Image credit: Epic Games

Fortnite has faced tons of difficulties in recent times, with engagement going down and massive layoffs at Epic affecting its short-term creative potential. However, its recent return to the Apple App Store has kickstarted a surge in downloads and activity.

The legal battle with Apple over storefront taxes and payment options isn't over yet, but the raw numbers are in following Fortnite's global return to iOS devices, and they're fantastic to the point it almost neared its 2018 launch-week popularity on Apple's platform.

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GamesIndustry.biz shared the data by AppMagic and compared the numbers to other key moments of Fortnite's long life. With 3.4m downloads during last week's return to the App Store, it nearly matched the launch-week figure of 3.7m, landing "its fourth-strongest week" ever.…