Fortnite studio Epic is suing Google and Samsung over a mechanism built into the latter's mobile devices constitutes what it calls "anti-competitive and unfair conduct".
Per GamesIndustry.biz (which cites Epic's legal filing with the Northern District of California), Epic wants the courts to prevent Samsung enabling by default a feature called Auto Blocker on its phones and tablets.
In essence, this feature automatically prevents the installation of any app that isn't from the Google Play Store or Samsung's own App Store on Samsung mobile devices, and given Epic's fury regarding Apple and Google's so-called mobile duopoly, you can probably guess how the company feels about that feature.
According to GI.biz, Samsung originally introduced the Auto Blocker feature to its devices in October last year, but the company began switching on the feature as default in July this year.
Epic says that in order to bypass Auto Blocker and download its mobile store on Android devices, Samsung users must embark on "an exceptionally onerous 21-step process", since the Auto Blocker describes Epic's mobile store as coming from an "unknown" source.
The gaming giant's argument is that Samsung's description of its apps as coming from "unknown" places harms its reputation and leads to "identifiable instances of users abandoning the installation of Epic apps".
Furthermore, Epic argues that Samsung and Google (the latter of which owns the Android operating system) being in partnership is in contravention of an antitrust ruling in December, wherein a judge found Google did indeed have what The Verge calls an "illegal monopoly".
As a reminder, Epic has a storied history when it comes to challenging Google and Apple on letting users install apps from sources other than the Play Store or the App Store.
The company's fight with the two mobile giants goes back to 2020, when a sale on Fortnite's V-Bucks, which Epic attempted to use its own direct payment system to facilitate, prompted both Google and Apple to remove the game from their stores.
Since then, Epic has been embroiled in protracted battles with both app store makers, although December's antitrust ruling, as well as the reinstatement of Epic's Apple developer account back in March and the subsequent reappearance of Fortnite on that platform, bode well for the studio.
Whether or not Epic wins this battle against Samsung and Google remains to be seen, but it's not likely that the Fortnite developer will back down. Stay tuned for more on this.
