Fortnite is hiking cost of its currency to 'pay the bills.' Are its battles against Google and Apple to blame?
CBC
The popular online gaming platform Fortnite is hiking the price of its in-game currency starting Thursday, a rare move that experts say sheds some light on the cost of its parent company's antitrust battles against tech giants Google and Apple.
"The cost of running Fortnite has gone up a lot and we’re raising prices to help pay the bills," a March 10 statement on the game's website said.
While the game itself is free to play, Fortnite makes money from in-game purchases — including its signature "V-Bucks," a currency that players can use to buy new "skins" or other status symbols.
The changes are global. If you're in Canada, the company will start charging the same price for fewer V-Bucks — so, an $11.99 pack that used to buy 1,000 V-Bucks, for example, will now buy 800 V-Bucks, a spokesperson for parent company Epic Games told CBC News.
For years, Epic has waged antitrust battles against Google and Apple, accusing them of anti-competitive behaviour by taxing developers with a commission on in-app purchases, sometimes up to 30 per cent.
Fortnite was swiftly removed from both the Google Play Store and Apple's App Store when Epic attempted to bypass the tax in 2020.
Google eventually lowered its fees in a major settlement and opened itself up to competitors, including the Epic Games store, potentially helping Epic offset some legal costs.
The case against Apple is still ongoing. A judge initially ruled in 2021 that it can charge a non-prohibitive fee if its link to alternative payment methods, but found in 2025 that the company violated her order. Apple then lost its appeal of that decision.
Epic Games has "done a big favour for the whole industry by fighting these antitrust cases for six years, losing all of the [potential] revenue for Fortnite on mobile during that time," said Dean Takahashi, editorial director at GamesBeat, a gaming news outlet.
It might take some time for the company to re-establish a consumer base on mobile platforms after such a long absence, he added.
As for the prices changes, "they're just sort of giving you less for the money you are giving them, right? Perhaps that's the correct way to do this without angering too many people," Takahashi said.
Fortnite last hiked global prices in 2023 and 2021.
Stephen Totilo, a reporter who covers the gaming industry through his Game File newsletter, pointed out that it's difficult to say definitively whether or why Epic Games, a private company, might be hurting financially.
It's estimated that Fortnite generates billions in annual revenue, though that number appears to have been falling between 2021 and 2023.
