Apple restores Civil War games sans Confederate flags to App Store
Apps that displayed the flags outside of ‘educational or historical uses’ were removed, but the company later allowed them within games, provided the symbol did not appear in App Store icons or screenshots.
Specifically, Apple wanted apps like “Civil War: 1863” and “Ultimate General: Gettysburg” to remove the flag from their app icons and screenshots.
Apple originally issued the following statement on June 25:
We have removed apps from the App Store that use the Confederate flag in offensive or mean-spirited ways, which is in violation of our guidelines. We are not removing apps that display the Confederate flag for educational or historical uses.
Some app developers were surprised that the ban extended to historical games, as the flag would seem to make sense in that context.
Touch Arcade followed up with developers who worked through the weekend to make their apps compliant. The site reports that the flag is “okay within games, but it appears that it just needs to not be prominent at all in the forward-facing parts of the App Store.”
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