"Fortnite" maker Epic CEO Tim Sweeney revealed that Epic is willing to go to court with Sony over the issue of cross-play across all platforms of "Fortnite". This was revealed by Sweeney during the ongoing court battle between Epic and Google. As part of the case, Epic's CEO took the stand to lay out the company's stance on open platforms and what he and Epic would be willing to pay to get full cross-platform gaming support on PlayStation.
I believe most people still remember that Sony was not a big fan of cross-platform games. It was not until 2018 that it finally compromised and announced that it would allow "Fortnite" to provide cross-platform game support with Xbox One and Switch. Interestingly, earlier that year, Sony said that "regardless of the size of the game," allowing gamers on different platforms to communicate with each other was not a sure thing.
As part of her testimony in the Epic/Google case, Sweeney has now provided some insight into Epic's stance on Sony not allowing cross-play. "We are willing to go to court with them if necessary," the Epic CEO said.
According to GamesIndustry.biz, the conversation relates to an email Sweeney sent to Sony Interactive Entertainment's head of global partner development and relations Phil Rosenberg (then senior vice president, head of global publisher and developer relations) in 2018.
The email sent by Epic's CEO reads: "Please inform Mr. Kodera and please make it clear that Epic will achieve full interoperability across all platforms in Fortnite at some point in the future... We are ready to leverage every available resource to make this happen, no matter where that goal leads us or how long it lasts."
Sweeney’s words do carry a lot of weight. Fortunately, Sony later relented, and Fortnite became the first game to be available across all platforms, including mobile, PC, and all major consoles. A few months later, Rocket League also enabled cross-play.