A California judge has ordered Valve to comply with Apple’s recent request for financial information on more than 400 Steam titles.
Earlier this month, Apple approached Steam for information on annual sales of apps, IAPs and external products, along with details on Steam revenue.
The iPhone maker said the information would be used in its long-running legal battle with Epic by allowing it to calculate the “total size of Epic’s digital distribution channels”. Apple explained that they had already reached Samsung with a similar request, which the court eventually considered relevant to the issue.
Valve pushed back against Apple and essentially told the company that it did not see how the data from a completely different platform and a different market was relevant to the case.
“Somehow, a computer game maker that does not compete in the mobile market or sell ‘apps’ is portrayed as a key figure in a dispute over mobile applications,” Valve said. “
However, as reported by Kotaku, a judge has now told Valve to share the data on 436 specific titles sold by Steam since 2017.
Judge Hixson said Valve had until mid-March to comply with the order and told his legal team that “Apple has salted the earth with subpoenas, so do not worry, it’s not just you.”
Epic and Apple will be on track in May 2021 to settle their legal dispute, which came to life Fortnite manufacturer tried to bypass fees from the App Store platform using third-party payment methods – which Apple asked to withdraw Fortnite from its platforms.