Google thought-about shopping for Epic Games as the businesses sparred over Epic’s Fortnite Android app, in accordance with newly unsealed court filings. Last night time, Google lifted a few of its redactions in Epic’s antitrust criticism towards Google, which Epic amended and refiled final month. The criticism nonetheless omits many particulars about Google’s dealings with particular firms, however the brand new particulars mirror inside Google communications about competitors on the Android platform.

Epic claims Google was threatened by its plans to sidestep Google’s official Play Store fee by distributing Fortnite by different channels, and in an unredacted section, it quotes an inside Google doc calling Epic’s plans a “contagion” threatening Google. Here’s Epic’s description of the scenario:

Google has gone as far as to share its monopoly earnings with enterprise companions to safe their settlement to fence out competitors, has developed a sequence of inside initiatives to deal with the “contagion” it perceived from efforts by Epic and others to supply shoppers and builders aggressive options, and has even contemplated shopping for some or all of Epic to squelch this risk.

The inside messages discussing that chance stay secret, and the criticism doesn’t point out that Google ever reached out to Epic with these plans. It additionally doesn’t give a timeframe for the dialogue — though it presumably occurred after Epic began its plans to launch Fortnite on Android in 2018.

Epic has additionally alleged that Google provided it a “special deal” to launch Fortnite on the Play Store. In one other unsealed part, the criticism describes a Google Play supervisor reaching out to Epic about its plans to sideload Fortnite — and apparently admitting that sideloading is a “frankly abysmal” expertise within the course of.

One supervisor contacted Epic’s Vice President and Co-Founder to gauge Epic’s curiosity in a particular deal and, amongst different issues, mentioned “the experience of getting Fortnite on Android” by way of direct downloading. The supervisor’s name notes state that she considered direct downloading Fortnite as “frankly abysmal” and “an awful experience”, and that Epic ought to “worry that most will not go through the 15+ steps.”

Another part says that “staff members have acknowledged internally that the difficulty Google imposes on consumers who wish to direct download leads to a ‘[p]oor user experience,’ in that there are ‘15+ steps to get app [via sideloading] vs 2 steps with Play or on iOS.’”

Overall, “Google understands that the myriad barriers it erects to direct downloading have the effect of protecting its app distribution monopoly and limiting developers’ ability to distribute their apps,” Epic alleges in its criticism.

In an inside doc titled “Response to Epic”, a Google worker defined that the “install friction” related to direct downloading was “not only a bad experience” for customers however that Google knew “from its data that it will drastically limit [Epic’s] reach”. The doc goes on to elucidate that “[f]uture [Fortnite] updates will be challenged re: targeting, update experience via web”; that the direct downloading strategy was “most associated with malicious apps”, which might be “incompatible with [Epic’s] brand/demographics”; and that “[t]he approach will create significant user confusion, since [Google Play] will still attract [billions] of users who will search for Fortnite and run into deadends that aren’t clear how to resolve”.

Epic’s lawsuit was not too long ago linked with a a lot greater state antitrust criticism towards Google. Like Epic, a gaggle of state attorneys basic alleges that Android is way much less open than Google claims, saying it cuts create deliberate boundaries — together with Android telephone options and offers with telephone makers — to limit third-party app shops and discourage downloading apps straight.

Google additionally eliminated some redactions in the state complaints, principally referring to its inside descriptions of how Android works. In a 2017 presentation about Amazon’s App Store, as an example, Google apparently famous that “if we were honest we would admit that most users and developers aren’t consciously ‘choosing’ they are going with the default.” And in 2019, it referred to Apple and Android as “new closed internet ecosystems” that “centralized content distribution via app stores… [and] payments via app store services” — though the bigger context of these remarks isn’t clear.

Google has strongly denied the claims in each fits. “The open Android ecosystem lets developers distribute apps through multiple app stores. For game developers who choose to use the Play Store, we have consistent policies that are fair to developers and keep the store safe for users,” it mentioned in a earlier touch upon Epic’s amended submitting. “While Fortnite remains available on Android, we can no longer make it available on Play because it violates our policies. We will continue to defend ourselves against these meritless claims.”

Epic filed lawsuits towards each Apple and Google final yr after it launched a brand new Fortnite fee system that sidestepped their fee programs and in-app buy commissions, main each firms to kick Fortnite off their cell shops. (Fortnite continues to be out there on Android units by way of sideloading.) Epic’s case towards Apple went to trial in May and is presently awaiting a ruling from the courtroom.