Apple has made its first ever gaming studio acquisition in the form of Sneaky Sasquatch developer RAC7, and a report has also suggested that a new gaming-focused app could be on the way.
In a statement given to Digital Trends, Apple says it’s “excited” that RAC7 has joined it, and that it intends to “continue to deliver a great experience for Apple Arcade players”, offering “hundreds of games from many of the best game developers in the world”.
RAC7 consists of just two employees, namely artist Jason Ennis and programmer Jesse Ringrose. The studio’s previous works include sound-based horror game Dark Echo and “free-form puzzle game” Splitter Critters.
This purchase may well mark a more pointed move towards gaming for Apple, especially if a new report from Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman is anything to go by.
In the report, Gurman, citing “people with knowledge of the matter”, says that the Cupertino giant is planning to introduce a “dedicated app for video games” on iOS devices later this year.
Said app will apparently serve as a launcher for games on the platform, and it’ll also feature leaderboards, achievements, and “editorial content…about new titles”. It’s apparently intended to replace the Game Center app.
Gurman’s isn’t the first report to claim that Apple is developing a new gaming-focused app, either; back in 2024, 9to5Mac’s Filipe Espósito said Apple was working on a “new App Store-like app dedicated to games”, which, if Bloomberg’s report is accurate, is almost certainly the same app.
According to Bloomberg, Apple will debut its new app alongside a major iOS update in September, along with several other features. That’s also when the next set of Apple iPhone devices are likely to be revealed.
The news comes shortly after a major blow was dealt to Apple last month in the form of a €500 million fine issued by the European Commission over the company’s refusal to allow developers to point customers to non-App Store-related payment systems and third-party app stores.
Epic’s Fortnite was at the center of that row, and following a worldwide outage that Epic says was caused by Apple blocking the game’s release on iOS, Fortnite finally reappeared on Apple’s operating system last week.
