Gaming Executive Sweeney Fumbles with Nintendo Switch at Trial

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Billionaire Tim Sweeney, who founded Epic Games Inc. and created money-making games like Fortnite, delivered an unexpected gaming gaffe in his court fight against Apple Inc.’s App Store: He struggled to plug a controller into the Nintendo Co. Switch gaming console during his testimony.

Epic has to prove that the App Store is a monopoly that limits choices users have to play games across devices, including billions of iOS devices, to win its antitrust suit. Epic’s lawyers brought in an iPhone and a Nintendo Switch video game console to show it’s easier to play games on smartphones while a user is on-the-go.

Sweeney said he has played games on a mobile phone while commuting but to use a Switch on a train he’d need Wi-Fi and two devices to play.

Sweeney fiddled with the Switch and the game controller unsuccessfully and said, “As you can see, I’m not a Switch player.”

“Well, now the world knows,” U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers quipped. “That’s alright, neither am I.”

©2021 Bloomberg L.P.