According to new court filings, Apple subpoenaed Valve last November as part of its ongoing legal battle with Epic Games. Apple was hoping to learn more about Valve's business, supporting its position that the App Store is a competitive platform.
The filing is loaded with legal jargon – and is nine pages long – but it all really boils down to a few requests from Apple. One request demands "documents sufficient to show" a variety of statistics for Steam, including total yearly sales, annual advertising revenues, and annual earnings. The other request asked for the name of every app on Steam along with its pricing info.
"This is basic information relating to the identity and availability of games over time on Steam, is necessary to determine the scope and breadth of the digital distribution marketplace, and is 'relevant to showing competition' between these platforms," reads the court filing.
Of course, Valve isn't keen to get entangled in this messy affair – which is aptly summarized at the end of the report.
"Somehow, in a dispute over mobile apps, a maker of PC games that does not compete in the mobile market or sell 'apps' is being portrayed as a key figure. It’s not. The extensive and highly confidential information Apple demands about a subset of the PC games available on Steam does not show the size or parameters of the relevant market and would be massively burdensome to pull together. Apple’s demands for further production should be rejected."
Needless to say, Valve isn't playing ball. Apple's legal battles will rage onward, with Epic Games recently bringing the fight to Europe. It's also loosely associated with a recent North Dakota bill that would ban App Stores from taking a portion of game sales. The whole thing is a nightmare for Fortnite fans on iOS, who no longer have a way to play the popular game.
The battle between billionaires continues, and there's no indication as to when the fight will come to a messy conclusion.