Ridley Scott, who directed Apple’s famous 1984 Super Bowl TV advertisement, is less than pleased with the parody version Epic Games released last month.
The original ad introduced the Apple Macintosh to the world. Epic Games’ version seeks to portray itself as the underdog in a legal fight with Apple over App Store policies.
IGN asked Scott what he thought of the parody. “I think the animation was terrific, the idea was terrific, the message was ‘ehh’,” responded the director.
Scott pointed out that he felt complimented that Epic Games copied his work so closely. But he was let down that the company used the opportunity to say something “so ordinary when they could have been talking about democracy or more powerful things.”
Watch the parody, Nineteen Eighty-Fortnite, now:
Epic Games v. Apple is more than a war of words
Epic Games objects to Apple taking a 30% commission of in-app purchases. On top of that, it accuses Apple of having a monopoly on iPhone app distribution. Epic is asking a court to force the iPhone-maker to allow it and other developers to distribute their apps independently from Apple.
Apple’s response is that its goal is to “keep the store safe for our users.” Plus, the company points out that all it’s asking Epic Games to do is follow the same rules every other iPhone developer follows.
Epic Games snuck a direct payments system for in-app purchases into a Fortnite update, causing Apple to expel the game from the App Store. And Apple later upped the ante by kicking out every other app made by the developer.