Rocket League Sideswipe is being removed from the Play Store next week

Ben Schoon | Aug 16 2024 - 10:45 am PT

With the launch of the Epic Games Store on Android, it’s been announced that Rocket League Sideswipe will be removed from the Play Store globally and will be exclusively available via sideloading.

Rocket League Sideswipe launched on Android and iOS app stores in late 2021. The game, while not a full port of Rocket League from PC and console, brought the competitive fun of the title to mobile for the first time. The game has since gone through several seasons of content and updates, and is soon to enter Season 17.

However, you’ll have to change how you play the game if you’re on Android.

In a blog post, Epic Games has announced that Rocket League Sideswipe is leaving the Play Store on August 23. This will happen globally, and it’s because the game is moving to the newly-launched Epic Games Store. This new store needs to be sideloaded and will be the only way to access Rocket League Sideswipe moving forward. Epic similarly moved Rocket League from Steam solely to its store on PC a while back when the game went free-to-play. But, unlike the move from Steam, Epic Games requires that you delete Rocket League Sideswipe if it was downloaded via the Play Store and instead install it via the Epic Games Store.

⁠Starting August 23, if you have Sideswipe downloaded through the Google Play Store, you will need to delete it from your device and redownload it from the Epic Games Store in order to play online and update the game.

On iOS, nothing is changing for users in the US and many other parts of the globe. Only in the European Union will the game be removed from the App Store and ported to the Epic Games Store as a result of sideloading being available in the region. But, unlike Fornite, which is not available in the App Store or Play Store globally, Rocket League Sideswipe will remain readily accessible in the App Store in many regions, but not in the Play Store anywhere.

The arrival of the Epic Games Store for mobile devices also brings the release of the hit game Fall Guys, which is now available on Android and iOS, exclusively via the Epic Games Store.