Fortnite could launch on Apple TV at one point in the future, according to a new discovery by the @StormLeaks Twitter account late yesterday. As reported by esports and gaming website Dexerto, @StormLeaks found a single line within Fortnite's code that references "tvOS," suggesting that Epic Games may be planning to launch the popular game on Apple's fourth- and fifth-generation set-top boxes down the line.
Still, this is just a single mention of tvOS in Fortnite's code and shouldn't be taken as a guarantee that the game will be available to play on Apple TV soon. If it does, the game would likely require a compatible wireless gaming controller, two of which Apple sells for $49.95 on its website.
#fortnite Fortnite is coming to Apple tvs. tvOS a Apple tv operating system has been found in the files. pic.twitter.com/QBBojQI0SX — Storm - Fortnite Leaks (@StormLeaks) August 21, 2018
Fortnite Battle Royale on iOS is free-to-play (like it is on all platforms), but due to in-game content purchases the app in June reached $100 million in revenue 90 days after launch. Fortnite initially launched wide in summer 2017 on consoles, macOS, and PC, focusing only on the Save the World mode, with Battle Royale releasing a few months later in September 2017.
Update: According to Epic Games, there are no plans to bring Fortnite to the Apple TV. From Epic's Senior PR Manager: "Epic isn’t planning to bring Fortnite to Apple TV. References to tvOS in the Fortnite files are the result of general Unreal Engine support for the Apple TV platform."
Top Rated Comments
What I really want to see Apple do is take the publisher role, fund some AAA exclusives for it through third parties.
I would finally have an argument to buy a pad for Apple TV.
Now it's hard to justify the expense.
From the beginning their gaming strategy with the Apple TV was bad. Requiring the use of the Siri Remote for all games was terrible (although they finally realized how awful the Siri Remote was for gaming and eventually removed that requirement). No API for clickable analog sticks was a slight oversight. Limiting app downloads to 200 MB with the rest of the application needing to be streamed on demand each time was a huge oversight (although they also finally increased that limit to 4 GB last year, I believe).
Apple has slowly been fixing their obvious problems. With this 5th gen Apple TV, though, gaming on the Apple TV probably won't progress much further than it is now. Apple fixed the obvious mistakes, but they aren't doing much else with the platform at the moment. But when Apple releases the Apple TV 6th gen in however many years, they could learn from their past mistakes and make Apple TV a viable gaming platform. .... maybe.