect Galactic Battle content to be available. We'll keep you up to date with the latest news on when Fortnite will be playable as soon as we hear it.

Fortnite: Galactic Battle official trailer

The official cinematic trailer for Galactic Battle has been released, giving us a glimpse of what's to come once the Fortnite outage is over.

In the trailer we can see Star Destroyers appearing through a hole in the universe, launching TIE Fighters, stormtroopers and all kinds of other Imperial nasties into the world of Fortnite. Also making an appearance are Rebel X-Wings, with Luke Skywalker leading the charge, Mandalorians, a Samurai-ified version of Darth Vader and the Death Star. To name just a few.

If this trailer is anything to go by, Fortnite is going to be full to the brim with new Star Wars content and characters over the course of the season. Of course Darth Jar Jar makes an appearance as well. Which is quite exciting, assuming to subscribe to that particular fan theory...

Servers are back online

Fortnite has confirmed that servers are back online, meaning the Galactic Battle update is now yours to enjoy. While this is certainly good news, the amount of people flooding to Fortnite to enjoy the new season may cause some stress on the servers — and further downtime.

We're hoping that doesn't happen. But we're covering the launch of the new season right here with live updates. So if Fortnite does have some problems with the influx of players, we'll be the first to let you know.

Fortnite Galactic Battle release schedule

The launch of Chapter 6 season 3 (or Galactic Battle) is only the start of what Forntite has to offer in the coming weeks.. In fact, Epic Games has confirmed that Galactic Battle will receive weekly updates, adding new weapons and content into the battle royale.

Here's the official schedule:

• Tales of the Underworld (watch first two episodes in Fortnite) - May 2, 2025
• The Pull of the Force – May 8, 2025
• Mandalorian Rising – May 22, 2025
• Star Destroyer Bombardment – May 29, 2025
• Death Star Sabotage – June 7, 2025

It's not clear what extras these updates will actually bring to Fortnite just yet. So we'll have to wait and see whether our favorite Star Wars weapons and characters will be playable at some point over the next month.

Behold... Darth Jar Jar

A lot of Star Wars fans will have heard the not-so-serious theory that Jar Jar Binks was actually a Sith Lord. We even got to see Darth Jar Jar make his official debut in the Lego rebuild the Galaxy series last year.

Fortnite Galactic Battle takes things a step further, bringing Darth Jar Jar to the game. This is a brand new skin, which means you can actually play as an evil version of bumbling character.

All new map locations with a Star Wars flavoring

Any good multiplayer game knows that new content should always offer new places to explore. Fortnite is no exception. 4 new Points of interest (POIs) are being added to the Galactic Battle season as a result.

The first is Outpost Enclave, a rebel base with a distinctly Tatooine feel to it. To counter that we have a First order base populated by Stormtroopers. Vader's Samurai Solitude is a blend of Star Wars and historic Japan featuring the Samurai Vade mini boss. Finally there's the Resistance Base, which is in the forest and houses the Millennium Falcon.

Even more skins to enjoy

Aside from Darth Jar Jar, there are a bunch of other new skins coming to Fortnite as part of Galactic Battle. They include Poe Dameron, a Wookie Team Leader, Resistance Evie and Emperor Palpatine himself.

Later on in the season will also give gamers the chance to unlock General Grievous, Mace Windu and a customizable Mandalorian skin.

Everything's holding pretty well so far

An hour ago, Fortnite was down and Down Detector was flashing red across the board. Now, though, with the game back up, reports of issues have dropped back down to a slightly less scary-looking orange.

As of the last update at 12:38, Down Detector only had 32 reported issues with Fortnite in the U.S. — suggesting that the servers are holding up to demand pretty well.

Though this may change as more of the continental U.S. wakes up and jumps into the game. We'll keep you posted on how that goes.

Galactic Battle on iOS?

One of the bigger news stories from the start of the week involved Apple and its ongoing feud with Epic Games.

A court ruled that Apple has ignored an injunction from 2021, and means Apple has to allow app developers to direct users to off-app payment systems. That was one of the reasons Fortnite got kicked from the App Store in the first place, and Epic CEO Tim Sweeney has confirmed this means Fortnite could return to the Apple App Store in the U.S. as early as next week.

What this means is that Fortnite will be officially playable on iPhones and iPads for the first time in several years. Who knows, maybe this means you'll be able to play Galactic Battle on your iPhone now?

All new weapons

Obviously no Star Wars-centric video game is complete without the lightsaber. And there will be plenty of lightsaber action going on in Galactic Battle. heck, there's even an unlockable purple lightsaber, for those of you hoping to complete the Mace Windu look.

But what about other weapons? Star Wars isn't just about lightsabers. Fortunately there are plenty of blasters to enjoy as well:

• Reliable DL-44 Blaster Pistol
• Heavy CR-2 Blaster (an SMG!)
• Close-range ACP Scatter Blaster and BARM-ST12 Scatter Blaster
• Close-to-medium range DLT-19 Blaster Rifle
• Long-range IQA-11 Marksman Blaster Rifle
• All-purpose A280-CFE Blaster Rifle
• (unvaulted) Highly accurate DC-15 Heavy Blaster Rifle
• (unvaulted) Empire standard Issue E-11 Blaster
• (unvaulted) First Order standard issue F-11 Blaster

There's also a "Thermal imploder," a grenade that kicks off a compression vacuum that ignites to cause some pretty major damage. Enough to rip holes in buildings.

Early access to a new Star Wars show

Remember back before Episode 9 came out, Fortnite hosted a special Star Wars event that led into the events of the movie? Galactic Battle doesn't quite have anything on that scale, but it is giving fans chance to watch the next Star Wars series early.

Tales of the Underworld officially hits Disney Plus on May 4th, but Fortnite players will be able to watch the first 2 episodes from 10 a.m. ET today (May 2).

I've been a big fan of Star Wars' "Tales" series, thanks to it offering smaller stories in the Star Wars universe. So any kind of early access sounds like a good deal to me.

The App Store is about to change, and this time it's not because of the EU. Apple has announced plans to change the rules of the App Store in the U.S. this time. It's all thanks to a court ruling in the company's ongoing feud with Fortnite developer Epic Games.

In a ruling yesterday, Apple was found to be in violation of a 2021 injunction allowing developers to direct users to third-party off-app payment options using in-app links.

That injunction came about as a result of an antitrust lawsuit brought by Epic Games. Epic wasn't happy with the way Apple always took a 30% cut of all in-app purchases, and attempted to circumvent the rules on iOS and Android back in 2020. Google and Apple responded by pulling Fortnite from their app stores, resulting in Epic suing.

Judge Yvonne Gonzalez-Rogers ruled that Apple could not restrict alternative payment methods for app-related purchases. However Apple continued to charge developers a commission on sales outside the App Store, ranging from 12 to 27%.

Epic complained to the courts, and asked that Apple be held in contempt, despite Apple arguing that it was being fully compliant. Evidently the judge did not agree.

What the ruling says

In the initial ruling the courts found that Apple's 30% commission "allowed to to reap supracompetitive operating margins" that weren't tied to its own intellectual property — making it anticompetitive.

Apple's response, according to Gonzales-Rogers, was to "charge a 27 percent commission (again tied to nothing) on off-app purchases, where it had previously charged nothing, and extend the commission for a period of seven days after the consumer linked-out of the app". This was described as Apple attempting to "maintain its anticompetitive revenue stream".

The judge also ruled that after the court prohibited Apple "from denying developers the ability to communicate with, and direct consumers to, other purchasing mechanisms".

But instead of offering this Apple was found to have "imposed new barriers and new requirements to increase friction and increase breakage rates with full page "scare" screens, static URLs, and generic statements." With the aim of dissuading users from spending through alternative payment methods.

“Apple’s continued attempts to interfere with competition will not be tolerated,” Gonzalez Rogers said. This is an injunction, not a negotiation. There are no do-overs once a party wilfully disregards a court order.“

What happens now?

Apple has said it will be appealing the decision, but will comply with the ruling until that runs its course. In a statement to MacRumors the company said "We strongly disagree with the decision. We will comply with the court's order and we will appeal."

Until then, the court rules that Apple has to stick with the following terms, because Judge Gonzales-Rogers declared that the court "will not tolerate further delays," and "Apple will not impede competition."

• Imposing any commission or any fee on purchases that consumers make outside an app, and as a consequence thereof, no reason exists to audit, monitor, track or require developers to report purchases or any other activity that consumers make outside an app;
• Restricting or conditioning developers' style, language, formatting, quantity, flow or placement of links for purchases outside an app;
• Prohibiting or limiting the use of buttons or other calls to action, or otherwise conditioning the content, style, language, formatting, flow or placement of these devices for purchases outside an app;
• Excluding certain categories of apps and developers from obtaining link access;
• Interfering with consumers' choice to proceed in or out of an app by using anything other than a neutral message apprising users that they are going to a third-party site;
• Restricting a developer's use of dynamic links that bring consumers to a specific product page in a logged-in state rather than to a statically defined page, including restricting apps from passing on product details, user details or other information that refers to the user intending to make a purchase

This feels like a win for consumers

Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney has called this ruling a "significant win for developers and consumers," adding that, "It forces Apple to compete with other payment services rather than blocking them, and this is what we wanted all along."

And he could be right. For starters cutting commission for off-app purchases could mean lower prices. The fact is developers don't want to eat into their own profits by paying almost a third to Apple (or Google), so those costs get passed onto the consumers.

Epic Games did this with Fortnite, back before it started feuding with Apple in court. While payments through the App Store may still carry those extra charges, the option to get cheaper prices by clicking an in-app link means you pay less.

The second is that the process of buying stuff on your iPhone gets easier. Apple's been told to stop putting up barriers for developers trying to direct users to alternative payment systems.

That should mean they have better opportunity to send you to those cheaper payments, and without Apple's alleged scaremongering tactics trying to send you back to the App Store.

For services like Netflix, which don't offer App Store payments anymore, this essentially makes it a lot simpler to subscribe. Because the app can take you to the payment page on the web, rather than asking you to do it yourself.

The other bonus for gamers, and confirmed by Tim Sweeney on X, is that Fortnite will be returning to the U.S. App Store next week.

He also declared that "If Apple extends the court's friction-free, Apple-tax-free framework worldwide, we'll return Fortnite to the App Store worldwide and drop current and future litigation on the topic."

More from Tom's Guide

• Gemini might be coming to your iPhone before the end of the year — here's what we know
• iPhone 17 Air isn’t what the iPhone family needs — Apple should have tried this with the mini and Plus
• Is Apple playing the waiting game? Smartwatches still lack key health feature

At a time when it seems like almost every game from the mid 2000s is getting either a remake or a remaster, there’s one entire genre that’s been completely ignored: rhythm games.

PaRappa the Rapper for the PS1 is considered by many to be the first game to kick off this genre but Dance Dance Revolution helped solidify its popularity worldwide. From there, the Japanese title Guitar Freaks served as the inspiration for Guitar Hero and then Rock Band, two of the most popular rhythm game franchises of all time.

It’s now been nine years since the release of Guitar Hero Live and Rock Band 4 but fans of the genre are still holding onto their plastic guitars and drum kits. In fact, even used controllers are highly sought after with accessories like the PDP Wired Legacy Adapter going from anywhere from $650 to $1,500 online.

Fortunately though, there’s now a modern guitar controller for those looking to scratch their Guitar Hero or Rock Band itch without paying a fortune for used accessories. Last year, PDP released its new Riffmaster controller for PS5 and Xbox Series X/S to coincide with the launch of the third season of Fortnite Festival.

Although I never got caught up in the rhythm game craze myself, one of my closest friends certainly did. When he told me he had finally gotten a PDP Riffmaster after they were quite hard to come by at launch, I headed over to his place to check it out as there’s nothing I love more than going hands-on with a new controller.

A new riff on a classic controller

At first glance, the Riffmaster resembles a lot of the other plastic guitar controllers that came before it. There are five fret buttons at the top of the guitar’s neck and five solo buttons at the bottom, a strum bar, a whammy bar, a d-pad for navigating menus and either an Xbox or PlayStation-style home button. However, the Riffmaster has a few more tricks up its sleeve and quite a bit more elegance than some of the cheaper guitar controllers we’ve seen in the past.

Like some of the newer guitar-style controllers, the Riffmaster has a rechargeable battery that’s rated for 36 hours and on the side, there’s a USB-C port for charging. While it only comes in black, the fretboard is removable, so you could sticker bomb it or even paint it if you want to give your controller a more unique look.

One feature that I completely missed when going hands-on with the Riffmaster is that it has a joystick, a first for this kind of controller. It’s located around the back where the headstock meets the neck of the guitar. 

You do get a D-pad on the front too, though in my experience with the Riffmaster, I think this joystick really would have come in handy when navigating menus on the Xbox Series X. It’s also worth noting that the controller has a 3.5mm audio jack on the side for those times when you want to rock out without bothering everyone else in your household.

Easier storing and touring

If you were around during Guitar Hero and RockBand’s heyday, then you’ll likely remember just how much space all of these guitar controllers took up. During college, I remember walking into apartments and just seeing a whole corner of a person’s living room dedicated to storing all of the guitars, drums and other accessories needed for a full virtual band. Thankfully, PDP has thought of this too.

The Riffmaster has a foldable neck which makes it much easier to store the controller when you aren’t using it. You just press a button on the rear and the neck folds up. While the controller itself doesn’t come with a carrying case, I’m sure you’ll eventually be able to get one online, either from PDP itself or from a third-party seller.

For those who do intend to pack up the Riffmaster and bring it with them to a friend’s house, you won’t need to worry about forgetting the 2.4 Ghz USB dongle needed to connect it to your Xbox or PS5. The fretboard is detachable and underneath it, there’s a cutout to store the dongle like you often see with the best mice.

Not just for experts

After my buddy showed off his skills on a few tracks in Rock Band 4, it was my turn to give the Riffmaster a try. Even though I completely missed out on all the hype back in the day, it was easy to get accustomed to the controller and how it worked with the game. 

I liked how much smoother the strumbar felt as a lot of the ones in previous guitar controllers were really clicky. Jumping right into full tracks proved a bit difficult for me at first, but once I played through Rock Band 4’s tutorials, I got the hang of things quickly, even if my scores were nothing to write home about.

My friend bought the Riffmaster specifically to play Rock Band 4. However, when I explained Fortnite Festival to him and how this controller was compatible with it, we downloaded Fortite and gave the game’s music-driven, rhythm-based mode a try. 

Even though he had played countless hours of both Guitar Hero and Rock Band 4, it took him a bit to get used to Fortnite Festival. One thing that really impressed him though was the wide selection of free tracks available. You see, he would often buy add-on tracks for Rock Band 4 and was surprised by just how many true bangers there were in Fortnite Festival’s setlist. 

Even if you’ve played Rock Band 4 and Fortnite Festival to death, the Riffmaster also works with the open-source rhythm game Clone Hero. You won’t need one of the best gaming PCs to play it either as it’s not really that demanding of a game graphically. Clone Hero has its own online versus mode too and you can even add your own songs. You will have to convert them first though.

Getting the band back together

At $130, the PDP Riffmaster isn’t the cheapest controller you can get. However, if you’ve been using an old Guitar Hero or Rock Band one, I’d say it’s certainly worth the upgrade. Not only can you play on modern consoles without any adapters but the Riffmaster has some nice quality of life features like its folding neck, 3.5mm audio jack and especially the joystick on the back.

For those gamers who are a bit too young to remember, Guitar Hero and Rock Band were absolutely huge back in the day. You really couldn’t go over to a friend’s house or apartment without seeing a guitar controller either out in the open or tucked away in a closet. 

If you did play a lot of Guitar Hero or Rock Band growing up like my friend did, the Riffmaster is the perfect way to relive the nostalgic feeling of mastering a track on expert mode. However, it can also provide a much easier way to introduce your kids to one of the biggest crazes in gaming history.

While PDP only makes a guitar now, who knows, if the Riffmaster does well enough, we could see the company come out with its own take on a bass controller or even a drum set. Either way, this peripheral is just what fans of the genre have been waiting years for.

More from Tom's Guide

• I just found my new favorite PC controller — this changes everything
• These are the best PC controllers you can get right now
• I finally started playing my Switch in handheld mode and it’s all thanks to this controller

Fortnite is one of the most popular video games ever made, but it's been absent from the iPhone for nearly four years (though it has been playable through web browsers and the cloud). This is because of the long legal battle between Apple and Epic Games over Apple's payment requirements. 

Now, thanks to laws in the EU that allow developers to launch third-party app stores on iOS, Epic Games has relaunched its beloved battle royale game on Apple devices. Unfortunately, because these laws only exist in the EU, those outside the region can't download and play it.

Fortnite fans can download the game through two alternative app stores — Epic Games Store and AltStore PAL. The game experience is the same regardless; it's just a matter of where you want to download the game.

“We’re really excited and grateful for the European DMA law,” Epic Games founder and CEO Tim Sweeney said in a briefing with reporters. “Fortnite is finally returning to iOS in Europe.”

Oddly, despite the company's FAQ saying you can run the game on iOS 17.4 or later, the download link says, "To install the Epic Games Store on your iPhone, update to iOS 17.6 or later.” This shouldn't be a problem for most users, as it's wise to keep your iPhone updated anyway. But if you didn't update your phone, you'll need to do so if you want to play Fortnite.

Outside of releasing Fortnite and its app store on iOS, the company also launched the Epic Games Store today for Android devices. This isn't restricted to just the European Union, so if you want to check out the store on Android, you can do it anywhere.

The Epic Games Store currently has three first-party games. Epic Games is already talking with third-party mobile developers to bring more games to its app store.

More from Tom's Guide

• The best camera phones tested 
• iPhone 16 vs iPhone 15: Biggest expected upgrades
• iOS 18 — all the new features coming to your iPhone

After a four-year-long legal battle with Apple, Epic Games announced this week that Fortnite will soon be coming back to iPhones — though only in the EU. When it does, not only will it be available on the Apple App Store but also through the new standalone Epic Games Store as well as third-party mobile stores like AltStore.

The EU will also be the first to get the Epic Games Store on iOS and Android later this year.  Apple approved the Epic Games marketplace app for iOS iPadOS earlier in July, and Epic Games previously said it's targeting the second half of 2025 as a launch window in the UK.  

"Fortnite will be returning to iOS in the European Union soon, and the Epic Games Store will be coming to Android worldwide and iOS in the European Union bringing all developers great terms: a store fee of 12% for payments we process, and 0% on third party payments," Epic Games said in a Thursday press release. 

Epic and Apple's longstanding legal feud kicked off in 2020 after Fortnite was removed from the App Store for circumventing its policy to block developers from processing app payments outside of the App Store. Epic retaliated with a lawsuit, which forced a crack in Apple's walled garden to enable certain apps to allow external payments. In the EU, where the iPhone maker faces increasing antitrust scrutiny, regulators ruled its App Store practices violated the Digital Markets Act (DMA), a law that effectively forces Apple (and any other platform owner, like Google) to allow third-party marketplaces to do business on their operating systems.

Epic yanks Fortnite from Galaxy Store over sideloading restrictions

Importantly, while iOS users will no doubt be happy to see Fortnite return, players with Samsung phones won't be as lucky. Epic Games also announced the popular battle royale game and other titles from Epic Library are set to leave "mobile stores that serve as rent collectors without competing robustly and serving all developers fairly." 

That includes the Galaxy Store, a move Epic Games said was "in protest of Samsung's anticompetitive decision to block side-loading by default on Samsung Android devices, and as a result of public revelations in the US Epic v Google lawsuit of ongoing Google proposals to Samsung to restrain competition in the market for Android app distribution."

Last year, Samsung introduced Auto Blocker to its phones as a security measure to protect users from installing malware by preventing sideloading apps and downloads via USB cable, among other precautions. While Auto Blocker can be disabled in the Settings app, Epic seems to take issue with the fact that it's enabled by default, leading it to pull its library of games from Samsung's app store. 

However, it's worth noting that with the Epic Games Store on the horizon, that should open up another avenue for Samsung phone owners to download their favorite Epic Games outside of the Galaxy Store.

More from Tom's Guide

• iOS 18 Photos — 5 things I like about the redesign and 2 I don't
• Fortnite banned from Samsung phones due to sideloading restrictions — but Epic Games has a solution
• Apple Intelligence release date — when to expect Apple's AI features on your iPhone

As a die-hard RPG fan, I've always been more at home managing inventory screens and character stats than engaging in frantic shootouts. "Fortnite,"" with its bright colors and frenetic mechanics, had never quite clicked for me. I'd dipped my toes in occasionally, but always found myself drifting back to more familiar gaming territories.

Once constantly played, my Nintendo Switch had begun to gather dust. The call of sprawling open worlds and turn-based combat on other platforms had lured me away from Nintendo's hybrid console. Little did I know that an unexpected update to a game I'd all but written off would not only bring my Switch back to life, but also challenge my preconceptions about what Fortnite could be.

Enter Fortnite Festival, a rhythm game mode that's part "Guitar Hero" nostalgia trip, part battle royale madness, and entirely responsible for my newfound addiction to power chords. This impulse download would not only revive my Switch, but also challenge everything I thought I knew about "Fortnite," the type of game I enjoy playing, and even my music taste.

Battle of the bands: 'Fortnite' style 

"Fortnite," the battle royale phenomenon that has dominated the gaming world for years, has always been a divisive title. Some players are drawn to its fast-paced action and building mechanics, while others find themselves overwhelmed by how frantic it is or are put off by its cartoony aesthetics. For those who prefer RPGs or strategy games, "Fortnite's" shooter-centric gameplay often fails to hit the mark.

With the introduction of Fortnite Festival, however, Epic Games has thrown a curveball that's catching the attention of gamers across the spectrum. This new rhythm game mode is breathing fresh life into both "Fortnite" and the Nintendo Switch, appealing to a broader audience that includes those who may have previously dismissed the battle royale giant.

The Battle Stage is where Fortnite Festival truly shines, transforming from a mere game into a digital colosseum of musical combat. Four players, four instruments, and a whole lot of competitive spirit collide in a symphony of button-mashing and strategic thinking. 

It's not just about hitting notes anymore; it's about outplaying your opponents, timing power-ups perfectly, and adapting to key changes that would make even seasoned musicians sweat. 

The 'Fortnite' 'Wrecked' experience

Fortnite 'Wrecked', this season's theme, has elevated the experience from a mere rhythm game to a post-apocalyptic rock opera. Imagine a "Mad Max" fever dream colliding with "Fallout," sprinkled with a dash of Magneto for good measure. I'm shredding solos while surrounded by rusty war rigs and biker hordes – it's like playing the world's most epic concert at the end of the world. Ridiculous? Absolutely. Addictive? You can bet your last bottle of Nuka cola. 

The visual spectacle is something to behold. Neon-drenched wastelands stretch as far as the eye can see, punctuated by towering scrap metal structures that serve as impromptu stages. Your character, decked out in a mish-mash of salvaged gear and rock-star glam, takes center stage amidst this chaotic backdrop. The Switch deserves some credit for this renaissance. Its portability means I can sneak in a quick jam session before bed, or turn my commute into an impromptu stadium tour. 

Sure, the Switch occasionally struggles during the most intense solos, with frame rates dipping when the on-screen action gets particularly hectic. But in the heat of battle, when you're neck-and-neck with your opponents and the crowd's roaring for more, who's counting frames? 

More than just a game 

Fortnite Festival isn't just a game mode; it transports players back to the heyday of rhythm games. For those of us who spent countless hours mastering plastic guitars in our living rooms, this new addition to "Fortnite" strikes a nostalgic chord.

Remember the thrill of nailing a perfect streak in "Guitar Hero"? Fortnite Festival captures that same rush but with a modern twist. It's as if "Guitar Hero" grew up, got a job in game development, and decided to crash "Fortnite's" party. The game cleverly integrates "Fortnite's" signature elements into the rhythm game format. 

It's a surreal blend of past and present that somehow works perfectly. But Fortnite Festival doesn't just rely on nostalgia. It builds upon the foundation laid by games like "Guitar Hero" and "Rock Band," adding competitive elements that feel distinctly "Fortnite." The Battle Stage, where up to four players compete head-to-head, adds a layer of strategy and intensity that wasn't present in the rhythm games of yore. 

Choosing when to activate power-ups or when to risk a complex solo for extra points brings a tactical element that keeps the experience fresh and engaging. The song selection itself is great, featuring a mix of classic rock anthems and current hits that showcase the game's relevance. It's a setlist that bridges generations. There's something for everyone. 

Dust off that Switch 

As I dive deeper into the world of Fortnite Festival, I'm continually surprised by the depth of strategy involved. Choosing the right instrument for your play style, deciding when to activate power-ups, and learning to read the rhythm patterns all require a level of thought I didn't expect from a game that, on the surface, seems like simple button-mashing. It's this combination of accessibility and hidden complexity that keeps me coming back for more.

The social aspect of the game shouldn't be understated either. Competing against friends or teaming up for co-op sessions has brought a new dimension to my gaming nights. So, if your Switch has been gathering dust, it might be time to give it another go. Boot up Fortnite Festival and prepare to rediscover your inner rock god. 

The stage is set, the crowd is waiting, and your Switch is ready for its comeback tour. Just don't blame me when you find yourself randomly humming Metallica in the elevator. 

More from Tom's Guide

• I was planning to sell my Switch, but Nintendo just changed my mind
• Nintendo Switch OLED vs. Nintendo Switch vs. Switch Lite: What should you buy?
• Nintendo Switch 2 — latest rumors and everything we know so far

Epic Games owns Fortnite, one of the most successful video game franchises in the world. But despite its massive popularity, you can't download Fortnite on iOS, one of the most popular gaming platforms worldwide. This is due to issues between Apple and Epic. However, now that the Digital Markets Act requires Apple to open iPhone and iPad devices to outside app stores in the E.U., Fortnite is ready to make a comeback to Apple's portable platforms.

First, Epic announced that its beloved battle royale would return to the iPhone in January when the Digital Markets Act first started being enforced in the European Union. Now, the company has once again taken to X to announce that it plans to bring the game to iPad later this year.

"We’re moving full steam ahead to bring Fortnite and the Epic Games Store to iPhones in the EU soon and iPads this year," reads the post.

The company didn't announce an exact date for either the iPhone or iPad version, but it's exciting to know that the game will be available on Apple devices sometime in 2024. For Fortnite fans who use iPhone and iPad devices, this is nothing but good news. 

Of course, if you're outside of the E.U., where the Digital Markets Act is enforced, you won't be able to play Fortnite on your iPhone or iPad. That could change at some point if the U.S. and other governments adopt similar rules, but for the time being, users outside of Europe remain locked to Apple's App Store. 

It's also possible that Apple and Epic could resolve their issues. However, since this first happened a couple of years ago and there's been no movement toward a resolution, I don't expect that to happen. 

More from Tom's Guide

• Thank EU very much! Apple’s iPad now has to follow the same app sideloading rules as iPhone
• Apple just terminated Epic’s iOS developer account — here’s what’s going on
• New AltStore will let you download iPhone apps in the EU via Patreon — going around Apple’s App Store

The Walt Disney Company has announced a collaboration with Epic Games that will see the Mouse House buy a $1.5 billion equity stake in the Fortnite-creator. 

As detailed in Disney's announcement, the multi-year project will take form as a "new persistent universe" connected to Fortnite that will give Disney fans the opportunity to "play, watch, shop and engage with content, characters and stories from Disney, Pixar, Marvel, Star Wars, Avatar and more."

According to Disney CEO Bob Iger, the joint-venture "marks Disney’s biggest entry ever into the world of games and offers significant opportunities for growth and expansion." In the words of Mickey Mouse, "Oh boy!"

Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney elaborated further, stating that the relationship will lead to "a persistent, open and interoperable ecosystem that will bring together the Disney and Fortnite communities.”

Epic adventures ahead

Taking advantage of Unreal Engine, the new universe will reportedly give Disney fans the tools to "express their fandom in a distinctly Disney way," and also "create their own stories and experiences" to share with other members of the online community.

The move should see the already-strong relationship between Disney and Epic reach greater heights, with previous Disney-themed content integrations bringing in more than 15.3 million concurrent players.

Disney and Epic are already teasing some exciting things ahead — a trailer accompanying the announcement offers glimpses of famous characters like Indiana Jones, Darth Vader, Deadpool, Elsa, Lightning McQueen and more as they get ready to head into the new universe. You can check out the announcement trailer below. 

The announcement coincides with The Walt Disney Company's latest quarterly earnings call, where Moana 2, a new EPSN streaming platform and more were announced.

More from Tom's Guide

• Taylor Swift Eras movie is heading to Disney Plus with four new songs
• Disney Plus is cracking down on password sharing — what you need to know
• Pedro Pascal reportedly confirmed for 'Fantastic Four' — here's what we know

Minecraft has never been my thing, but maybe if the sandbox game was built around Lego bricks, I would've felt differently. At least, that's what I took away from the Lego Fortnite experience, which I experienced for myself ahead of its launch on December 7.

Lego Fortnite makes a massive statement for the recently released Fortnite Chapter 5, bringing a survival crafting expedition to the Epic Games title for the first time. Your Fortnite character transforms into a minifigure as you acclimate to the elements in a world 20 times the size of Battle Royale. 

In this Lego-based environment, you're forced to forage the food and materials you need to build a camp, battle enemies, and endure different climates. And yes, the items you collect and develop your community with take the form of actual Lego bricks. And that's what makes it endearing.

If you know the Lego brand and its fans, you know being true to life is imperative. Epic Game's Unreal Engine supports more than 10,000 actual Lego brick pieces in the new Fortnite experience. In the virtual world you encounter and build upon, the structures are all ones you could create in the real one with the proper bricks.

What's more, your minifigure in Lego Fornite takes on the likeness of your existing Fortnite character, with over 1,200 compatible outfit parts and over 100 compatible emotes. I played as the virtual minifigure version of Fishstick, and it surprised me that my character didn't ask me me sacrifice authenticity to either the Lego or Fortnite fandom.

That said, one major difference between Lego Fortnite and my long-time love of real Lego bricks became obvious to me as I got my feel for the experience. In Lego Fortnite, I didn't hesitate to destroy any unfamiliar camps. I pillaged abandoned buildings to collect the scraps for my own benefit. I slashed ruthlessly at any structure outside of my own camp with a pickaxe until it crumbled, leaving nothing but pieces to bring back to build my own budding town.

In the real world, demolishing anything built with Lego bricks would bring a tear to my eye. It's much more difficult to dismantle and reconfigure Lego actual structures after all. (Side note: Epic Games had an impressive Supply Llama made of Lego bricks over twice my height at the hands-on, I can't even imagine how long that took to make.)

The beauty of this virtual Lego world is that I felt empowered to build, blast, and re-configure as much as my creativity would allow. Now, only being able to play for about 30 minutes, I only managed to attract a few people to my camp, complete with sleeping quarters and a tool bench. 

But Epic showed me ways those with early access leveraged the Lego experience. Someone built the ultimate mansion inside a lava mine, while another player designed a waterside tiki bar. The more you embrace the Lego Fortnite world, the more opportunities to engineer based on imagination arise. And that's what makes it worth a go.

To try Lego Fortnite out for yourself, enter the main menu Lobby screen, scroll down to the Discover section, and select LEGO Fortnite. Just be sure to grab some friends to jumpstart your camp first.

Fortnite has been having one hell of a moment lately between the new season's highly anticipated release and this weekend's Big Bang live event, which culminated in the destruction of the Chapter 4 island and a virtual concert from Eminem. 

As part of the event, Epic announced three new games coming to the Fortnite experience, including a LEGO-themed survival/crafting adventure, Rocket Racing developed by the studio behind Rocket League, and Fortnite Festival, a music game from Harmonix, the creators of Rock Band, where you can play in bands solo or with friends.

And it all leads up to Epic rolling out Fortnite Chapter 5 Season 1 this week. Dubbed the Underground, the new season brings with it a number of new in-game locations and map redesigns, the addition of five powerful boss characters, and tons of other new features. 

You can check out the trailer for the new season below, featuring Family Guy’s Peter Griffin and Metal Gear’s Snake.

When does Fortnite Chapter 5 Season 1 begin?

Fortnite's servers went down late Saturday evening and into Sunday morning for a few hours as Epic pushed the update, but Chapter 5 Season 1 is now live. You should be able to install it right now (though you may still be looking at lengthy queue times with so many other players rushing to check it out too). 

Everything new with Fortnite Chapter 5 Season 1

The Fortnite Chapter 5 Season 1 update brings a new railway to the game complete with a train you can hop on to travel around the map as well as marinas, mansions, and new grassland and snowy areas. 

Five boss characters have also been scattered about the island. As part of The Underground, your mission is to take down The Society, a mysterious organization that's been pulling the strings behind the scenes and made off with Peely. 

Take down each of The Society's bosses, one of whom is Family Guy's Peter Griffin, to earn a medallion that unlocks a very handy feature: the ability to regenerate shields over time. With the drawback that the medallion works as a beacon to alert other players to your location on the map. The effect stacks too: “The more medallions you have, the more precise the radius of your exact location,” Epic explained in a press release.

Other additions include: a new Cars section in players' lockers to customize their vehicles with different bodies, decals and wheels; a weapon called the Ballistic Shield that let’s you “defend yourself with the shield while shooting the pistol at the same time;” the ability to move while healing or restoring shields; a new SUV vehicle; and the ability to mod weapons in certain areas around the island. When it comes to car customizations, certain cosmetics from Rocket League will also carry over for those who play both games. 

Looking ahead, Epic announced the upcoming Lego Fortnite experience, a collaboration between Epic and Lego that'll be available in-game starting on December 7. Details are pretty scarce at the moment, but it's being described as an "all new survival crafting adventure." You can check out the teaser trailer here.

More from Tom's Guide

• PlayStation Store End of Year sale offers PS5 games from just $4 — here’s 23 deals I’d buy now
• Nintendo Switch 2 tipped for 2024 launch — and new Mario Kart detailed
• The Last of Us 2 Remastered looks amazing but I can’t bring myself to replay the game — here’s why

Apple’s decision-making process in removing apps from its App Store recently came into question by activist investors. A Financial Times report has said that Apple has promised to be more transparent with details on why it removes certain apps from the App Store. 

Apple is known for removing apps that don’t comply with its guidelines. The tech giant removed as many as 30,000 apps from the Chinese App Store in 2020. And apps like WhatsApp and Signal are also not allowed in the country’s App Store. Similarly, many social media apps are also banned in China and Russia's App Stores. Likewise, both TikTok and PUBG have been banned in India’s App Store since 2020.

In late 2021, the China App Store banned some Bible and Koran study tool apps which then prompted activist investors to question why some apps were “inexplicably banned”. The investors said this could be a threat to “freedom of expression” in countries like Russia and China.

The Financial Times mentions that Apple has “long been criticised for acquiescing to foreign governments’ requests that certain apps be removed.” In the first half of 2021, for instance, China raised 34 legal violations and asked that 89 apps be removed. Apparently Apple did not object to any of those requests. 

Apple’s Transparency Report 

Apple does release a Transparency Report to investors which mentions how many apps each country has requested be removed, whether the request is based on a legal violation, and whether Apple complied with the request. 

Now, the tech giant has agreed to divulge more information on the removal of apps in its next report. This will include the legal basis for removal requests by each government along with a breakdown by country and app category. It will also mention how many apps it removes for violating App Store policies. However, the company has reportedly said it will still not disclose why individual apps have been taken down. 

Investors have said this additional information will help determine if Apple is stifling freedom of speech and expression with its decisions.

Trouble in Apple’s ‘walled garden’

These are not the only issues that have plagued Apple's App Store recently. A French court fined Apple €1 million over its “abusive” App Store practices with regard to “unfair” commercial clauses on app developers.

Closer to US shores, Apple is in a long standing battle with Epic Games over Apple’s in-app purchase system. Epic Games went with its own in-app payment system which prompted the iPhone-maker to remove Fortnite from the App Store. This in turn led to Epic Games filing a lawsuit against them saying Apple's policy of taking up to 30% of a purchase made through the App Store is anti-competitive and harmful. Fortnite is still banned from the US App Store as of now.

In some good news for iPhone users though, Apple could soon open iPhone to third party app stores. If this comes through, it is huge and is a big change from the company’s walled-garden stance for its App Store. This could also mean apps like Fortnite could make a comeback on iOS and potentially even the many-deleted apps in China and Russia as well. 

You can now get Fortnite on your phone for free. The game is now easier to access on your iPhone and also your Android phone thanks to Nvidia’s GeForce Now cloud gaming service.

Nvidia is rolling out support for the hit game with full touchscreen support. It is great timing as well since Obi-Wan is coming to Fortnite just next week.

Nvidia’s GeForce Now means we now have another way around Epic Games’ legal battle with Apple to access the game for free. Epic’s skirmish with iOS had led to Apple removing the app from the App Store for good. Epic’s feud with Android also meant the game was not available to download through the Play Store, and could only be sideloaded. 

Microsoft’s XBox Game Pass recently did allow iOS and Android users to finally start playing Fortnite again through the cloud gaming service via the iPhone's browser or through the Xbox GamePass app on Android. 

Now, Nvidia GeForce does a similar workaround, and the game can be accessed on Safari on iOS and through the GeForce Now app for Android users. Accessing it is pretty straightforward — you just need to sign up for GeForce Now and link your Epic Games account and start playing. There is no waitlist required. Moreover, it is completely free even though it is streamed through the cloud. GeForce Now has a free tier that supports gameplay sessions up to one hour at a time. For 6-hour sessions you will have to opt for the priority tier, which is $10/month. 

Nvidia announced a closed beta of Fortnite with full touch controls earlier this year. Nvidia says a whopping 500,000 people streamed over 4 million sessions of Fortnite through the service. Thanks to the testing, Nvidia claims it has been able to optimize the “on-screen touch controls and game menus.”

Great timing — Obi-Wan Kenobi is coming to Fortnite next week 

Fornite has given us another reason to get us playing — Obi-Wan is coming to the game as soon as next week. Epic has just announced that we will be able to see Mr. Kenobi — the latest Star Wars character in the battle royale.

On May 26, one day before the new show Obi-Wan Kenobi debuts on Disney Plus, gamers will be able to see the Jedi Knight himself in the game’s item shop. There will also be a bundle that includes a Jedi Interceptor glider and a pickaxe blade (unfortunately, we will not get to see a lightsaber.) Now that Obi-Wan has his own show this seems like a good next step to get fans excited. 

We hope we will get to see more Fortnite and Star Wars crossovers. Characters like the Mandalorian have been great additions to Fortnite in the past. Now that Fortnite is accessible with full touch controls on our phones for free, Nvidia GeForce Now is definitely worth considering.

Fortnite is one of the biggest games in the world, to the extent that it’s been a catalyst in the Apple vs Epic legal battle. So it’s no surprise that it’s an ever expanding entity. 

Over the past few years Fortnite has spread across multiple platforms and grown to be more than just a battle royale game with a building angle. It’s now a place for major stars to host virtual concerts. It’s also a repository for various movie, TV and popular culture tie-ins and character skins. 

Keeping track of all the comings and goings of Fortnite isn’t easy, but we're here to help. So read on for the latest on Fortnite updates and news, and other things you need to know about Epic’s epic game.  

Fortnite latest updates, news and patch notes

Fortnite is finally back on iPhone and iPad thanks to the power of Xbox Game Pass. 

While you can't download and paly the game via Apple's App Store, you can stream it to an iOS or iPadOS devices with Xbox Cloud Gaming, as Microsoft has added Fortnite to Game Pass. 

You wont even need an Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscription, rather you just need a Microsoft account. So follow these steps to start playing Fortnite on your iPhone or iPad once again. 

1. Open the Safari browser and head to xbox.com/play

2. Sign into your Microsoft account — if you need to, you can create a new account at this stage.

3. On the Game Pass webpage, hit the "Play for Free" option under the Fortnite panel. 

4. From there, tap the "Get get ready to play" option, which will prompt you to add an Xbox Cloud Gaming icon to your iPhone or iPad home screen. 

5. To do that, tap the bookmark button in the top right-hand side of Safari; it's the icon that looks like a box with an arrow coming out of it. Next, select "Add to Home Screen" and then tap "Add".  

6. Quit Safari and head to the new Xbox Cloud gaming app-like icon on your home screen (it looks like an app but is actually a bookmark), and launch it.

7. Sign into your Microsoft account again (iOS/iPadOS may have remembered your details). At this point, you may need to create an Xbox profile, which takes a few taps. 

8. Once logged in, simply tap Fortnite's "Play for Free" option again, and then "Play" on the next page, which will then launch the cloud-streamed version of Fortnite. From there you can play with touchscreen controls or a Bluetooth controller.

How to play Fortnite 

The good news is finding a platform to play Fortnite on is trivially easy, as it’s available on pretty much every recent console, phone and tablet. 

You can download and play Fortnite for free on PC and Android; for the former, you can get Fortnite through the Epic Games Store (it’s probably best to download the Epic Games launcher first if you don’t have it), and on Android simply head to the Google Play Store. 

Fortnite is also available on the PS5, PS4 Pro, PS4, Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S (Fortnite has been optimized for Microsoft's new games consoles), Xbox One X, Xbox One and Nintendo Switch. You can download it for free on the PlayStation Store, Microsoft Store and Nintendo eShop.

For the PlayStation consoles you’ll need a PSN login. And for the Xbox consoles, you’ll need to have an Xbox Live Gold membership, which is also included in Xbox Game Pass. 

On the Nintendo Switch, you’ll find Fortnite in the Nintendo Store. But you’ll need a Nintendo Switch Online subscription, which starts at $3.99 per month. 

While Fortnite was available on iPhone, iPad and Mac, the battle between Apple and Epic over app transaction policies has seen Fortnite removed from the App Store. 

You can download Fortnite on macOS by getting it through the Epic Games site. But doing so means you’ll need to put up with an older version of Fortnite that Epic no longer updates. And you won’t be able to tap into the cross-platform gaming the latest versions of Fortnite support. So Fortnite on Mac is probably best avoided for the time being. 

Once you get started with Fortnite, then you're in for a rich world of items, customization, events and more, all framed in a battle royale package. Check out our Fortnite battle royale tips to help you get started. 

Fortnite deals

Fortnite useful tips and links

• Everything you need to know about Fortnite Season 6
• How to get free V-Bucks in Fortnite
• Fortnite 2FA: How to enable Epic Games two-factor authentication
• Ultimate guide to Twitch: The tips, tricks and gear you need
• The best gaming PCs to buy now
• Call of Duty Warzone vs. Fortnite: Which battle royale is for you?
• How to find the Ferrari 296 GTB in Fortnite

Epic’s legal battle with Apple over in-app transactions and revenue cuts saw the massively popular battle royale game Fortnite kicked off iOS and the App Store. But now Fortnite is back. 

Does that mean Apple and Epic are now friends? Heck no. But thanks to Microsoft and Xbox Cloud Gaming, you can now play Fortnite on the likes of an iPhone 13 or iPad Air. That’s because Fortnite has just become the first Xbox Game Pass title that's free-to-play for all users, even if you don't subscribe to what's arguably the best deal in gaming. 

Xbox Game Pass ultimate deal

Now, you won’t be able to play Fortnite natively on an iOS or iPadOS devices, given the App Store ban. Nor will you be able to use the native Xbox Game Pass app, as Apple’s policies don’t let Microsoft provide an app-based game-streaming service via the App Store.

But the way Xbox Cloud Gaming is handled on iPhone and iPad — namely, through the Safari browser — means it’ll feel very much like accessing game streaming through the Android version of the Xbox Game Pass app.

How to access Fortnite via Xbox Game Pass on iPhone and iPad

• Open the Safari browser and head to xbox.com/play
• Sign into your Microsoft account — if you need to, you can create a new account at this stage.
• On the Game Pass webpage, hit the "Play for Free" option under the Fortnite panel. 
• From there, tap the "Get get ready to play" option, which will prompt you to add an Xbox Cloud Gaming icon to your iPhone or iPad home screen. 
• To do that, tap the bookmark button in the top right-hand side of Safari; it's the icon that looks like a box with an arrow coming out of it. Next, select "Add to Home Screen" and then tap "Add".  
• Quit Safari and head to the new Xbox Cloud gaming app-like icon on your home screen (it looks like an app but is actually a bookmark), and launch it.
• Sign into your Microsoft account again (iOS/iPadOS may have remembered your details). At this point, you may need to create an Xbox profile, which takes a few taps. 
• Once logged in, simply tap Fortnite's "Play for Free" option again, and then "Play" on the next page, which will then launch the cloud-streamed version of Fortnite. From there you can play with touchscreen controls or a Bluetooth controller.

You’ll need a decently fast and stable internet connection to stream Fortnite, and to accept that it won’t be as responsive as the experience is on, say, the native Android version or on consoles. But, as we found out recently, Xbox Cloud Gaming on iOS has been improved and runs rather well on a 5G connection.

So if you’ve been hankering for a Fortnite fix on your iPhone, then Xbox Game Pass Ultimate is well worth considering.

Update: Fortnite is finally back on iPhone and iPad — here's how to play it now.

Fortnite remains one of the biggest live-service games out right now. Unfortunately, though, it doesn't seem that the game will be making its way over to the Steam Deck.

The news comes via Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney himself, in replies to fans on Twitter. As reported by our sister site PC Gamer, Sweeney apparently is unsure that Epic Games can bring over its Easy Anti-Cheat technology to Linux, which is the open-source operating system that powers the Steam Deck. Anti-Cheat is a piece of software necessary to ensure that a game such as Fortnite runs fairly.

 "We don’t have confidence that we’d be able to combat cheating at scale under a wide array of kernel configurations including custom ones," said Sweeney in a tweet. However, Sweeney did confirm that there's a "big effort underway to maximize Easy Anti-Cheat compatibility with Steam Deck."

It's a nuanced statement by Sweeney. He admits that the team at Epic Games is working on bringing Easy Anti-Cheat to Steam Deck in general, just not for Fortnite. 

Easy Anti-Cheat is an Epic Games-owned piece of software, which aims to limit cheating in multiplayer games. Titles that use Easy Anti-Cheat include Apex Legends, Dead by Daylight, Fall Guys and more. 

"With regard to anti-cheat on the Linux platform supporting custom kernels and the threat model to a game of Fortnite's size, YES THAT'S EXACTLY RIGHT!" he tweeted. "The threat model for anti-cheat varies per game based on the number of active players and ability to gain profit by selling cheats or gain prominence by cheating. Hence anti-cheat which suffices for one game may not for another game with 10, 100, or 1000 times more players."

Essentially, the open-source nature of Linux poses some security risks for a game like Fortnite.

It's also worth noting that Fortnite is not available on the Steam marketplace. Epic Games has its own online digital storefront called the Epic Games Store. Essentially, Epic Games wants to keep most of its major titles exclusive to its own store.

Sweeney also addressed this point when replying to a fan. While Epic Games is not opposed to the idea of bringing its titles to a rival platform, the company does not want to give over 20-30% of its revenue to Valve in the process. Epic Games actually sued Apple over this, and got one ruling in its favor. Apple must now allow rival payment platforms on the App Store: a move that Apple is fighting hard against, with the case currently in the appeals process.

There's also the very obvious fact, which Sweeney points out, that demand simply isn't there to bring Fortnite to Steam Deck. It's a handheld PC that, while exciting for the hardcore gaming community, will likely not attract a large chunk of Fortnite users. Sweeney's statement did anger some Linux gamers, but the operating system is still fairly niche, never amassing more than a few percentage points in comparative OS usage versus Windows or MacOS.

Still, it won't be impossible to play Fortnite on Steam Deck. Users can still go through the trouble of installing Windows 11 on Steam Deck, then run the game via the Epic Games Store launcher instead. At the very least, early impressions of the Steam Deck are highly positive. 

Update: Fortnite is finally back on iPhone and iPad — here's how to play it now. 

The battle between Apple and Epic isn’t over yet, despite a court ruling earlier this month, because Apple has now told Epic that it’s still blacklisted from the App Store until the appeals process is completely over.

In other words, Apple won’t be restoring Epic’s developer account, nor will Fortnite be allowed back on iOS anytime soon.

• iPhone 13 review: The best iPhone for most people
• Here are the best iOS games you can play right now
• Plus: iPhone 13 is great — but it suffers from one major flaw

The initial ruling was a win and a loss for both sides. The courts ruled that Apple could not prevent app developers linking to an external payment system, which is a win for Epic. However, the ruling also declared that Apple didn’t have a monopoly on mobile games, has the right to collect fees on in-app purchases, and that the original contract between the two companies was both valid and enforceable. Meaning Epic knowingly broke it.

While Epic has appealed the ruling, CEO Tim Sweeney wrote to Phil Schiller, the Apple executive in charge of the App Store, promising that Epic payments had now been disabled server-side, paid Apple $6 million as ordered by the court and that the company would "adhere to Apple's guidelines whenever and wherever we release products on Apple platforms." 

In return Epic asked for Apple to restore its developer account, which was originally suspended last year. The goal is to return Fortnite to Mac, and restore Unreal Engine testing and development to the iOS version of the game. Apple promptly refused.

“Epic committed an intentional breach of contract, and breach of trust, by concealing code from Apple and making related misrepresentations and omissions," according to the letter sent by an Apple legal representative. "In its decision, the court recognized that 'Apple had contractual rights to act as it did. It merely enforced those rights as [Epic's] own internal documents show Epic Games expected.”

Because of this, and Tim Sweeney’s statement that “Epic '[w]ouldn't trade [an alternative payment system] away to get Fortnite back on iOS”, Apple has decided not to restore Epic’s developer account. The company also confirmed it “will not consider any further requests for reinstatement until the district court's judgment becomes final and nonappealable."

This has clearly not gone down well at Epic, given Tim Sweeney’s tweet declaring this a “loss for fair competition and consumer choice”. Sweeney also pointed out that the appeals process could take as long as five years. Sweeney also attacked Apple, accusing them of lying about its willingness to allow Fortnite back into the App Store if Epic played by the same rules as everyone else.

Epic has vowed to fight on, declaring that “the need for regulatory and legislative action is clearer than ever before”. But for the immediate future Apple has every legal right to deny Epic access to its platform. Whether you agree with that action or not is another matter.

• More: The best Android phones you can still play Fortnite on

Epic has had to pull its new “bear hug” emote from Fortnite after a glitch made the animation look a little... questionable.

While the emote was just supposed to allow two players to hug, an unfortunate glitch meant that if one person crouched just before performing the animation, it didn't look like just a hug anymore. The glitch was captured by Twitter user @DatOneJackalope, and was pulled from the game shortly afterwards. 

•  Check out the latest Fortnite updates, news and more
•  Or our Fortnite battle royale tips
•  Plus: Windows 11 on a Mac? Parallels 17 makes it possible

While we’re sad to see something this hilarious go, it makes sense that Epic had to remove it. Fortnite’s main audience is kids, after all, and with celebrities like LeBron James and Ariana Grande represented by characters in the game, Epic wouldn’t want to get in any trouble with their management by enabling users to recreate a risqué pose with their likenesses.

According to the Fortnite Status Twitter account, anyone who bought the emote will be able to get their V-bucks refunded. It also stated that the emote will remain disabled until the issue is fixed, meaning even people who had the emote on their account won’t be able to use it right now. 

There’s currently no word on when the emote will return, but the refund will apparently be available in the next week, so we’d expect the emote to return sometime after that.

The bear hug emote first debuted as part of Ariana Grande’s virtual Fortnite concert, which ran from August 6-8. We hope that it does get fixed and make a comeback, if only to give us something to remember the whole ordeal by.

• More: How to find the Ferrari 296 GTB in Fortnite 

Update: Fortnite is finally back on iPhone and iPad — here's how to play it now.

I got to "play" the Fortnite x Ariana Grande Rift Tour experience a little early, and I sort of didn't know how to react. I'm very much a casual fan of Ms. Grande's work. I appreciate it, but I am not an Arianator (all respect to them). That said, I went into the experience with a mind loaded with thoughts about virtual musical experiences, and came out thinking about how they could be a lot better.

Right now, the Ariana Grande Rift Tour feels like the world's greatest visualizer layer. Your avatar can move around the virtual representative of the superstar at hand, and there's slight interactivity. But it just needs more. 

Just that morning, I opted to not buy concert tickets for the upcoming Tyler The Creator tour (for a variety of reasons, related to and not related to Covid's Delta variant), and it left me thinking about all things music. Tyler seems like a natural fit, as do a bunch of other musicians I follow (Charli XCX, The Weeknd and — of course — Gorillaz). So I've started to think about how these Fortnite events could be improved. Here's how I'd do it. 

• Here are some of the best streaming services right now
• And here you'll find all the latest Fortnite updates, news and patch notes
• Plus: Stranger Things season 4 new teaser released

1. Give us something new, we're desperate

There is value in the familiarity of a song everyone knows and has listened to hundreds of times over. That said, fans of a musician can hear that same song without going into Fortnite — and even as someone who plays video games, I'm of the opinion that the Fortnite interface is too complicated for first timers to fully know where things are. The buttons to press for doing a dance emote are not displayed on screen, so first-timers may be sitting there wondering why everyone but them can dance. I certainly had that issue.

So you've got to reward folks who made the effort to log in at a certain time, and figure things out, with something new from the artist. Yes, I'm sure Ariana Grande contributed to many aspects of the video. It was great that Fortnite Ariana's got a bag that's created in the name of Piggy Smallz (her pet pig and emotional support animal), and the video has tons of references to her songs and career. But it clearly lacked anything that we haven't heard or seen IRL yet. 

Maybe Ariana Grande's music release schedule has been set a long ways into the future, so we couldn't get a new song. But why (aside from money) couldn't the version of 7 Rings we heard be a new recording? 

2. Get your Fortnite out of my fandom

Since I'm not an Arianator, I was a bit confused when songs that didn't sound like hers started the experience. "Oh, these must be collaborations she's done with someone else," I thought to myself, as "Come & Go" by Juice WRLD and Marshmello, "Audio" by Sia, Diplo and Labrinth / LSD and "Victorious" by Wolfmother blared. I later learned (again, thank you Alyssa), that they are not Ariana's.

There was also the matter of a bunch of stuff that didn't feel exactly related. You traverse an inky slide of blues and purples, and pick up power-ups to move, and later, you ride tiny llama unicorns — and it all screams "Fortnite!" more than it does feel like "an Ariana Grande Joint."

I get it that Epic Games is not going to throw away their whole brand identity and make a white-label experience for musicians, but it definitely felt like there was a lot in there that new audiences wouldn't identify with as authentic to their fandom. And if the Fortnite events are meant to grow the brand — we're betting Grande's legion of supporters are going to practically break Fortnite's servers this weekend — they should feel more welcoming.

3. Please, Fortnite, may I have some more?

At this point, you're probably shocked to hear that, with all my complaints, that I wanted more. Well, that's a part of the problem. At around 10 minutes or so (it felt as long as the Travis Scott x Fortnite collaboration), the Ariana Grande Rift Tour feels more like a pit-stop than an event. I've had longer Instagram Story binge-watches.

Again, I know that this isn't meant to replace concerts. It's free and all. But I could imagine a situation where you get to the end of the set we saw, and get an offer to unlock a whole new series of songs and events.

For a price, of course. These events take a lot of time and effort, with artists wearing motion-capture suits and both parties (Epic Games & Ariana's team) hammering out details. We already know they're willing to charge — the Ariana Grande skin costs $20 — so why not let them have us pay for a better overall experience?

4. Let us fight with our faves

The Ariana Grande Rift Tour has some baddies, namely a giant horned beast that was seemingly made out of crystals and Monster energy drinks, but the experience of battling them felt detached from Ms. Grande's part of the game. As far as I can tell, it has zero connection to her or her songs, and even though she has a giant sledgehammer (her 'pick-axe' to borrow the Fortnite terminology), she doesn't join in the fight.

Instead, you just stand on the wings of a by-plane, shooting at the crystals and face of the beast, doing damage. I racked up the second-most points of my group (out of three, LOL), but found this to be odd and unrelated. That kind of boss battle would have meant more, say, to a Rob Zombie x Fortnite collaboration (please, Epic), but for Ms. Grande, it felt incongruous. 

Grande's sledgehammer, for example, could have been made interactive, as players could chain their attacks with her, or attack the back of the sledgehammer to increase its attack velocity.

5. Give us an actual narrative

The Ariana Grande x Fortnite Rift Tour experience leans on references in lieu of a story. She shatters the Rift with her sledgehammer as a nod to how she broke the glass ceiling in the "God Is A Woman" video — and as I noted earlier, the Piggy Smallz backpack is nice. It certainly got the fans reacting.

But references are just a puff pastry when compared to an actual story, which could make this whole thing feel like a meal. Even though you can play it over a few times, it's definitely the kind of ephemeral art that comes and goes and you move on. If there was a story to it, I probably would have come out with a better vibe. 

Outlook

I know I'm not a part of the target demo for the Fortnite Ariana Grande event. But it's not hard to see that the Rift Tour format may leave first timers going "that it?" This thing has gotten seriously hyped, but there's no indicator of its length in Epic's blog post.

In fact, Epic advises people to boot up Fortnite "60 minutes before your selected showtime," and then the experience you get is about a sixth of that? That's one way to possibly aggravate Arianators. 

But I'm not here to dunk on Epic. I just want the Rift Tour to be cooler for when I get excited that one of my favorite musicians or artists is getting in on the fun. 

• Read next: How to watch The Suicide Squad online today

It's time for the Ariana Grande's concert to kick off Fortnite, as the debut of the Rift Tour experience rocks both fanbases. But do you know how to get around this 7 Rings-circus?

Soon, you will get the chance to hear the pop diva's whistle tone in-game as she arrives at the battle royale island for a special free-to-watch show. Better yet, we've seen reports that you can even get the rare Ariana Grande Fortnite skin to show off the singer's iconic long ponytail in-game — but more on that later.

Ariana Grande is not the first A-list celebrity to headline a Fortnite show. The developers have previously collaborated with other big-name artists, including Travis Scott, Marshmello, and Major Lazer. After a series of leaks teasing Grande's Fortnite show, we finally got an official confirmation from Epic Games. 

Whether you're a Fortnite veteran, or an Arianator who wants more information on the upcoming Ariana Grande Fortnite event, we've got you covered.

• Here are some of the best streaming services right now
• And here you'll find all the latest Fortnite updates, news and patch notes
• Just in: Team USA vs. Brazil women's volleyball live stream

Below, we've included a roundup of everything you need to know ahead of the big day, including the start times, a guide on how to tune in, information on getting the skin, and, of course, an explainer on downloading the game in the first place. 

Be prepared for a Grande performance,. Judging by previous events, Fortnite does not play around when it comes to hosting such concerts. 

Ariana Grande Fortnite event: Start times

To ensure that everyone can tune in to the show at an appropriate time, Epic Games will host five showtimes over three days. These will begin with two shows on Friday and Saturday (August 6-7), and conclude with three shows scheduled for Sunday (August 8). We've included all of the exact starting times below. 

One thing to note, however, is that the developers recommend that players arrive an hour before showtime. This not only ensures a stable connection, but also allows players to join in some of the Fortnite-themed festivities, which "[pair] popular tracks with moments based on elements from the game" before Ariana's arrival. Epic Games also warns that if an event reaches maximum capacity, you may have to join one of the other shows instead. The Rift Tour Playlist should also become available 30 minutes before each show, so that you can prepare to sing along with Grande's iconic tunes. 

Shows are not region-locked, so feel free to tune in from anywhere in the world (provided that you have a decent connection, of course).

To view more details on the schedule, head over to RiftTour.com. Alternatively, you can use the in-game Rift Tour tab instead. Using the Rift Tour tab allows gamers to connect with friends and schedule the shows that they plan to attend, as well as check out the special Rift Tour Quests. 

• Show 1: Friday, August 6 starting at 6 p.m. ET/ 11 p.m. GMT/ 5 p.m. CT/ 3 p.m. PT
• Show 2: Saturday, August 7 starting at 2 p.m. ET/ 7 p.m. GMT/ 1 p.m. CT/ 11 a.m. PT
• Show 3: Sunday August 8 starting at 12 a.m. ET/ 5 a.m. GMT/ (08/07) 11 p.m. CT/ (08/07) 9 p.m. PT
• Show 4: Sunday August 8 starting at 10 a.m. ET/ 3 p.m. GMT/ 9 a.m. CT/ 7 a.m. PT
• Show 5: Sunday August 8 starting at 6 p.m. ET/ 11 p.m. GMT/ 5 p.m. CT/ 3 p.m. PT

Ariana Grande Fortnite event: How to watch

1. If you're unfamiliar with Fortnite, you'll have to download the game first. It's free-to-play, and available on the majority of the platforms, including PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, Android and PC.

2. Make sure that you download the latest update (v17.30) ahead of the event. Don't leave this until the last minute, as it may take some time.

3. Launch the game early. Epic Games advises users to hop on 60 minutes before showtime.

And that's it. Have Miss Grande bring the magic to your screen!

Ariana Grande Fortnite event: How to get the skin

Tuning into the show is only half the fun. And just like previous events with special in-game cosmetics, including the Marshmello and Travis Scott skins — there's an Ari skin to get here as well. 

And just like some of those, the Fortnite Item Shop is the only place to get this skin. There are challenges, but for other items.

Available now, the Ariana Grande skin and Piggy Smallz back bling go for 2,000 V-bucks in a combo pack. But if you want the sledgehammer pickaxe, emote, and glider? You're spending 2,800 V-bucks.

The Ari Skin two designs. One with platinum hair from the Sweetener album days, while the other shows off her signature brown ponytail. Both costumes have a cosmic vibe, which could be an homage to the singer's "Break Free" music video. 

Ariana Grande Fortnite event: Rewards and Rift Tour quests

Since Ariana Grande's in-game concert is a part of Fortnite's Rift Tour music experience, players can participate in special event quests to unlock unique rewards. 

Ahead of the show, you can play the first wave of Rift Tour Quests. You can check those out by viewing the Rift Tour tab, from July 29 until August 8.

Every player who attends the shows will get the adorable Cuddly Cloudcruiser commemorative Umbrella.

Fortnite Crew active subscribers who log into the game between August 5 (10 a.m. ET) and August 9 (10 a.m. ET) will also receive the Rainbow Cloudcruiser Umbrella, the Skye up High Loading Screen and a Rift Tour-themed Banner.

• More: Razer just made Zephyr face mask official — just in time for Delta variant

Earlier this week, Epic Games announced that its first licenced car would be appearing in Fortnite: the Ferrari 296 GTB. If you find one in game, you’ll be able to take part in a time trial to level up and unlock more Battle Stars.

The trouble is that everybody else wants to grab the car and complete the time trial themselves, so competition is pretty fierce. So where exactly do you find the Ferrari 296 GTB in Fortnite?

• Fortnite 2FA: How to enable Epic Games two-factor authentication
• The best PC games of 2021
• PLUS: PS5 really needs this Xbox Series X feature

 Fortnite Ferrari 296 GTB locations 

Our sister site, PC Gamer, highlights two Fortnite locations where the Ferrari 296 GTB will spawn pretty regularly: Believer Beach and Lazy Lake.

At Believer Beach, you’re likely to stumble across a Ferrari in the parking lot outside the hotel in the east of the town. If that fails, you may find one at the gas station on the town’s west side. 

At Lazy Lake, meanwhile, you can probably guess where a Ferrari would appear: both the gas station and car dealership often spawn the elusive vehicle.

There are also reports of a spot to the south of Weeping Woods, on the crossroads next to the gas station.

So, to recap, focus on these areas when you leave the Battle Bus:

Fortnite Ferrari 296 GTB time trial tips 

Of course, getting to the vehicle first is only half the battle. Then you’ve got to actually complete three epic quests. The first two are pretty straightforward: driving at full speed just requires you to go flat out without hitting anything for a few seconds, while driving in the storm just means you need to be in your vehicle when the storm approaches. Not particularly taxing.

The final one — to complete a time trial — is a bit trickier, so here are some tips.

The time trial locations are clearly marked when you check the map: they’re at Holly Hatchery, Weeping Woods and Lazy Lake. You can pick whichever is most convenient, and you only need to complete the trial once.

When you get there, look for a white light floating above the road. Drive through it when you’re ready to start.

Anybody who has played a time trial in any racing game before will be familiar with what’s required: just drive through the checkpoints and reach the end before the timer runs out (the circle shrinks above each checkpoint as the clock runs down). 

You don’t need to use boost mode to complete the challenge, and in fact we’d actively avoid it, as it burns through gas far too quickly to be practical. Additionally, the Ferrari 296 GTB is like every other sports car in the game, in that it works best when on tarmac, so stick to the roads and avoid grass and dirt, even when it looks like a more direct route. 

• More: 7 Things Parents Need to Know About Fortnite

On the heels of making his multimedia jump in Space Jam: A New Legacy, LeBron James, the four-time NBA champion, will soon have his avatar be playable in Fortnite. The new avatar is set to launch on July 14. 

The skin pays homage to the mythology surround James, sometimes referred to as King James. The avatar will come in three variants. 

• Fortnite updates, latest news and patch notes
• Here are the best gaming mice to up your game
• How to find the Ferrari 296 GTB in Fortnite

One will be James in a black suit, with a golden crown floating atop his head. The second will have him in his new Tune Squad livery, just in time for the upcoming Space Jam movie, which hits theaters on July 16. And the third skin has him wearing shorts and a taco t-shirt, a callback to his Taco Tuesday Instagram posts which went viral a few years back.

Coincidentally, James tried to copyright the term Taco Tuesday, which the U.S. Copyright and Trademark Office turned down. But at least he gets this cool shirt. 

Along with the new skins, Fortnite will also showcase the Nike LeBron 19 sneakers, in either leopard print, Tune Squad or what looks to be a Christmas tree. 

Along with the new skins will come some additional accessories and weapons. These include the Lion Pickaxe, the Wingspan Glider, and James' on-court celebration, The Silencer. 

It will also be possible to augment the amount of gold on James during character customization, giving players 20 variants in total. 

The most striking suit is King's Back Bling. Not only does it have a floating gold crown, but two glowing golden lion shoulder pads that look rather imposing. 

All skins will go on sale in the Fortnite Shop on Wednesday, July 14 at 8pm ET. A price was not given, but considering past skins from the Fortnite Icon series cost 1,500-2,000 V-bucks, or $15-20, it's likely James' skin will be at the higher end of that price structure. 

• More: I’m skipping Nintendo Switch OLED and waiting for a Switch Pro — here’s why

As if you haven't heard this countless times before, security matters. Even when you're playing a video game like Fortnite, two-factor authentication can come in handy.

Realizing that, Epic Games, the developer behind the wildly popular Fortnite: Battle Royale, wants to boost the use of two-factor authentication to secure your Fortnite account. 

If you sign up for two-factor authentication for your Epic Games account, you'll get a free Boogiedown Emote for use in Fortnite: Battle Royale. In Fortnite: Save the World, you'll get 50 armory slots, 10 backpack slots and a Legendary Troll Stash Llama.

Two-factor authentication is one of our best defenses against possible hacks. The technology uses two factors — something you have and something you know — to verify your identity and allow you to access accounts. 

The thing you know is your password. And the thing you have is something else — a smartphone, an e-mail address, or another tool — that a remote hacker won't have access to. The only way to access your account is to have both.

Adding two-factor authentication to your Fortnite account is a pretty good idea. Fortnite is a wildly popular franchise and hackers are always on the lookout for platforms with boatloads of users that are at risk. Fortnite could be one of them.

How to set up 2FA on your Epic Games account

So, if you're ready to start two-factor authentication on your Epic Games account, here's a quick guide on how to set it up:

1. Log into your account on EpicGames.com and go to Account in the top right-hand corner, under your name.

2. There, click on Password & Security in the left hand navbar.

3. On the bottom of that page, you'll see an option called "Two-Factor Authentication." Click to enable either a third-party authenticator app (the best option), email authentication (not as good as an app, but OK) or SMS text-message authentication (the least secure option). 

Many companies provide free authenticator apps, including Authy, Duo, Google, LastPass and Microsoft. They're all intercompatible. Again, this is the method we recommend.

And that's it. Once you have the feature turned on, you'll need to have both components on the ready to log in to your account.

Since you know what you're doing with 2FA now, you might also want to know how to set up two-factor authentication on Facebook, how to set up Gmail two-factor authentication (2FA) on your phone, how to enable two-factor authentication (2FA) for Ring cameras and how to enable 2FA on the Epic Games Store.

• 7 Things Parents Need to Know About Fortnite
• How to Get the Fortnite Galaxy Skin
• Fortnite Battle Royale — How to Do More Damage
• How to find the Ferrari 296 GTB in Fortnite

The Apple vs. Epic Games trial kicked off this week, and the outcome is certain to shake up the tech world. 

Apple's App Store business model is at stake. Epic argues that Apple is breaching antitrust laws by (among other things) not letting developers take in-game payments through iOS apps without giving Apple a 30% cut of the proceeds.

Apple says that its 30% cut of App Store revenue is in line with standard revenue-sharing arrangements on other digital storefronts, including Steam and the Google Play store. 

The iPhone maker is also pushing back against Epic's claim that Apple has a monopoly on a large portion of smartphone users by arguing that the App Store faces competition from other smartphone and console platforms.

• Want to game on a phone? Here are the best gaming phones
• And here are the best gaming PCs
• Plus: Apple vs Epic Games: What the trial of the century means for you

This all started brewing last August, when Epic quietly updated the iOS version of Fortnite with an option for players to buy in-game currency directly from Epic at a slight discount compared to what it cost to buy the currency through Apple's payment system. 

Apple responded by kicking Fortnite out of the App Store, and Epic's lawyers went to work putting together the lawsuit that's currently playing out.

We'll have to wait and see who wins, but in the meantime we stand to learn a lot about each company's business, as Apple and Epic filed pre-trial fact findings in separate documents of more than 300 pages each. 

Both documents are now publicly available online — you can read Epic’s here and Apple’s here. To save you time, we've pulled together some of the juiciest insights below.

Apple execs saw this coming a decade ago

One of the documents made public as part of the pre-trial fact-finding process (and publicized by Bloomberg) is a 2011 email to Steve Jobs and Eddy Cue from App Store head honcho Phil Schiller suggesting that the company plan to reduce its 30% cut in order to remain competitive with other markets.

"Do we think our 70/30 split will last forever? While I am a staunch supporter of the 70/30 split...I don't think that 70/30 will last...I think someday we will see enough challenge from another platform or web based solution to want to adjust our model," Schiller wrote, appending a link to a Wall Street Journal article outlining how developers could sidestep the App Store fees. 

"Once we are making over $1B a year in profit from the App Store," he added, "is that enough to think about a model where we ratchet down from 70/30 to 75/25 or even 80/20 if we can maintain a $1B a year run rate?"

In the intervening decade, Apple has adjusted its take of App Store revenue in isolated areas, most notably cutting it to 15% on any apps from devs who have made under $1 million on the App Store, but the overall 70/30 split has remained unchanged.

Epic chief Tim Sweeney emailed Apple CEO Tim Cook about this in 2015

In June of 2015, Epic Games founder and CEO Tim Sweeney sent an email to Apple CEO Tim Cook with "iOS as an open platform" in the subject line. 

This was two weeks after Apple's WWDC event, during which Epic representatives appeared to demo Fortnite (which was still in development at that point) on iOS and talk up how Apple's Metal API had helped make it possible.

"Y'all should think about separating iOS App Store curation from compliance review and app distribution," Sweeney wrote. 

"Compliance review would keep iOS free of malware, while open distribution would combine the best aspects of the App Store with the best aspects of open platforms," Sweeney added. "It would be extremely positive for Apple to take this approach proactively before the topic is overly complicated by opposing political, regulatory, moral, and competitive forces."

A day after receiving the email, Tim Cook apparently forwarded it to Phil Schiller and Eddy Cue with one sentence: "Is this the guy that was at one of our rehearsals?"

According to The Verge, further emails uncovered during the pre-trial process suggest Sweeney didn't give up after nothing (presumably) came of that first email. 

In an email dated to January 2018, Sweeney asked Epic co-founder Mark Rein to set up a 30-minute meeting with Apple exec Greg Joswiak in order to talk about "the potential for iOS and future Apple things to operate as open platforms."

Rein later replied that he'd talked to Apple's Tim Kirby about setting up a meeting, noting that Kirby was "definitely receptive to the idea which doesn't mean it will go anywhere but it means he'll line up people who will listen and not shoot it down like Phil Schiller would. He says they have had internal discussions about this sort of thing."

Epic is losing hundreds of millions to build its own store

At the end of 2018, Epic launched its own digital storefront, the Epic Games Store, on the back of Fortnite's massive success. The company has since been trying to expand the store's customer base by offering a rotating selection of free games every month to anyone with an Epic Games Store account. 

Epic pays the developers of those games a flat fee for the privilege. Now, thanks to the pre-trial documents, we have a sense of how much money Epic is willing to lose to attract customers to its own storefront.

According to Apple's pre-trial filings, which aim to support its argument that Epic itself is being anti-competitive by financing its unprofitable Epic Games Store with money from more profitable parts of the business, Epic "lost around $181 million on EGS in 2019" and "projected to lose around $273 million on EGS in 2020." 

Furthermore, Apple claims "Epic projects to lose around $139 million in 2021" and that "at best, Epic does not expect EGS to have a cumulative gross profit before 2027."

If you want a clearer sense of how much Epic is paying per free game it gives out, game industry veteran Simon Carless took to Twitter to publish some court documents which break down how much Epic paid for each game, how many copies were claimed, and how many new Epic accounts were created for each.

The incomplete lists shows payments to developers for 38 of the 100+ free games given away on the Epic Games Store so far. They range from over a million dollars ($1.5 million to developer Rocksteady for all three of its Batman Arkham games, $1.4 million to Unknown Worlds Entertainment for its underwater survival game Subnautica) to the tens of thousands ($45k for Six Foot's game Rime, $50k for Team Meat's Super Meat Boy) to zero in the case of Koch Media's Metro: 2033 Redux, the PC version of which was exclusively available on the Epic Games Store for a year.

Epic's Tim Sweeney would have taken a special deal from Apple

Epic has poured a ton of resources into this fight. It's tried to position itself as a champion of the little guy, most notably by involving the Fortnite fanbase with a bizarre #FreeFortnite marketing campaign. 

Company chief Tim Sweeney has also repeatedly taken to Twitter to argue that this fight is primarily about opening up Apple's closed App Store ecosystem for all developers. He's claimed on multiple occasions that "Epic won't seek nor accept a special deal just for ourselves."

However, when Sweeney was asked by Apple's lawyers in court this week whether he would have accepted a special deal that would let Epic pay Apple a smaller cut than other developers on the App Store, Sweeney said "Yes, I would have." 

That suggests most of Epic's pro-developer marketing campaign around this trial was just that: marketing.

Epic wanted Microsoft to make Fortnite multiplayer free on Xbox last summer

These pre-trial findings make clear that Epic tried to marshal a multi-pronged campaign against Apple and its 30% App Store cut last year. It almost got Xbox maker Microsoft to add some fuel to the fire.

Microsoft recently made playing free-to-play multiplayer Xbox games actually free, removing the requirement for players to pay for Xbox Live Gold memberships in order to access multiplayer. 

Fortnite is one of the free-to-play games on that list. Thanks to the pre-trial fact-finding process, we now know Epic's Tim Sweeney emailed Xbox chief Phil Spencer last summer to try and get Microsoft to make the change just as Epic was picking a fight with Apple. 

"We talked optimistically about the possibility of subscription-free multiplayer on Xbox...if this is coming, please consider the possibility of timing the program to support Fortnite Season 14 launch on 8/27," wrote Sweeney. 

"Epic has certain plans for August that will provide an extraordinary opportunity to highlight the value proposition of consoles and PCs, in contrast to mobile platforms."

Spencer responded the next day by acknowledging Sweeney's arguments on several matters, including "F2P outside of Gold (we will get there and I want to partner with you)", but making no promises.

"Totally understood!" Sweeney responded. "I gather there's a lot going on at Microsoft nowadays. Anyway, you'll enjoy the upcoming fireworks show."

Epic went on to roll out its own separate payment scheme for the iOS version of Fortnite later that month By Aug. 13, 2020, Apple had removed Fortnite from the App Store, kicking off this whole fight. 

Now we can see that Epic was making a concerted effort to make Fortnite totally free to play on Xbox (as it was already on PlayStation) just in time to pick a fight with Apple.

• More: Apple’s response to antitrust complaints — just build a web app

When it comes to console cross-play, Sony has always seemed a little hesitant compared to its rivals in Nintendo and Microsoft. In fact, it wasn’t until a significant public outcry in 2018 that Sony finally allowed the functionality starting with battle royal behemoth, Fortnite. 

Prior to this Sony had been extremely reluctant to play ball, blocking cross-play on games such as Rocket League and Minecraft. Documents that have come to light during the ongoing Epic Games versus Apple lawsuit, have given us details on Sony’s demands that ultimately allowed gamers on PlayStation to play Fortnite (and other games) with friends on separate systems. 

• PS5 restock update today: Track on Twitter, Walmart, Target and more
• iOS 14.5 guide — meet the biggest new features for your iPhone
• Plus: Nvidia RTX 3080 Ti release could be delayed — but it's still coming soon

After the backlash, which was primarily lead by Fortnite players, Sony agreed to allow cross-play on its platform in September 2018 but with the stipulation that it received compensation based on how much a game earned on a competing platform. The way this payment system works is outlined in a “cross-platform revenue share” agreement that Sony made (and may still make) publishers sign before the functionality can be enabled on PlayStation systems. 

The revenue split is outlined below. It boils down to the fact Sony believes it’s unfair if a higher percentage of active players use its platform than the percentage of players who are buying in-game purchases. So if 95% of Fortnite players were playing through PlayStation, but only 60% of the revenue the game earned was through PlayStation transactions, Sony demands additional revenue to account for the difference.

Sony’s justification for this agreement is that it prevents the situation where a majority of a game’s player base is on its platform, while a disproportionate amount of revenue is earned on another platform. Sony is using this agreement to ensure that it receives a fair portion of revenue for essentially lending its user base to its competitors. 

This document was first created in 2019, so it’s possible that Sony’s stance on cross-play has changed in the years since. Although based on comments made by Epic CEO Tim Sweeney that seems fairly unlikely, it was also confirmed that Sony is the only platform holder to have this sort of compensation system in place. 

Even after Epic twisted Sony arms to allow cross-play for Fortnite, and the feature has now been rolled out to additional titles like Call of Duty: Warzone and Destiny 2, Sony still seems unwilling to fully open up its platform to embrace gamers not playing on PS4 or PS5. 

While Microsoft is championing cross-play and cross-progression with its extensive backward compatibility offerings on the Xbox Series X and deep integration with PC gaming through Windows, Sony is decidedly more reluctant to allow gamers to play beyond the confines of a single system. 

What's most disappointing about this document being made public knowledge, is that it shows that Sony didn't have a change of heart back in 2018 and see the value of cross-play for gamers. Instead, it shows that cross-play is only permitted on PlayStation so long as it remains a money earner for Sony, and should that change we can only assume that Sony would revert back to its hard-line stance. 

As it stands cross-play is pretty evenly matched across the two platforms when it comes to multi-platform games at least. But perhaps in the future, Microsoft might decide it wants its own revenue sharing system in place if Sony isn't going to play ball without one. That could lead to cross-play becoming much rarer in the future as publishers decide it's just not worth the hassle of having to come to individual revenue-sharing agreements with multiple platform holders.  

Sweetening the pot for Sony

This cross-play revenue share agreement isn’t the only interesting Sony-related morsel to come out of the Epic Games versus Apple lawsuit hearing. 

We’ve also got details on how Epic attempted to sweeten the pot for Sony to get the Japanese tech giant to allow Fortnite cross-play on PlayStation platforms. Epic’s Joe Kreiner was fairly bullish in an early 2018 email exchange declaring that “I can't think of a scenario where Epic doesn't get what we want” and declaring Fortnite the “biggest game on PlayStation,” which in fairness is likely still accurate. 

Kreiner attempted to entice Sony with the offer of sharing valuable marketing data, cross-promoting Fornite and PlayStation at that year’s E3 showcase, And promised that Epic would “make Sony look like heroes” when announcing full cross-play support. 

The negotiations went a step further as well. Kreiner pitched a potential exclusive PSVR title down the line and even attempted to tighten the screw on Sony by pointing out that the company’s license on Epic’s Unreal Engine 4 would be up for renegotiation the following year. 

Sony seemed pretty unmoved by Epic’s offers, with the company’s former senior director Gio Corsi writing back: “There are a lot of great ideas in here for continued partnership however cross-platform play is not a slam dunk no matter the size of the title. As you know, many companies are exploring this idea and not a single one can explain how cross-console play improves the PlayStation business."

This stance would later soften, clearly thanks to the creation of the revenue sharing scheme as outlined above. While these discussions are obviously water under the bridge at this point, it’s still extremely fascinating to get a rare glimpse at how these powerful companies negotiate terms behind closed doors. 

The Epic Games versus Apple lawsuit is being fought over Epic’s attempts to circumvent Apple’s App Store fees, with the game publisher arguing that Apple has set up an unfair monopoly in return. The hearing is currently ongoing and could well reveal further behind-the-curtain information about the tech world before reaching its conclusion. 

Back to Sony and its reluctance to easily embrace cross-play, such a stance could be detrimental to future PS5 games, as some developers might not want to enter into the revenue sharing agreement Sony seems to impose. 

Now Sony's stance may have changed, and we're till seeking clarity on that. But the PS5 is a console you go are more likely to choose because of its current and future exclusive games, like Horizon Forbidden West, not cross-play. So far, it looks like the Xbox Series X and overall Xbox ecosystem is friendlier towards cross-play. 

• More: Returnal on PS5 already has a crashing problem

Update: Fortnite is finally back on iPhone and iPad — here's how to play it now.

Fortnite update 16.10 is live and brings a graphics boost for Nintendo Switch with it. The update dropped yesterday, introducing raptors, wolves, and other wildlife to the game. Dataminers have also dug out some Easter-themed skins which we expect to drop soon. 

First thing's first: what are Nintendo Switch players in for? Epic Games announced the GPU and performance boost for Fortnite on the Switch, noting it's upgraded the renderer on the console to better use the GPU. If you're playing on the hybrid console, that means better resolution in handheld and docked mode, a more consistent framerate and a smoother overall experience. 

• Nintendo Switch Lite vs Nintendo Switch: what should you buy?
• Nintendo Switch Lite review: A practically perfect portable console
• Plus: What time is Godzilla vs Kong streaming on HBO Max?

The studio explains that Fortnite on Switch will still use dynamic resolution to hit a consistent framerate, but instances will be less frequent, with "significantly higher" resolution in general. 

To give you an idea of what you're in for, the resolution in handheld and docked mode prior to the update sits at 1000 x 560 and 1390 x 780 respectively; post-update, the new resolutions are 1170 x 660 for handheld mode, and 1560 x 880 when docked. You can check out the difference in the side-by-side above.

Moving on to update 16.10, Epic delves into the new visitors to the island in the primal update. The eggs that have been scattered around in the run-up to Easter have hatched, and raptors are now on the loose. The dinos travel in pairs, so if you've watched Jurassic Park, you know what you're in for. Wolves and boars also join the fray, and you'll be able to fight, or farm the animals for resources.  Of course, if you'd rather make friends with the new wildlife, you can; just craft a Hunter's Cloak.

Not all of the new fauna pose a threat: chickens and frogs are also milling about the island now, and are valuable resources for crafting.

As well as the fresh content that's just dropped, dataminers have been ferreting around in the update to find out what else is in store. Fortnite Insider reports on a slew of leaked skins and cosmetics that could roll out any time soon. 

Easter-themed skins have been spotted, as well as an anime set. The site also points out the map changes that have rolled out, adding: "something has arrived on the island!"

Fortnite update 16.10 is live now on all platforms, and Nintendo Switch players can also look forward to saving around 140MB of storage space once it's downloaded.  

•  The best Nintendo Switch games you can play right now

It's time to watch the Fortnite Kaskade event. The latest pop culture event in the Fortnite world brings things back to where the fun happened all summer long. So, if you weren't keen to watch the Fortnite short film festival, we bet you're ready to rock out virtually with DJ Kaskade. 

Oh, and to amp it up another degree? It's going to be set in the world of Rocket League — inside of Fortnite. And you don't actually need Fortnite to watch this event. It's also going to be available in the Houseparty app too. Full instructions for how to watch both ways, below!

• Everything to know about Stranger Things season 4
• The best streaming devices
• Plus: what we know about The Umbrella Academy season 3

Kaskade will be performing his new Reset EP in Party Royale, and afterwards we will get the Rocket League season 3 trailer.

How to watch the Fortnite Kaskade event in Fortnite

1. At the Lobby screen, press Change in the bottom-right corner.
2. Select Party Royale.
3. Press Accept.
4. Press Play on the Lobby screen.
5. Use the in-game map, and the below graphic, to find The Big Screen.

1. After you spawn in the Plaza, look for the SoFDEEZ ice cream shop. 
2. Take the road on the back right (when facing the entrance) of that shop. 
3. See the disco sign? You're almost there. 
4. Just keep going.

If this is your first time, you'll want to start a bit earlier, to install it all. You can download Fortnite for Windows, Mac and Android. On PS4, Xbox One and Switch, search "Fortnite" in the game store.

Alternatively, you can watch the stream while you're in a standard Battle Royale, with picture-in-picture mode. Just pause the game, and tap "Show Party Royale Stream" on the right-hand menu.

How to watch the Fortnite Kaskade event in Houseparty

1. Prior to the start of the shows, open the Houseparty app (on iOS or Android)
2. Start a Houseparty with your friends as normal
3. Tap the TV icon
4. Tap Watch 

The latest season of Fortnite is officially upon us. Fortnite Chapter 2 Season 6 has managed to mostly avoid the bevy of leaks that have spoiled previous events in the massively popular online game, so we’re going into this season with plenty of surprises still to come. 

Launched on March 16, Fortnite Season 6 has been dubbed Primal and is already making significant changes to the battle royale game, with more to come in the next few weeks. 

• PS5 restock update today: Check inventory on Twitter, Target, Best Buy and more
• Xbox Series X restock update today: Track on Twitter, Walmart, Target and more
• Plus: FIFA 21 Ultimate Team sales halted amid scandal — what you need to know

Season 5 was dominated by crossovers. We saw iconic gaming characters like PlayStation’s Kratos and Xbox’s Master Chief join the fray, as well as popular culture icons such as The Mandalorian and Predator. 

However it looks like Season 6 will be taking a slightly different approach and focusing instead on Fortnite’s own lore and unique characters. Of course, there will still be a cameo or two from some familiar faces.  

There’s quite a bit to unpack here, so let’s dive straight in with everything we know so far about Fortnite Season 6, as well as some hints about what might be unveiled a little way down the road. 

Zero time to lose 

When you first boot into Fortnite Season 6 you’ll be tasked with completing the conclusion of Agent Jones’ mission in Zero Crisis Finale.  

Of course, Jones’ quest to prevent the island core from collapsing in on itself began in Season 5, so players have had to wait a while to see how it all shakes out. Based on the intro cinematic, it’s going to be suitably epic. 

Curiously this finale is a solo experience, which goes against the social aspect that has dominated most Fortnite events so far. This is perhaps an indication that Epic is keen to include more narrative-focused content this season. 

Take a walk on the wild side 

This season is being released under the title Primal, and it seems that Fortnite is about to be invaded by four-legged guests.

Animals now roam the island, ranging from vicious wolves to raging wild boars, as well as slightly more friendly creatures including chicken and frogs. 

You’ll be able to hunt these animals and use the collected resources to craft unique weapons, such as a bow and arrow. Alternatively, you can tame them, if you’d rather fight alongside an animal companion. 

Crafting mechanics have exploded in popularity recently, with survival games like Valheim built around the concept, so we’re not surprised to see Fortnite get in on the trend. 

Alternatively, you can tame the animals you’ll find on the island if you’d rather fight alongside an animal companion. 

Say hello to The Spire 

As is customary at this point, Season 6 is bringing with it some dramatic changes to the Fortnite map.  

The island now featuring a gigantic tower at its center. Known as The Spire, you can't miss this monolithic structure as it loams over just about the entire island.  

A new range of villages surrounds the tower, including locations like Colossal Crops and Boney Burbs. 

The new-look map leaked ahead of the season launching, so we’ve already had a chance to get acclimated with the changes. 

A new look for the Tomb Raider 

Considering that the new season of Fortnite is themed around hunting and wilderness survival, it’s rather fitting that the first crossover of the season is none other than Lara Croft. 

The Tomb Raider franchise is celebrating its 35th anniversary this year, so there had been some speculation that Lara might pop up in the world of Fortnite to mark the occasion. 

There are multiple different Lara skins available including, one modeled after her classic polygonal look, and one that is inspired by the recent reboot trilogy. 

Lara is unlocked through the Fortnite Season 6 Battle Pass. Raven from the superhero cartoon Teen Titans is also available as part of the pass. 

 Neymar bursts onto the scene (yes, really) 

After some teasing on twitter, it’s been confirmed that Neymar will be joining Fortnite this season.  

The Brazillian soccer star would seem like an odd inclusion in just about any other game (bar FIFA), but this is Fortnite. At this point we’ve long stopped questioning inclusions here — the Travis Scott virtual concert proved that anything goes.

We don’t yet know how Neymar will feature in Fortnite, but the smart money would suggest he’ll likely be an unlockable skin. Maybe he’ll have a unique football weapon, or the ability to theatrically roll around on the floor after being meleed by another player?

Looking to the future 

Fortnite Season 6 has been kept under closer wraps than usual, so we don’t have as strong an idea of what’s to come throughout the season as we have done in the past.

Leaker HYPEX did reveal multiple things that were earmarked for Season 5 that never came to fruition, including a crossover with animated-sitcom Family Guy. 

There is the potential that all these bits of content have now been held back for Season 6. Time will tell. 

• More: Sony Direct sending PS5 restock e-mails: do this to increase your chances of getting one

It’s time to watch the Fortnite Short Nite event! And yes this film festival is going to continue the game's experimentations in pop culture events. This half-hour event is free, and will present a series of animated short films to all those who want to jump into Party Royale (details below). 

Short Nite will feature content "from around the world," including shorts that got Academy Award nominations for Best Animated Short Film. And if you just want to watch the films while you hunt and shoot, it will be available in Picture-in-Picture mode, and starting every two hours afterwards for the following 24 hours.

• Everything you need for a Super Bowl 2021 live stream
• The best streaming devices
• How to watch the Super Bowl without cable

In addition, there will be a Jumbo Popcorn emote available as of February 19 at 7 p.m. ET.

And since this is a film festival, subtitles are also an important thing to pay attention to. Enable text for the language of your preference in Audio Settings.

According to The Verge, these are the movies set for the schedule:

• Bench
• Makin’ Moves
• Rollin’ Wild
• Car Park
• Maestro
• Oktapodi
• A Single Life
• Catastrophe
• Commuter Glitch
• Creature Comforts
• Lynx & Birds

How to watch the Fortnite Short Nite film festival

1. At the Lobby screen, press Change in the bottom-right corner.
2. Select Party Royale.
3. Press Accept.
4. Press Play on the Lobby screen.
5. Use the in-game map, and the below graphic, to find The Big Screen.

If you spawn in The Plaza, look for the bridge that's near the cafe and snack stand. Cross the bridge and follow the trail up the hill to the Big Screen.

If this is your first time, you'll want to start a bit earlier, to install it all. You can download Fortnite for Windows, Mac and Android. On PS4, Xbox One and Switch, search "Fortnite" in the game store.

Fortnite and the NFL are set to collide across a huge week of streaming competition. This week hosts three major nights of competition that could draw in a huge audience beyond fans of the sport and game, as comedians Desus and The Kid Mero will host some of the festivities. 

While the NFL's already made its mark in Fortnite by taking over the Creative Welcome Hub, events kick off properly on Tuesday with the first of a pair of Fortnite competitions starring NFL players (including Tua Tagovailoa and Kyler Murray) and pro gamers KittyPlays and Myth.

• Everything you need for a Super Bowl 2021 live stream
• The best streaming devices
• How to watch the Super Bowl without cable

And then there's Thursday's big event: the Twitch Rivals Streamer Bowl II Featuring Fortnite. We'll watch as 30 NFL players are paired with top Twitch streamers and fans who reached the top of the Streamer Bowl Cup. The entire event is a competition for the $1,000,000 non-profit prize pool.

Not only will Fortnite factor in heavily, but the Bowl will also have a Rocket League halftime show. Rapper/streamer T-Pain and streamer BigCheeseKit, along with players including George Kittle and Trent Taylor, are on board.

Thursday is the big day of the event, as Fortnite releases the Gridiron Gang Set outfits. There will be two uniform styles for every team (not just the Buccaneers and Chiefs), plus Logo-a-go Back Bling.

That same day will see a NFL Rumble LTM pitting fans of the Buccs and Chiefs against each other.

How to watch the Fortnite NFL events

To attend in real time, log into Fortnite and enter the Creative Welcome Hub. 

Those who would rather watch the Tuesday and Friday events can also get in on the action, as the event will be streamed on Twitch (channel TBA) and on the @Verizon Twitter account. The competitions hosted by Desus and Mero will take place at 7 p.m. ET on Tuesday (February 2) and Friday (February 5). 

The Twitch Rivals Streamer Bowl II will be on the TwitchRivals channel.

If this is your first time, you'll want to start a bit earlier, to install it all. You can download Fortnite for Windows, Mac and Android. On PS4, Xbox One and Switch, search "Fortnite" in the game store.

If you’re a Fortnite devotee still lamenting the loss of your favorite game from iPhone and iPad earlier this year, then you’ll be pleased to hear that it may be about to return. Though probably not in the way you imagined.

The court case between Fortnite creators Epic Games and Apple isn’t going to be resolved any time soon — indeed, it’s not even expected to begin until May 2021 — but that might not matter. According to the BBC, Nvidia’s GeForce Now streaming service is coming to iOS and will bring Fortnite with it. 

• iPhone 12 review: Should you buy Apple's new phone?
• The best iOS games
• Just in: iPhone 12 Pro Max review — our verdict is in

Anybody following Apple’s difficult relationship with game streaming services will know that this isn’t going to be as simple as just tapping the Fortnite icon on your iPhone’s home screen. Apple famously updated its terms and conditions to insist that each streaming platform would require a shell app for any game installed, which makes the simplicity of something like Microsoft’s Game Pass a bit more complex.

For GeForce Now, apparently, Nvidia’s solution is to allow it to run via the Safari browser. That may sound like a hacky workaround, but it is actually condoned by Apple's own words, with the company telling The Verge back in August that “developers can choose to reach all iPhone and iPad users over the web through Safari and other browsers on the App Store.”

Fiddly? Certainly. But will it provide a good in-game experience? That’s a more difficult question to answer: on one hand, GeForce Now’s servers are considerably more powerful than even the mighty iPhone 12, which means it’ll likely look better than ever. On the other, the nature of streaming means added latency will be a factor, and that could be further exacerbated by being stuck in Safari rather than a native, optimized app.

The good news is that it won’t cost players anything to find out how it runs. Fortnite on PC is free to play, just as it is on other platforms, which means it can appear in people’s GeForce Now library without extra cost. And while GeForce Now does have a paid $5-per-month tier with optional ray tracing and faster access, anyone can play for limited time periods without paying a cent.

All the same, it’s a slightly ludicrous situation to be in, especially given Fortnite’s proven popularity on iOS. Court filings indicate that, before the ban, the game had 116 million users on iOS – 73 million of which only played on mobile. Between them, they had clocked up a mammoth 2.86 billion hours’ worth of gameplay.  

But that’s where we’ve ended up after Epic Games tried to use those impressive stats as leverage to escape from Apple’s punishing 30% cut of all microtransactions. Rather than attempting to negotiate behind the scenes, Epic instead put an in-app purchase option with lower prices for players without Apple getting a cut. That was enough for Apple to ban one of its most popular apps leaving millions of players disappointed. 

It could be years before the situation is resolved by the courts in Apple or Epic’s favor. So for now, short of playing on a different platform, this is iPhone owners’ best shot at getting their Fortnite fix — unwieldy as it demonstrably is. 

Fortnite isn’t the most technically demanding game, but on the bright side, that means you can run it at relatively high settings without a powerful gaming rig. Phone maker OnePlus seems keenly aware of this fact, and wants to use Fortnite to demonstrate the power of its new flagships, the OnePlus 8 and OnePlus 8 Pro. Both devices can now run Fortnite at frame rates up to 90 fps, which is a full 150% faster than either the PS4 or the Xbox One.

Information comes from a OnePlus press release, in which the company announced a partnership with Epic Games. Even though the ability to run Fortnite at 90 fps is the most interesting thing in the statement, the press release mostly highlights the Epic Games App and the OnePlus 8’s launch in India. Using the OnePlus-exclusive “Game Space” app, players can install the Epic Games app, which in turn lets them install Fortnite. This is, in theory, much easier (and safer) than the multistep side-loading process required by most Android phones.

• Learn about the best phones
• Play the best PC games
• Plus: iPhone 12 leak kills any hope for USB-C — but there’s some good news

However gamers choose to install it, the key takeaway is that Fortnite will run at a very high frame rate on the OnePlus 8 and 8 Pro, two of the best Android phones we've recently reviewed. On the surface, this is because of the OnePlus 8’s powerful specs, including a Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 processor, an Adreno 650 GPU and at least 8GB RAM.

While it’s not really possible to do an apples-to-apples comparison of console and mobile CPUs and GPUs, it’s worth noting that both the PS4 and Xbox One have 8GB RAM apiece as well. Smartphone technology has come a long way over the past seven years, and OnePlus' latest handsets are very powerful, even by premium smartphone standards.

It will be interesting to see whether Fortnite runs at a full 2400 x 1080 resolution while pulling 90 fps, though. Generally speaking, lowering resolution is one way to bump frame rate, and OnePlus 8 devices may prioritize the smoothness of gameplay over display resolution to achieve that 90 fps goal. Whether that matters will largely depend on the player, but it might be worth monitoring for those who have both a OnePlus 8 and an affinity for Fortnite.

While the OnePlus 8 and 8 Pro's specs are ideal for Fortnite, there’s still a fair question about how much it means for Android gaming overall. Fortnite is a popular game, but it’s also easy to play on almost any platform. There aren’t many other Android games that push systems to their limits, spec-wise, and at present, there’s no definitive answer to Apple Arcade: a subscription service that delivers premium, iOS-exclusive games.

Still, it’s good to know that Android has handsets powerful enough to give current-gen consoles a run for their money in certain respects. And, from the way the press release reads, the OnePlus 8 duo won't be the only phones in which you'll be able to experience Fortnite at that speed, as OnePlus and Epic say that they're only "the first line of smartphones able to run Fortnite on the Unreal Engine at 90 fps." That indicates that perhaps other high-end handsets, like the Samsung Galaxy S20 series, could eventually join OnePlus' ranks.

Nevertheless, if companies like OnePlus can leverage the power of their phones into providing an experience that players can’t get elsewhere, the mobile gaming landscape could get a whole lot more interesting. Well, at least until the PS5 and Xbox Series X blow them out of the water once again.

Want to see your friends? If you're bored of Zoom you should consider video games to play together as virtual hangouts: titles that put more of an emphasis on being social than on showcasing skills.

Online gaming can be a great way to connect with friends when you’re stuck at home. But most online games require laser-focus on what you’re doing. A momentary lapse in attention can cost your team victory, and that’s not a great mindset to be in if you just want to hang out and catch up.

• For something more challenging, try the 10 best games for new gamers
• 11 best games to play when you're stuck at home

Of course, some friend groups will feel right at home in Overwatch or League of Legends, and power to them. But if you’re not already super-skilled in a competitive online game, using it as a virtual hangout space can be daunting. 

Instead, we’ve compiled a list of ten games where hanging out is either the primary goal, or very easy to do alongside regular gameplay. These include sims, RPGs, racing games and even pure social experiences. Each provides a solid alternative to simply using a Zoom background to liven up your next online meetup.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons

Animal Crossing: New Horizons is already one of the chillest games on the market today. While there’s a lot to do in the game, you don’t have to do any of it under a time limit. The game accepts whatever goals you set for yourself, and gives you mild nudges to accomplish them as you go. You can invite up to seven friends to your island at once, and then all of you can pull weeds, hunt bugs and simply explore to your hearts’ content.

What makes Animal Crossing such a good hangout space is that there’s no overarching goal to work toward. The entire crux of the multiplayer mode really is “spend time together.” Best of all, if you can get a group of eight friends together, you can take turns visiting each others’ islands, which will be sure to eat up at least a few evenings. Each player collects items, and if you're in a giving mood, you can even send trinkets to your friends to help them improve their islands. 

• 12 essential Animal Crossing: New Horizons tips

Final Fantasy XIV

Massively multiplayer online (MMO) game fans have known for years that these titles are often virtual hangout spaces first, and engrossing games second. Just get a group of friends together, pick a nightly time to meet, and work your way through FFXIV’s gripping story and easygoing, quest-based gameplay. Having a ready-made party makes the game feel much more rewarding, particularly since FFXIV requires you to join groups in order to tackle a lot of its story quests. (Compare and contrast to World of Warcraft, which generally doesn’t necessitate forming parties until the endgame content.)

FFXIV is a gorgeous game with a lot of fun classes to play, including Final Fantasy mainstays like Warrior, White Mage, Machinist, Summoner and Dragoon. If you all start at Level 1 and work your way through the game together, you’ll have plenty of time to chat, especially since the game is rarely too challenging. (And yes, WoW would work just as well, but FFXIV is a better game.)

Fortnite: Party Royale

By now, you probably already know if you love or hate Fortnite, and this list probably isn’t going to change your mind. But it is worth pointing out that if you’re at least open to the idea of playing it, the game recently implemented a new, combat-free mode. Fortnite: Party Royale came about after the game’s massively popular Travis Scott concert, and features a similar pitch: Hang out with your friends in a big, virtual world where combat isn’t a factor.

That doesn’t mean there’s nothing to do, though. Fortnite: Party Royale features timed challenges and a bunch of vehicles to play with, so you won’t simply be standing around. There’s also gear to earn and, every so often, concerts to watch. The player cap is much higher in Party Royale than in a traditional Fortnite game, so it might be worth logging in just to see whom you’ll meet.

Forza Horizon 4

Each Forza Horizon 4 multiplayer server supports up to 72 players, so you shouldn’t have any trouble fitting your whole friend group into this digital representation of Great Britain. For those who haven’t played it, Forza Horizon 4 is an open-world racing game where players compete on the streets, racetracks and off-road trails of England and Scotland. It’s very much an “explore and see things at your own pace” experience, which means it’s incredibly well suited to a group of friends hanging out.

Since the player cap is so high, your group doesn’t have to coordinate its actions. One person can cruise across the country while another competes in a race and another adds more cars to his collection. Of course, you can all meet up and race, if you like — and you’ll have more than 450 real-life cars from which to choose, if you do.

The Jackbox Party Pack

By this point in quarantine, I imagine that everybody’s played at least one Jackbox game with friends, and it’s not hard to see why. Jackbox games require no specialized gaming skills or dedicated controllers. You just hop into a server with your phone or computer and let your brain (and often some alcohol) do the rest of the work. Whether you’re coming up with clever lies in Fibbage, testing your smarts in You Don’t Know Jack, penning rhyming diss tracks in Mad Verse City or making incomprehensible images in Drawful, the Jackbox games are exactly the kind of thing you might play at a house party or a bar.

There is a fair question about whether Jackbox really facilitates socializing, since most of the games require your full attention for a good ten minutes at a time. However, I’ve found that playing Jackbox games online is a lot like playing them in person: ten minutes of gaming, followed by ten minutes of shooting the breeze, followed by another ten minutes of gaming, and so on, until someone conks out on a couch.

Mario Kart 8 Deluxe

While I like a good round of Mario Kart as much as the next Switch owner, I think we can admit to ourselves that it’s not the most hardcore racing series out there. Think about how often Mario Kart 8 Deluxe gets pulled out at a house party. It’s not really about the challenge, or the skill involved; it’s almost always just a way to get people loosened up and having fun. (Granted, there’s always that one guy who takes it way too seriously, but don’t be that guy.)

Mario Kart 8 Deluxe is an especially good hangout game if your group has already played it ad nauseum. You know how to navigate your favorite tracks; you know which character you’re going to pick; you know which settings you like. All you have to do is run the races, then let your fingers do the work while you and your friends catch up.

Neverwinter Nights: Enhanced Edition

There are ways to play Dungeons & Dragons online, but they tend to be very involved. If you want a tabletop RPG experience that’s a little more social and a little less technical, Neverwinter Nights: Enhanced Edition is a great option. This re-release of the 2002 classic lets you create your own Dungeons & Dragons modules, then play through them with up to 64 players. (If you actually manage to make a module where 64 players can collaborate in a meaningful way, my hat’s off to you.)

What’s great about Neverwinter Nights is that the game takes care of all the tedious parts of an RPG for you. Rather than consulting your rulebook while you figure out movement speed and special abilities, you just choose the action you want to take (attacking a monster or disarming a trapped treasure chest), and the game engine will take care of the rest. Simple dungeon crawls, rather than story-driven adventures, tend to facilitate the best hangouts.

Sea of Thieves

When you’re stuck at home, nothing could be more alluring than the promise of adventure on the high seas. You and three friends can crew your own pirate ship in Sea of Thieves: an online multiplayer game that gets surprisingly granular about ocean exploration. You don’t just hop on a ship and sail from objective to objective; you actually have to raise anchor, unfurl your sails, man the cannons, bail out water and repair damage with wooden planks as you go. Once you make landfall, you can fight fantastical foes and dig up buried treasure.

Sea of Thieves is almost entirely about the experience of getting lost in a pirate fantasy; it didn’t even have a story campaign until last year. Once you and your crew get in the rhythm of things, Sea of Thieves can be a great alternative to simply sitting around and talking, since everyone’s role is just passive enough to zone out a bit, and just active enough to keep them from getting bored.

Tabletop Simulator

I covered Tabletop Simulator in its own article, but it’s impossible to talk about virtual hangouts without it. Tabletop Simulator isn’t a game, per se; it’s more of a physics engine with a lot of game pieces attached. You set out a game on a tabletop, then roll dice, draw cards and move pieces, just like in real life. You can play chess, poker, mahjong and other public domain games right out of the box, as well as collaborate on jigsaw puzzles and run tabletop RPGs. If you want to pay money, you can also get official digital versions of popular board games, or dive into the Steam Workshop to see what other fans have created.

Tabletop Simulator is great for hanging out since there’s nothing in particular you have to do in the game. You could play a round of checkers, then pack it up and play rummy instead. It’s a lot like actually sitting around someone’s game table at home. You’ll play what you came to play, sure, but you’ll also be able to unwind and talk with no objectives hanging over your head.

Ticket to Ride

To be fair, I could have put any good board game adaptation here; Ticket to Ride is just easy to learn and has a stable, widely available digital version. Anyone who’s sat through a board game knows that it’s basically impossible to play one start to finish without stopping to chat and catch up along the way. (Those incredibly complex German strategy games that take a whole afternoon to set up might be an exception — but not always.) Especially if you play a game you all know and love, you don’t need to spend any time explaining the rules, letting you focus on other people instead.

For those who haven’t played it, Ticket to Ride is a lightweight strategy game that challenges players to build train routes across the United States, or Europe, or Asia, depending on which version you pick up. It’s newbie-friendly and feels a bit like traveling, which is a nice touch during a quarantine. But again, any decent digital board game will work just as well.

If there's one thing you should know about Fortnite as a parent, it's that you shouldn't let your kid play with voice chat on.

I heard about 50 F-bombs during the course of one game, many of them about my playing ability. There are also no filters of any kind to keep players from saying (or typing) whatever they want to each other.

But that doesn't mean Fortnite is necessarily bad for kids, especially if you use the right in-game tools and properly monitor their play.

Here's what parents need to know about this game.

• Fortnite is an online shooter that starts with 100 players and leaves one winner standing.
• The entire point of the game is to kill other players, but the violence is cartoon-like.
• Although the game itself seems pretty harmless, players can talk and type whatever they want to each other, and bad language is rampant.
• In-app purchases can turn this free game into an expensive habit, with the average player spending about $85.
• Short matches and accessible gameplay make the game addictive.
• You can regulate your child's playtime (as well as in-app purchases) via parental controls on platforms like PS4, Xbox One, Switch and iOS.
• If your child is showing signs of isolation or depression because of the game, seek professional help.

What is Fortnite Battle Royale?

Fortnite Battle Royale is an online third-person shooter game in which 100 players parachute onto an island, and the last player alive wins. Each game lasts about 20 minutes (although you have the option to leave the game if you die, so if you aren't very good, games can be very short!).

Even though it was released less than a year ago, Fortnite Battle Royale already boasts 125 million players, according to its publisher, Epic Games.

While there are two different Fortnite games at the moment, we're going to focus only on Fortnite Battle Royale, since that game is free and is the one that most people are playing and talking about.

MORE: Fortnite for Dummies - Why It's Taking Over the World (And How to Jump In)

Is there anything that should concern parents?

The game is violent — it is a battle to the death, after all — but the violence is bloodless and rather cartoon-like. There's just lots of shooting and hacking and noise.

Although the game is free to play, in-app purchases can add up quickly. Players can buy things like new looks and new dances, and while these purchases don't affect a player's chances of winning, one of my friends told me that her son has spent more than $200 in the game. Most platforms allow you to block in-app purchases via parental controls (see paragraph below), so be sure to set up yours if you don't want junior running up the credit card bill.

There are both voice-chat and text-chat capabilities within the game, but not with solo play. You can turn off voice chat  in the game's settings but your child could just turn it on again. You may be able to turn off all voice chat within the device itself using parental controls, but it's different for every platform.

MORE: How Much Fortnite Is Too Much for Kids?

Most parental control settings will allow you block the game completely. Macs, PCs and Xboxes, iPhones/iPods, Nintendo Switch and PS4s all have some version of parental controls.

Can other players talk to your child?

Text chat cannot be turned off, and there are no filters for voice or text, which may be concerning to parents. There's nothing to stop an adult from saying lewd things to a younger player, or to stop kids from swearing at each other.

Now, you can report players from within the game by clicking on "Report Player" in the bottom right of the screen if you think they've crossed a line or cheated, or after the game (just make sure you remember their player name!). Players can also mute individual players, so if your child is hearing things he knows he shouldn't, he can make it stop.

When I played with voice chat on, there was a lot of swearing. Usually it was the adults swearing, but when I ended up on a team with one other adult and two very young-sounding children, it seemed like the kids were getting a kick out of swearing when grown-ups could hear.

I spoke with Lewis Ward, a research director with International Data Corp. who studies gaming and VR/AR, who told me that the only way to stop the bad language in Fortnite was to turn chat off.

MORE: Fortnite's Playground Mode Is Here: What You Need to Know

"If there's a way to stop teens or adults from swearing and trash talking in a game I don't think anyone's found it yet,"  Ward said.

What makes Fortnite so addictive?

I played a good amount of Fortnite myself while preparing for this assignment, and while I'm not a gamer and don't usually have any trouble staying away from things like this, I found myself on multiple occasions playing "just one more game."

Since the games are short, it was easy to trick myself into thinking that it wasn't eating up that much time, and since you would never want to just leave in the middle of a game, putting a time limit on it is a bit harder than for a game that just continues on without end.

Ward told me that making addictive games is an art form, and that Epic knows what it's doing — the company has been around the block a few times.

"Epic does a good job releasing weekly updates to keep the gameplay fresh. There's just a lot of things that go into it. There's skill involved but it isn't too hard for noobs to pick up the basics and have fun."

How can I control my child's playtime?

While some children have developed the ability to self-regulate how much Fortnite they play, an informal poll of my friends indicates that that's not usually the case.

If you need to put limits on how much your time your child is spending on the game, there are several ways to do that (aside from just kicking the child off  the device). With the exception of iPhones/iPods, all of the parental controls listed above include instructions for limiting how long the device can be used, allowing you to set a hard limit on how much time your child has with Fortnite (or any game).

MORE: Fortnite Is On the Switch! How to Get It Now

For iPhones, the new Screen Time feature in iOS 12 will allow parents to impose usage limits on their child's iPhone through Family Sharing. For devices that need Wi-Fi  to get online, it may be easier to handle time limits at the router level with something like Circle, which can put time limits on categories such as "games."

How does Fortnite affect the children who play it?

I spoke with Dr. Anthony Rao, a pediatric psychologist and author of "The Way of Boys: Promoting the Social and Emotional Development of Young Boys." He was not at all alarmed about the game itself, which he considers to be fairly benign as far as video games go. He was much more concerned with screen time in general, and how it affects individual children.

"I tell parents, don't fight with your kids about the game itself – don't tell them it's bad or it causes problems, because that just lowers the credibility of the parent," Rao said. "The thing I want parents to know about is the overall screen-time exposure. That's what's interrupting the healthy daily living. [Game-playing time] is time that would have been used to play and explore and meet up with friends."

When I asked  Ward what parents can do if their kids are addicted to Fortnite, he sent me to the World Health Organization’s recent categorization of gaming disorder as a diagnosable condition, and he was only half kidding.

"Addictions are hard to break but the key is finding one or more other positive interests or hobbies they have and nudging them in that direction firmly but lovingly,"  Ward said. "You don't just restrict access and yell at them."

MORE: Fortnite's Mysterious Meteor: What You Need to Know

A high school teacher (who wished to remain anonymous) told me that the accessibility of Fortnite (being free to play) has managed to get Fortnite into her classroom, making it even harder to grasp students'  attention. This teacher is a gamer, so she understands the hype, but she's caught students using their laptops to watch Twitch streamers play Fortnite, when the students were supposed to be working on assignments.

How do I know if my child is playing too much Fortnite?

Rao has nine warning signs that can help indicate if your child is playing Fortnite (or any game) too much, in order from mild to extremely concerning.

These include the game becoming the child's default downtime activity (rather than, say, going outside) as well as your child not turning the game off when  asked. Rao also notes that your child may become agitated when you limit their play time, and that their addiction to the game makes them more impatient and prone to frustration.

Other urgent signs include your child becoming more sedentary and playing outside less. But according to  Rao, the most dangerous signs are your child becoming more isolated, and showing "aggression and depression at clinical levels."

MORE: Fortnite Is Getting Jetpacks: What You Need to Know

Rao stressed to me that if a child exhibits the last three behaviors, you should seek professional help for the child immediately.

Bottom line

So, is Fortnite safe for kids? With the right supervision, it can be.

While the actual content of the game is inoffensive, you'll need to take the proper steps to make sure  your child isn't exposed to the potentially lewd language of other players by keeping them in solo mode or ensuring that they're  teaming up with friends. And be sure to take advantage of parental controls on your platform of choice to ensure that junior isn't playing through the wee hours  (or racking up your credit card).

Like any online game, Fortnite can even be a positive social activity that keeps kids connected to their pals — not to mention a great potential bonding experience if you choose to play with your child. Just be mindful of screen time and monitor that chat, and your little one will have a safe environment for racking up those victory royales.