Advertisement

"Unpleasant Horse" shows Apple isn't afraid to reject big developers

Apple has taken a lot of flak about the seemingly arbitrary rejection of apps in the App Store. Often small developers who have had their apps rejected cry foul, stating that Apple would never reject apps from bigger publishers. Earlier this week, however, Apple showed that even big publishers aren't immune to Apple's ban hammer.

PopCap, publisher of megahits like Plants vs. Zombies, submitted an app called Unpleasant Horse. The game's objective is to jump a Pegasus-like horse from cloud to cloud. If you miss a cloud, the horse falls to the earth and is chewed up in a meat grinder. The app was promptly rejected by Apple. In response to the rejection, PopCap tweeted "WTF? Apple rejected Unpleasant Horse cuz of 'mature content?' We thought horses dying in meat grinders was wholesome family entertainment!"

But as the New York Times points out, the tweet was later removed and PopCap has stated that it will appeal the ruling and submit the app again with a higher age rating. It's unknown what rating the game was originally submitted with, but the rejection of Unpleasant Horse goes to show you that Apple's acceptance or rejection of an app, while sometimes seeming arbitrary, at least affects large and small developers alike.