As the EU has announced six gatekeepers to be subject to special rules when applying the Water Framework Directive, Epic Games was one of the companies wringing their hands the most thinking about the implications of Apple being forced to remove some of the restrictions that have until now turned iOS into a walled garden. And while there have been several conflicts that Apple has had with other tech companies over these restrictions, the clearest and most notable example can be found in the lawsuit that has pitted the two companies against each other for years.

So we had it confirmed at the beginning of 2024 Epic Games have already been working on bringing their own iOS app store, something the Fortnite creators reconfirmed a few weeks later. Now, Apple had a surprise in store, which was published in early March when we learned that, based on some frankly questionable arguments, those from Cupertino decided to cancel the developer account of Epic Games, something that is essential to being able to publicize their store and this way, make Fortnite come back to iPhones.

On more than one occasion, Apple has gone too far with its countermeasures in adapting iOS to DMA, and this was a new case in that sense. So much so that after Epic Games publicly condemned it, Cupertino was forced to back down and reinstate the previously canceled developer account. The excuse for this change of decision was that Epic had committed to meet the terms set by Apple, but as we told you at the time, Epic had done so before.

Update: Apple has informed us that our previously rejected Epic Games Store notary submission has now been accepted. https://t.co/tl5LY1aQD6

— Epic Games Newsroom (@EpicNewsroom) July 5, 2024

Since then we have been waiting for news in this regard and finally we have it, AApple has finally approved the Epic Games Store submitted to the notary process, a key process for third-party developers, including stores, to reach iOS. It was Epic themselves who confirmed that their store got the green light from Cupertino, as you can see in the tweet above this paragraph.

The process was also not easy because, as you can see in the tweet quoted in the tweet, Epic Games announced a few hours ago that Apple had previously rejected the binaries from the app store sent by Epic claiming that an element of its interface could be confused with another element from Apple itself. Epic, of course, argued that the decision was arbitrary and contrary to what was set out in the European Union’s Water Framework Directive. So we understand the quick change of criteria on the part of Apple because, as we told you a few weeks ago, the EU decided to open an investigation in this very respect.