Given Apple's action against incentivised downloads platforms in the past, the suggestion studios can now actively buy a spot in the App Store's top 25 rankings will make grim reading for those at the firm's Cupertino HQ.

An annoymous poster on Touch Arcade's forums has alleged an unnamed company is offering developers a guaranteed route to the top of the App Store's charts for $5,000.

It's claimed the company in question utilises bots that downloads a developer's app several times until it breaks into the top 25, gaining the game in question a whole host of exposure in the process.

Crowding out the market

Though details are sketchy, a further source has told Pocket Gamer the story has merit, with the outfit having also been approached by a company that pitched a similar offer to the one outlined on Touch Arcade.

Going further, the anonymous poster went on to claim Crowdstar – the studio behind recent female-focused freemium hit Top Girl – had already utilised the service.

It's an allegation Crowdstar co-founder Suren Markosian naturally took issue with.

"We all spend hundreds of thousands if not millions promoting our games every month using legitimate advertising channels such as Flurry, Chartboost, iAd, etc," he said.

"While I sympathise with the smaller developers who may not have as much funding as we do and feel that we are getting a free ride the fact is we are spending significant marketing dollars to achieve top ratings."

You can read the full story over on Pocket Gamer.