Epic Games founder and CEO Tim Sweeney apparently attended a high-profile lunch today, May 13, in Saudi Arabia with US President Donald Trump and other world and business leaders from across the globe.
This is according to a list of attendees supplied by the White House and shared by reporter Kaitlan Collins. Some of the other attendees include Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, BlackRock CEO Larry Fink, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, and Halliburton CEO Jeff Miller, just to name a few.
Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman was said to have attended the lunch as well. The New York Times reported that the high-profile executives might have been there to make business deals or lobby Trump and his own officials on tariffs and trade policies in general.
Sweeney was the only video game executive on the list of attendees, though. Saudi Arabi's Public Investment Fund has invested tens of billions into the gaming market in recent years, which has prompted some concern from people dismayed by the nation's human rights history.
GameSpot has reached out to Epic Games in an attempt to get more details on Sweeney's reported involvement in this lunch.
For its part, Chinese internet behemoth Tencent is a minority investor in the company. In 2024, two directors at Epic who had been appointed by Tencent resigned from the Epic board following a US government investigation.
Sweeney's Epic Games recently scored a key victory in its fight against Apple, but Fortnite hasn't yet returned to the App Store. As of May 13, Apple is still reviewing Fortnite for release.
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This is according to a list of attendees supplied by the White House and shared by reporter Kaitlan Collins. Some of the other attendees include Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, BlackRock CEO Larry Fink, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, and Halliburton CEO Jeff Miller, just to name a few.
Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman was said to have attended the lunch as well. The New York Times reported that the high-profile executives might have been there to make business deals or lobby Trump and his own officials on tariffs and trade policies in general.
Sweeney was the only video game executive on the list of attendees, though. Saudi Arabi's Public Investment Fund has invested tens of billions into the gaming market in recent years, which has prompted some concern from people dismayed by the nation's human rights history.
GameSpot has reached out to Epic Games in an attempt to get more details on Sweeney's reported involvement in this lunch.
For its part, Chinese internet behemoth Tencent is a minority investor in the company. In 2024, two directors at Epic who had been appointed by Tencent resigned from the Epic board following a US government investigation.
Sweeney's Epic Games recently scored a key victory in its fight against Apple, but Fortnite hasn't yet returned to the App Store. As of May 13, Apple is still reviewing Fortnite for release.
Source