Days after rumors said that Fortnite for Android may launch as a Galaxy Note 9 exclusive, a new report says that Android users may have to jump through a hurdle to get the game when it does release broadly.
Source code included in the Fortnite Mobile page on the Epic Games website suggests that the game may not be available in the Play Store when it launches. The folks at xda-developers dug through that source code and found a line that reads "To get started, please visit this URL on the Android device provided." and another that says "Download and install Fortnite through your browser."
After pressing the Get Started button, the web page tells users that they'll be prompted with some security permissions after downloading the game. "This is necessary to install any app outside of the Play Store," the web page reads.
These statements suggest that Epic could skip the Play Store and only allow Android users to download Fortnite by sideloading the APK. This is something that a lot of Android users have probably never done, but if there was ever an app that could get them to do it, it's probably Fortnite, which seems to be the biggest game on the planet right now.
As for why Epic might skip the Play Store and have users download Fortnite using their browser, it's possible that they want to avoid paying Google a 30 percent cut of in-app purchases. Apple takes a similar cut of in-app purchases on iOS, but installing apps outside of the App Store isn't really an option for Epic. It's much more feasible on Android, and because Fortnite brings in millions of dollars in in-app purchases, the company may figure that making users do a little more work to download Fortnite from a browser is worth the money they'll save from not having to give Google a cut of their in-app sales.