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Epic Games respond to quirky Fortnite Jellie skin glitches Epic GamesAfter only being added into Fortnite with the January 20 store update, the Rare Jellie skin seems to have taken its name literally as developers at Epic Games have responded to some hilarious glitches. Adding in countless cosmetic items week in and week out, it’s no surprise certain skins would eventually come with a few bugs. One of the most recent Fortnite updates introduced the community to Jellie, a whimsical new skin that looks to be made entirely from a gelatinous substance. While visual design and actual in-game function are two completely separate things, it appears as though this skin is actually made of jelly as a few amusing bugs have forced Epic Games to comment on the new cosmetic. “The anemone you don’t want for an enemy,” the in-game store reads when hovering over the Rare Jellie skin. That statement couldn’t be more accurate as bizarre visual glitches could make your enemies impossible to hit. With three players using the bugged skin, Reddit user ‘Dolotone’ and his squad started to emote in the middle of a match. In just a matter of seconds, one player stumbled upon a ridiculous glitch that saw Jellie’s legs grow a dozen times their regular size. Taking all sorts of odd shapes and sizes throughout the animation, the player made himself a far more difficult target for anyone to hit. Amusingly enough, these quirky glitches aren’t exclusive to the battlefield however, as players using the Jellie skin are able to bug their character model in the main menu as well. One example from ‘froggiejp’ shows the skins legs expanding in the menu while they spun in a circle. Others in the lobby didn’t seem to mind a gelatinous helicopter phasing through them but eventually, the legs returned to normal size. Similarly, the ‘Spring-Loaded’ emote also serves as a catalyst for some ridiculous visual bugs. Expanding and contracting all over the screen, the longer this emote goes on the more whacky Jellie’s skin appears. “He’s got those dancin’ feet!” Epic Games community coordinator ‘EmptyTux’ responded on Reddit. “Thanks for the vid, we’ll investigate.” There’s no quite telling just how soon the issues will be patched out of the game though it’s clear that it wasn’t an intentional feature from Epic to make the skin that little bit more unique. Until the problems are resolved, however, this could be a hilarious way to freak your friends out in the lobby before loading into a match.

Epic Games Respond to Accusations that Fortnite Summer Skirmish Winner Cheated – “There is no evidence” After growing controversy surrounding accusations of foul play from the winner of Summer Skirmish Week 2, Epic Games has responded, concluding that they are satisfied there was no wrongdoing. A player named ‘iDroPz_BoDiEs‘ was invited to the tournament thanks to his placing in the ‘Solo Showdown’ LTM, and walked away with first place and $60,000 after an incredible performance. However, for a number of reasons other competitors and lots of fans began to doubt the legitimacy of his scores and matches. He was suspected because he wasn’t streaming – however this isn’t required. He also was accused of using a keyboard and mouse while playing on PS4. Lastly, he was accused of having friends join his game of various accounts and allow him to kill them to boost his score. More: Fortnite Pro WishYouLuck is Tired of Slander After a Player is Accused of Cheating in Summer Skirmish – A reddit user compiled all the accusations levelled against the winning player, which you can find here, titling the post “A crime was committed yesterday during the [Summer] Skirmish”. But, Epic Games has made it clear that after investigation, none of these claims and accusations hold up. Of note, they state that although there is ‘no evidence’ that iDropz_Bodies used a keyboard and mouse, it is not actually against the rules to do so, in order to promote inclusivity. “We do not restrict input device for players on our platforms in an effort to promote accessibility for our entire audience.“ You can read the full statement from Epic Games below. Hey all, We wanted to drop in with information regarding Friday’s Summer Skirmish and the performance of the winner iDropz_Bodies in an effort of clarify some assumptions held by the community. iDroPz_BoDiEs was unable to stream the event due to a Summer Skirmish rules requirement of a 2-minute stream delay for participants which wish to broadcast. This delay cannot be set on the console capture software and is not possible for non-Affiliates on Twitch. Following the event, he broadcasted replays of his Summer Skirmish matches. Our rules do not stipulate that a participant must stream the event, as we do not wish to exclude players who were invited based on their own merit because they cannot stream – iDroPz_BoDiEs was invited to Summer Skirmish based off his performance in prior Showdown LTMs. Now to address some concerns around that performance: Our internal Summer Skirmish analytics kept track of all opponents which participants eliminated. iDroPz_BoDiEs had 129 eliminations during the event and every single elimination was on a different opponent. This is not indicative of him having been intentionally fed eliminations and/or collusion with other players. – Our analytics events also noted when players left the match prior to the bus deploying, and recorded those matches. iDroPz_BoDiEs did not join more than the specified 10 matches for the event, the narrative that he was leaving if the server wasn’t full or the bus wasn’t on a favorable path is false. – Stat tracking sites are unreliable for recording historic performance, as they only update when the website requests stats for a user from the API. This makes any ‘Most Eliminations in a Single Match’ records on an account unlikely to be correct, as multiple matches in a time period are combined into one update. iDroPz_BoDiEs has achieved more than 20 eliminations in a match multiple times across his Fortnite career. – In previous Showdown LTM’s which followed a similar scoring format on public servers, there has been no discernible difference in final score between top performers on PC and Console platforms. During this event we saw 11 matches break the 20 elimination mark, with 8 of them on PC and 3 on Console. – There is no evidence that would suggest to us that iDroPz_BoDiEs played the competition using a mouse and keyboard. Furthermore, we do not restrict input device for players on our platforms in an effort to promote accessibility for our entire audience. – We appreciate the community’s concern around the integrity of the competition, but questioning the results of an individual participant without evidence unfairly tears apart at what should be a crowning moment of achievement for an individual who earned their way there and performed when it counted. Our primary goal is to support competition that is fun, inclusive, and in line with the overall spirit of Fortnite. Unsportsmanlike conduct from participants is not within that spirit, and will not be tolerated in Fortnite competition. EDIT: To address additional comments, none of the accounts which were eliminated by iDroPz_BoDiEs were created between the time he was informed of his participation and the event itself. Source: Reddit

Epic Games respond to nagging performance issues in Fortnite Epic GamesFortnite Season 10 has brought on a variety of performance issues thanks to the rift zones, but things have reached a breaking point with the Gotham City update and Epic Games responded to the problems. When Fortnite first launched, it did so with a pretty empty map and only featured a small selection of guns and items. We’re now 10 seasons in and Fortnite has changed greatly, to the point where this season required players on older PC hardware to upgrade or be locked out of playing entirely. These performance boosts introduced in Season 10 have been taxing on just about every platform, and Epic Games had no choice but to respond to all the complaints, especially since they’ve been piling up. In a Reddit thread, user Cheezymac2 gave us a look at how bad things have gotten, especially in the new Gotham City location. The video clip shows how bad the hitching and lag issues are, which prompted a developer to thank the user for the clip and share a link to the Trello page where they confirmed the issue is being worked on. Many players shared their experiences with the game in its current state and echoed what’s seen in the clip, mentioning the problem occurs on all platforms. No timetable has been given as to when this issue will be fixed, but with it being considered a top issue, it’s possible we could see an update on this as early as v10.40. The upcoming Fortnite update is going to be massive as Epic revealed huge aim assist changes are coming along with it. We’re quickly coming up on the end of Season 10 and Epic will be looking to get to a hot start out of the gate for the next season if these changes are any indication.

Epic Games respond to Fortnite ‘wall taking’ coin flip complaints Epic Games respond to disgruntled players who have been complaining about the supposed changes to Fortnite’s “wall-taking” coin flip mechanic. Due to the lack of patch notes, Fortnite players have been unsure of whether the “wall-taking” coin flip in the game has been removed, making wall replacements once again go in favor of the lower ping players. The coin flip was originally implemented in Season 10 as a way to provide a level playing field to players who don’t have the best of ping. It made it so there was an equal chance for both players to own the wall if they put it down in the same spot instead of always going to the lower ping player. Epic remained mostly silent on the issue until community coordinator FreightTrainUSA spoke up about it on Reddit. “After investigating I can confirm that no values in how this feature works have been changed,” he said on Reddit. “Our team took into consideration high vs low ping and a few other factors while testing and we can confirm that this feature is working as intended.” While he was able to confirm that no changes were made, players still have their questions. Many of them claim they have even tested wall replacements with friends and confirmed it was removed that way. This response by Epic directly contradicts those claims. Many replies to his response ask for more explanation, including a question of what “working as intended” actually means. “Can you explain more what working as intended is,” asked ballatw, a competitive Fortnite caster. “Did you implement any of the described changes to the mechanic at this point, or is it still coin flip when contested with a delay to replace pieces that were recently destroyed?” FreightTrain did not respond to this comment as of yet. A separate Reddit thread was spun up with the Epic comment, and players discussed their experiences with the coin flip with this new information, and many still agreed something had been changed. The comment didn’t make a mention of a “coin flip” so players believe something could have been changed behind the scenes that impacts it in a different way. Ballatw believes the coin flip still remains but has some doubts due to many players saying it’s gone. “I’m still skeptical, even though my own testing has always shown that coin flip has exists,” he said. “There are way too many people reporting otherwise.” As it stands, there is still a divide in the community on whether the coin flip still exists or not. While Epic addressed it directly, there are still players who think something is up, which shows why we need patch notes more than ever. Before Chapter 2 launched, there would have been no need for a debate like this because the change would have been listed if it happened. Since those have gone by the wayside, players have to figure out for themselves what’s changed with the game. In fact, that’s just what players have been doing as they’ve had to discover new items and even weapon changes on their own. On October 31, players took matters into their own hands about the coin flip, and many of the findings directly contradict what Epic have found. It could still come down to those players being incredibly unlikely with taking walls. Despite Epic’s confirmation, it doesn’t look like this debate is over.

Epic Games respond to game-breaking Fortnite bugs in patch 11.50 Epic GamesThrough Fortnite’s 11.50 update, Epic Games transitioned the battle royale over to Unreal Engine’s Chaos physics system and despite ensuring the process would be smooth, players are already uncovering new game-breaking issues. Since it’s initial release in 2017, Fortnite remained on the same engine while new content was added in on a regular basis. Deciding to switch things up Chapter 2, Epic switched to a brand new physics engine under the hood. While a January 24 blog post assured that there will be a few bumps throughout the transition, game-breaking bugs have been popping up ever since the new patch was deployed. With the 11.50 update, essentially every aspect of the environment in Fortnite has been updated to function properly on the new physics engine. From major items such as vehicles and buildings to the more nitty-gritty elements like foliage, almost everything has been touched by the drastic change. As a result, players have been stumbling upon bugs with greater frequency than usual. While some are mostly harmless, a number of these new issues have been completely breaking the experience for those in the community. Simply attempting to carry their fallen ally to safety, one such glitch actually saw a downed teammate fall underneath the map. Reddit user ‘danniee48’ slid down a cliff with a companion on their back, but just moments later that friend was stuck under the surface of the map. Looking up through the glitched textures, the player was trapped at sea-level and taken out of the game moments later. Epic community coordinator ‘EpicBoaty’ responded, indicating the developers will be looking into the specific bug. Another bizarre issue stemmed from the Motorboat hilariously sending players flying through the sky in slow-motion. As Reddit user ‘SlipperyYayas’ showcased, Motorboats are leaving players well out of position, potentially trapped in the storm, and even sinking in shallow water. These vehicles are evidently not working as intended and Epic Games responded once again to ensure that a fix should be on the way relatively soon. Read More: Fortnite v11.50 update patch notes – “I’ve heard boats are supposed to float, but this is ridiculous!” Epic Games Community Coordinator ‘EmptyTux’ joked. Plenty of other game-breaking bugs have been cropping up since the release of the latest update, including a glitch that lets players walk through walls. As a result, it’s likely that a suite of hotfixes are right around the corner already. Tyler ‘Ninja’ Blevins was one of the first content creators to show concern over the massive change. Worried that the new physics engine could majorly offset the popular title, it seems as though the Mixer sensation was somewhat on the ball due to the number of game-breaking glitches appearing on just day one alone.

Epic Games respond to Fortnite Slurpy Swamp health bug Update at 7:03 PM EST on October 22: The issue has been resolved. Slurpy Swamp has recalled the defective Slurp Barrels and put out a better batch. Slurp Barrels will again heal/give Shield when destroyed! Fortnite Chapter 2 location Slurpy Swamp isn’t providing players with health or shields and Epic Games finally responded to the issues. The v11.01 update in Fortnite fixed many nagging bugs with the game, but it turns out that another one was created from the patch and it’s a pretty big one. Players have discovered the barrels found in Slurpy Swamp aren’t rewarding them with any healing, despite that being their purpose. After many complaints, Epic became aware of the issue and announced they are looking into it. It’s a bizarre glitch that wasn’t there before the update, but now it’s becoming a problem. While it likely won’t make or break your game, it’s not ideal and Epic released a statement about it. “It looks like Slurpy Swamp put out a bad batch of Slurp Barrels,” tweeted Epic Games. “We’re currently working to resolve Slurp Barrels not healing or giving Shield when destroyed. We’ll update you when we resolve this.” It looks like Slurpy Swamp put out a bad batch of Slurp Barrels! We’re currently working to resolve Slurp Barrels not healing or giving Shield when destroyed. We’ll update you when we resolve this. pic.twitter.com/C7UGwsm6ih — Fortnite Status (@FortniteStatus) October 22, 2019 Given the statement, it looks like this bug has become a priority and should be fixed within the day. Strange bugs like this popping up in Fortnite is nothing new, but the more annoying ones, like this, are usually fixed pretty fast. Slurpy Swamps is one of the many new locations on the map so players who are just diving into the season for the first time will want to check it out and having a bug like this occur will certainly make for a bad first impression. In the meantime, it’s recommended that you avoid the area when you land, especially if you’re only here for health. Surprisingly, this isn’t even the first time a bug has come to Slurpy Swamp in the young season, as players were able to remain immortal there until a patch fixed that. We’ll keep you updated on this bug going forward but for now, it’s best to just carry around some extra healing items.

Epic Games respond to Fortnite bug that lets you fish on land A strange new bug has reared its head in Fortnite that allows players to fish anywhere on the map, despite water not being anywhere around. Fortnite Chapter 2 introduced fishing as a new mechanic that allowed players to pick up rods and cast into the water in hopes of catching materials, weapons, fish, and more. These weapons include anything from common pistols to rare and powerful assault rifles, while the fish will provide healing and shields depending on the types you catch. Fishing has been well-received by members of the community as it’s a good way to get your early-game farming in, and as Tfue has shown us, it has its place in the late game. However, a bug has been discovered that lets players fish on land, which is definitely not what the developers had in mind when they added the mechanic in. While he’s far from the first one to notice this, SypherPK highlighted the issue during his stream and explained how to do it. If you look straight down at the ground and cast your line, you’ll be able to catch things through the ground. It doesn’t take much to see how this bug can easily be abused, and it didn’t take long for Epic Games to respond to the bug. Of course, it’s not meant to be in the game and Epic employee MrPopoTFS said the team will look into it. “Yarrr, we don’t need water where we’re going,” he said. “I’ll be sending this over to the crew to take a closer look at what sorcery this be.” Beginning on November 5, a stealth update introduced a whole new way to fish in the game with the Harpoon Gun. It pretty much does everything the fishing rods currently do, except much faster. See a bunch of fish swimming around in the water? Just launch your harpoon in and catch them. The Harpoon Gun even does additional damage to players, at a whopping 75 HP a hit. Unfortunately, players had to find this all out on their own since no patch notes were revealed for this update. As far as we can tell, it looks like the Harpoon Gun is the only new thing to arrive.

Epic Games respond to debate over nerfing Fortnite’s Heavy Sniper Epic GamesFortnite fans who may have got their hopes up for a potential nerf to the Heavy Sniper Rifle might not take kindly to what Epic Games have had to say about the situation. The Epic and Legendary variants of the Heavy Sniper Rifle are two of the most powerful weapons in the game, as they are able to dish out 150 and 157 damage with one single shot, respectively. While some players have called to make the extremely powerful weapon less powerful, one fan’s response was answered by Epic Games. In a post to the Fortnite BR subreddit, user xbonesawx – who actually doesn’t want the weapon to be nerfed – issued a plea to the developer via the Fortnite BR subreddit to keep the sniper the way that it is. The post proved to have a huge amount of support, receiving over 17,500 upvotes – sending it to the top of the page – and Epic decided to address the issue head-on. Replying to the post, design lead for Fortnite’s battle royale mode Eric Williamson posted: “Although balance is always subject to change, we don’t currently have any plans to make changes to the Heavy Sniper Rifle.” The response, again, proved hugely popular as posters praised the post. “Thank you Eric. You are a godsend,” replied one fan. Another stated: “Thank god. It’s my favorite weapon in the game.” However, for those players who had been holding out for a change to the gun, it isn’t particularly welcome news.

Epic Games respond to crazy unlimited shield exploit in Fortnite Epic GamesDevelopers Epic Games have responded after a fan noticed an insane way of getting unlimited shield in Fortnite, through manipulation of the brand new Zapper Traps. Shield is the most sought-after consumable in Fortnite, giving players the opportunity to double their health from 100 to 200. There have long been debates surrounding the drop rates of Shield Potions and whether they are high enough; often leaving players stranded on low HP. One way players can easily get shield in the game’s current built is by landing in Retail Row and killing the Fiends that spawn there. This grants players a small shield bonus, as well as loot being dropped. These bonuses have caused Retail to be a popular landing place, particularly for pro players. However, Reddit user ‘Scifearious’ noticed a way to combine the Fiends with the new Zapper Traps, in order to create a never-ending shield bonus. In Retail Row, which recently returned in place of Mega Mall, the player throws a couple of Zapper Traps next to a Fiend spawn beacon, resulting in the Fiends consistently dying to the trap. However, the player leaves Retail Row and still gets the shield bonus every time his trap kills a Fiend. Similarly, the Fiends don’t seem to be attacking his trap, meaning the shield bonus continues to be granted until the spawn beacon itself is destroyed. The post garnered significant attention on Reddit; amassing nearly 2,000 upvotes in the short time since it was posted. It was also picked up by Epic Games, who replied: “We’re aware Fiends are destroyed by traps when outside of the Retail Row POI, but are investigating why they aren’t attacking your Zapper Trap consistently.” The issue seems to be stemming from the fact that Fiends aren’t correctly attacking the Zapper Traps as they do other builds, which would nullify a player’s ability to gain unlimited shield. Zapper Traps were added to Fortnite on September 3, a throwback to the Ceiling Traps that featured in Season 1 of the battle royale. However, issues with the trap saw them temporarily disabled, before being swiftly re-added. Given the seriousness of this problem, it seems likely that we’ll see a quick patch made, so players can’t make the most of such an unfair exploit.

Epic Games explain decision to permanently ban FaZe Jarvis on Fortnite Fortnite Battle Royale developers Epic Games have released an official statement regarding the ban they recently leveled against FaZe Clan content creator Jarvis Kaye. The biggest story that has dominated all of the headlines in the world of Fortnite recently is that of Jarvis getting permanently banned from playing Fortnite ever again. The news first broke when the FaZe star himself announced it in an emotional video he published on November 3, explaining that he had been punished for using aimbot hacks in public matches and making videos from the gameplay. Since then, his ban has been the topic of widespread discussion in the Fortnite community, and it has gotten enough attention where Epic Games themselves commented about it. In statements they made to both The Sun and TMZ, the developers stood by their decision and explained why they weren’t considering reversing it. “We have a zero-tolerance policy for the usage of cheat software,” an Epic Games spokesperson told The Sun and TMZ. “When people use aimbots or other cheat technologies to gain an unfair advantage, they ruin games for people who are playing fairly.” Their official Community Rules forbid cheating of any form and reserve the right for Epic to take action of the severity of their choosing based on various factors, with permanent account ban being the maximum punishment. Judging by their statements, there isn’t any indication that they plan on reversing the ban anytime soon, especially given how this would be an excellent opportunity for them to send a stern message to their entire player-base. Jarvis is very much a household name in the Fortnite community, having a massive presence on Twitter (174,700+ followers), YouTube (2.05 million subscribers), and Twitch (576,232 followers), so permanently preventing him from playing the game would undoubtedly show everyone that Epic mean business. The decision to ban him permanently has created a divide of opinion in the community. While almost everyone seems to agree that his actions do warrant punishment, many feel that a permanent ban may have been a bit too much for someone whose never been an offender before and is clearly apologetic and remorseful. FaZe co-founder Ricky Banks and Mixer star Tyler ‘Ninja’ Blevins have been among the big names to express their support for Jarvis, and believe that he should be given a second chance from Epic. Many have said the ban should be rescinded after a certain period of time, comparing this to the situation involving controversial pro players XXiF and Ronaldo, who were caught teaming during the World Cup Qualifiers and given only a two-week suspension, allowing them to return just in time to qualify for the Duos Finals anyway. However, it seems that Epic take the offense of using actual in-game hacks a lot more seriously than teaming, regardless of the type of matches the cheating occurred in, which would explain the drastic disparity between the two punishments.

Epic Games respond to allegations they failed to pay Fortnite pros Epic GamesEpic Games has responded to recent allegations from Fortnite pro players and content creators regarding a failure to pay them tournament winnings and Support-A-Creator earnings, citing “two separate issues” that led to the ongoing payment delays on both fronts. Epic came under fire from the Fortnite community again earlier this week after the revelation they had failed to pay numerous pros following DreamHack Anaheim. Morgan ‘RepulseGod’ Bamford and Evan ‘Cented’ Barron led the allegations. They revealed Epic owed each of them thousands of dollars worth of prizes, including their share of the DH Anaheim prize purse. Repulse placed fourth at the February event ($12.5k winnings), while Liquid’s Cented placed 40th ($1,750). Soon after, several more pro stars joined the chorus of demands, including Oceanic duos star Overt Punk. He revealed he hadn’t been paid out for FNCS heats, and when he reached out to Epic they rebuffed his initial claims. https://twitter.com/Punkkrr/status/1273811048928182272 After just under 24 hours of silence, the Fortnite developers reached out to Dexerto’s Fortnite Intel to address the situation. Epic suggested they had encountered “multiple delays” in the days after Anaheim “due to additional California state tax withholding.” “All prizes for DreamHack Anaheim have been sent directly to player bank accounts. These prizes should be deposited in the respective winners’ accounts in the next few days. We apologize for the delay,” they continued. Epic also confirmed a “clerical error” had held up overpayments for some players in online cups, and had required manual correction. After that correction, all payments for winners should be processed “in a more timely manner.” The Fortnite developers also addressed another ongoing financial issue that had arisen at the same time as the missing pro player payments: Support-A-Creator payouts, and a series of scams related to the benefits program. “Regarding Support-A-Creator payouts, there are two issues. The first relates to obstacles as we transition to a new payment system, including bugs. We appreciate Creators who have been patient as we make this transition,” they said. The second issue, Epic continued, was related to “creators who have violated the terms of the Support-A-Creator program” through actions that scammed or defrauded other Fortnite players. These included “false promises” relating to codes. “When these accounts are detected or reported, we remove these creators from the program and do not pay out their fraudulent accounts,” Epic said. “We take these violations seriously, and are looking at additional measures to prevent bad actors from abusing the program, up to and including potential legal action.” While this official statement doesn’t immediately take care of all the payment problems that have been flagged over the past week, it looks like the ball is finally rolling. For now, if you are involved, stay patient — Epic is finally on the job.

Epic Games could be planning $1 million Fortnite mobile tournament Epic GamesMobile players in Fortnite Battle Royale could soon have their own tournament, one that may feature a pretty massive prize pool, if speculation comes true. Epic Games splashing around large chunks of money on Fortnite tournaments has pretty much become the norm nowadays. Thanks to the record-setting levels of revenue that their prized battle royale has generated, they’ve been able to dedicate prize pools that haven’t really been seen before in esports. Now, according to Complexity Gaming’s Director of Mobile Gaming Matt Rutledge, Epic could be planning a massive tournament just for mobile players, which would be the first of its kind in Fortnite. “A $1 million Fortnite Mobile Cup could be coming soon,” he tweeted on July 17. “This is life changing money and fame. If you’re a mobile player, get on that hardcore grind now.” A $1 Million @FortniteMobile Cup could be coming soon :scream: This is life changing money and fame. If you’re a mobile player, get on that hardcore grind now :fire: — MobileMatt (@TheMobileMatt) July 17, 2019 Rutledge is right, the money and recognition that would come from winning a tournament of this magnitude and caliber would definitely classify as life-changing. While the mobile community in Fortnite isn’t as much in the spotlight as its PC and console counterparts, it does feature some extremely talented players, who have the ability to put on a show just as well as anyone else using a controller or mouse and keyboard. The primary and most obvious concern, however, would be about players gaining a major advantage by using controller attachments on their mobile device, some of which are virtually undetectable. That in mind, Epic would likely have to devise some way to ensure that everyone is playing fair and square and directly on their device, without the assistance of third-party technology. It must be reiterated that the competition itself hasn’t been officially announced yet by Epic, so there’s a chance it may not even happen. CompLexity’s Matt Rutledge has since clarified that he was simply speculating, given the Xbox-only tournament just announced. However, the possibility is certainly there, given Epic’s track record of running previous big-money tournaments, and their push to be as inclusive as possible. Thank you guys for covering mobile esports and for the mention in this article! I do want to clarify that I have not heard any communication at all about mobile events from epic, and that my tweet is pure speculation based on the Xbox Cup. But we all do hope one comes soon!:raised_hands: — MobileMatt (@TheMobileMatt) July 17, 2019 It wouldn’t even be the first event made exclusive to a singular platform; on July 17, Epic announced the $1 million Xbox Cup, which will be limited to those on the Xbox One console. This could kick-start a series of million-dollar tournaments for specific platforms, one of which could very well be mobile. (No official announcement yet, but a good chance mobile gets an exclusive event like the Xbox Cup) pic.twitter.com/PnQBdn18gn — MobileMatt (@TheMobileMatt) July 17, 2019 Fortnite Xbox Cup – how does it work? After having been leaked several days ahead of time, the Fortnite Xbox Cup was formally unveiled on July 17, as part of the v9.40 update that released on the same day. Scheduled to be held July 20-21, the tournament will feature a $1 million prize pool that will be available to only those who play on the Xbox One. Unlike previous in-game cash tournaments, the Xbox Cup will not require players to reach any specific division in Arena, but will involve a qualification round, from which the top 1500 players from around the world will advance to the second and final round.

Epic Games issue response after Fortnite players nabbed iKONIK skin early Epic GamesThe Fortnite players who took advantage of an error from Epic Games and downloaded what was supposed to be exclusive content, when it appeared in the in-game store, finally have an answer as to whether or not they’re able to keep it. The iKONIK skin and Scenario emote turned out to not be as exclusive as first planned, after many people spotted that Epic had mistakingly added it to their in-game store on March 5. Samsung had announced that the content bundle would be available for just new owners of their new Samsung Galaxy S10, S10+ or S10e Android devices, but the mishap made them available early and to much more than just new phone buyers. After being made aware of the gaffe, the developer has since owned the mistake and their latest announcement will be good news for those who managed to nab it from the store when they did. “There was an issue with how we set up the Outfit Pack within the mobile launcher, causing it to appear for free in the store during this limited time period,” JustMooney1 posted to the game’s subreddit. “If you claimed it, you keep it.” On the other hand, though, new Samsung buyers have lost out on what was supposed to be exclusive content in the process. We have already put together a simple guide on how to get the iKONIK skin, which could be very useful if you’re looking to get your hands on the iKON inspired content when it’s officially made available. In terms of an official timeline, the skin and emote will be released for owners of the smartphones listed earlier to download on March 8. There will also be an event held at New York City’s Meatpacking district on March 16 featuring Tyler ‘Ninja” Blevins where they will be showcased fully as well.

Epic Games reportedly hire Star Wars producer for Fortnite movie Epic GamesEpic Games appear ready to bring Fortnite to the big screen, as recent hires and reports suggest the studio is preparing for a movie (and other “scripted video programming”) based on their hit game. About three weeks ago, it was revealed that Fortnite might not be on iOS devices for another five years. In light of the ongoing legal battle between Epic Games and Apple, it appears that the game studio is preparing to grow elsewhere. As reported by The Information’s Matthew Olson and Jessica Toonkel, Fortnite’s developers are now looking toward Hollywood for momentum. And it appears likely that Tilted Towers could find a home in Tinsel Town. The new report notes that Epic are hiring a series of Lucasfilm executives who were involved in the “Star Wars” franchise. Further, it details that Epic’s intentions are to “diversify,” with a “feature film” being among loftier possibilities. Fortnite movie incoming? New from me + @jtoonkel: Epic’s assembling talent for a possible scripted entertainment division (think film and TV). A Fortnite movie has been discussed. This could be a smart way for Epic to grow in the near-term while still moving toward the metaverse.https://t.co/HGDKXL9zKG — mathew olson (@mathewolson) October 11, 2021 As tweeted by Olson, “a Fortnite movie has been discussed.” And this is in direct correlation with new hires, like Lucasfilm’s Jason McGatlin—an executive producer for all Star Wars films created with Disney. In tandem, the gaming studio has also enlisted two other former Lucasfilm employees. These moves branch the company’s experience into the entertainment industry, which follows Olson and Toonkel’s sources. Those sources claim that the studio is “considering launching an entertainment division focused on scripted video programming.” And, further, that the aim of this division is to diversify following mobile setbacks. Epic Games following Riot Games into film and TV Riot first — @arcaneshow launches November 6th on @netflix fro @riotgames (Riot Entertainment division) Now @jtoonkel @mathewolson @theinformation say @EpicGames going in similar direction https://t.co/xDNqwyMwko — Rich Greenfield, LightShed 🔦 (@RichLightShed) October 11, 2021 As noted by others in the industry, this move appears in line with Riot Games’ recent strategy. The League of Legends studio made waves by revealing a Netflix TV series in late-September. While a Fortnite movie is the most intriguing of the new Epic Games report, it’s not the sole option. Olson and Toonkel’s sources left room for other possibilities: “The division could develop projects including a feature film based on Fortnite.” At the moment, nothing remains confirmed and all is subject to speculation. But, combined with the recent hires and similar moves by Riot, a Fortnite show or movie feels entirely reasonable.

Epic Games remove and refund Fortnite’s Gunner Pet cosmetic Epic GamesAfter facing heavy criticism from players, Epic Games have decided to remove the contentious Gunner Pet cosmetic item from Fortnite Battle Royale. On August 14, Epic announced that the Gunner Pet will removed from players’ inventories moving forward, and anyone who purchased the cosmetic will receive a full refund. In fact, almost uncharacteristically, they also apologized for having put the item up for sale in the first place, and have promised players an additional 200 V-Bucks of compensation as a sign of goodwill. “We should not have released the Gunner Pet and apologize for doing so,” they tweeted. “Within the next couple of days, all purchases of Gunner will be refunded for the full amount of 1000 V-bucks as well as an additional 200 V-bucks and the Pet will be removed from the Locker” Read More: Fortnite Moisty Palms location coming soon? – Furthermore, those who purchased the item but used a Refund Token to return it will also receive the compensation, as well as another Token for future use. “Anyone who purchased Gunner and refunds it prior to this make-good will instead receive 200 V-bucks and a replacement Refund Token that can be put towards any eligible items that were purchased within the past 30 days.” Anyone who purchased Gunner and refunds it prior to this make-good will instead receive 200 V-bucks and a replacement Refund Token that can be put towards any eligible items that were purchased within the past 30 days. — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) August 14, 2019 Released in the August 13-14 Item Shop, the Gunner Pet instantly fell under extreme scrutiny and criticism from many in the community who felt that Epic were trying to rip off players. The item, which cost 1,000 V-Bucks, was very similar to the Bonesy Pet offered to those who reached at least Tier 12 of the Season 6 Battle Pass. Read More: Fortnite Season 10 Champion Series details – In fact, the only noticeable difference between the two cosmetics was that Gunner had a light fur complexion than Bonesy. Otherwise, the two pets looked identical. This, predictably, led to a lot of outrage from players, which did not think it was right for Epic to charge such a hefty price for an item that was once available for free. “Wow they’re actually selling a literal recolor of an old battle pass item for $10,” wrote Reddit user ‘King_D3D3D3.’ “Not even a new model at all.” “This is a massive red flag for me,” added ‘Tolbana,’ “At what point does the difference become minuscule enough for people to understand? Back when Skull Trooper was controversial many argued ‘It’s not BP so it’s fine!’ Now look how the goal posts have moved.” Fortunately for players, Epic have decided to remove and refund the item, which otherwise would have meant setting a dangerous precedent that would open the door for them to recycle old Battle Pass items through the Item Shop for further profit.

Epic Games removes bundles from Item Shop amidst pending error investigation Fortnite developers Epic Games have removed cosmetic bundles from the game’s Item Shop entirely, due to an error reported early on November 25. While the Wukong and Rex cosmetic bundles had already been made available for purchase, some players got an early glimpse of the upcoming Highland Warrior bundle in the Item Shop – however, according to Epic developer MrPopoTFS, this was actually an error. MrPopoTFS explained the incident in a Reddit post shortly after the bundle went live, claiming that its availability was an accident, and that the team would be removing all bundles from the Shop in an effort to fix the glitch. “We’ve removed bundles currently while we investigate an error associated with them,” MrPopo wrote. “Hotfixes sometimes take a little longer for all servers to receive them, so some players may have seen the bundle version of the store for a short time.” Fortnite’s bundles contain a collection of cosmetics for players to express themselves in-game, including such resources as a pickaxe, glider, and a skin altogether for a lower price (as opposed to buying each item individually). The now-removed Highland Warrior bundle contained the female Highland Warrior Skin (Epic), the Buckler Back Bling (Epic), the Silver Fang Pickaxe (Rare), and the Storm Sigil Glider (Uncommon). You can check out pics of the goodies below: Highland Warrior Skin (Epic) Until then, players will have to wait – but you can take our Fortnite Location Quiz to test your game knowledge, in the interim.

Epic Games reduces Fortnite Choppa spawn rates in June 25 update Epic GamesPlayers are still soaking up all of the new content from Fortnite’s major Season 3 update, yet Epic Games has already issued a follow-up patch to reduce the frequency of Choppas in some playlists. Plenty of all-new vehicles have been dropped into the mega-popular battle royale title over the past few updates. Season 3’s major patch alone introduced the likes of cars, buggies, taxis, and more. Yet despite the new additions, an older vehicle has been the centre of attention since the big update. Helicopters were implemented three months ago in the 12.20 Season 2 update. While players were anxiously awaiting the vehicle back then, many have clamored for its outright removal ever since. Reacting to the community backlash, Epic issued a quick update on June 25 that looked to address the issue. While Choppas have not been vaulted entirely, spawn rates have been reduced across “all competitive and tournament playlists.” We’ve pushed an update to reduce Choppa spawn rates in all competitive and tournament playlists. — Fortnite Status (@FortniteStatus) June 26, 2020 Choppas will still be just as common throughout regular modes. Therefore, you can expect to see them soaring through Solos, Duos, and Squads as per usual. This update specifically targeted the frequency of the vehicle appearing in Fortnite’s more intense modes. Capable of traveling great distances at ease or knocking out opposing structures without much fear of being taken down, helicopters have been a bane for many competitive players. At a whopping 1,500 HP, it takes a mighty effort to shoot them out of the sky. Some players praised the swift decision while others appeared to want a much more significant change. “Reduce?” Team SoloMid’s Fortnite professional ‘Slappie’ questioned. “So you know it’s bad and you just reduce?” As it currently stands, a total of eight vehicles have been vaulted in the three-year history of Epic’s battle royale. While some were purely rotated out for cosmetic reasons, others were scrapped for being controversially powerful. Still fresh in the minds of many Fortnite pros, the B.R.U.T.E mech reigned supreme throughout much of 2019. The monstrous vehicle was nearly indestructible, allowing for extremely one-sided engagements. Mercifully, the developers finally pushed to remove this controversial addition in September 2019. While Choppas haven’t quite elicited the same level of frustration, they could follow a similar lifecycle to the mech. If players continue to voice their displeasure, even after today’s spawn-rate adjustments, the helicopter could very well be the next vehicle locked away in Fortnite’s vault.

Why Fortnite’s Playground Mode Didn’t Work at Launch and How Epic Games Fixed It Epic Games has released lengthy “postmortem” of the trials and tribulations that were involved in the release of the Playground Limited Time Mode. Originally released on June 27, the Playground Mode was easily the most highly anticipated LTM that has come to Fortnite Battle Royale so far. But, soon after its release, it was disabled. This happened due to the Matchmaking Service (MMS) not being able to handle the extra strain, as Epic explains: “Since Playground mode makes matches for every 1-4 people instead of 100, it requires between 25 and 100 times as many matches as normal depending on party size. While we could pack virtual servers a bit tighter per physical CPU for Playground mode, we still had to use 15 times as many servers as we had been running for the other modes. We were able to secure the total server capacity, but it meant the list that each node had to manage was suddenly 15 times as long as well,” Read More: Friday Fortnite Set to Clash With Epic Games’ $500K Summer Skirmish Tournament as KEEMSTAR Hits Out on Twitter – “When we released Playground, the overwhelming demand quickly exhausted the local lists for MMS nodes far faster than the system could refresh them. Each node was running to every other node to request extra servers that just weren’t there yet, or at the very least took a long time to pick out of the non-local lists. The long compute times caused the CPU to end up with a backlog of pending requests, resulting in a feedback loop that eventually caused the system to grind to a halt.” It took Epic longer than they expected to fix the issues, but eventually the mode returned on July 2. “In short, we learned a lot about our own matchmaking system and its failure points as well. We planned and prepared for what we thought to be the maximum sustained matchmaking throughput and capacity based on the size of our player base (plus a healthy buffer), but didn’t properly anticipate the edge-case of of the initial “land rush” of players exhausting local lists, “The process of getting Playground stable and in the hands of our players was tougher than we would have liked, but was a solid reminder that complex distributed systems fail in unpredictable ways. We were forced to make significant emergency upgrades to our Matchmaking Service, but these changes will serve the game well as we continue to grow and expand our player base into the future.” The full postmortem can be found here.

Epic Games push back World Cup qualifiers after community backlash Epic GamesEpic Games have announced that the Fortnite World Cup Semi-Finals and Grand Finals will be pushed back to a new date after numerous complaints from pros started to mount. Fortnite Battle Royale pros have a packed month of June when it comes to tournaments with big prize pools. The Celebrity Pro-Am and the last weeks of World Cup qualifiers for duos were in danger of overlapping. Pro player Dennis ‘Cloak’ Lepore pointed out that the conflicting schedules might have made some people choose between attending the Summer Block Party tournament or taking their last shot at qualifying for the Fortnite World Cup Finals in New York City. Just found out E3 pro-am tourney is during the last duo week WC qualifier? Whose bright idea was that LOL @EpicGames — Creator code: cloakzy (@cloakzy) June 2, 2019 In a June 5 announcement, the Fortnite World Cup organizers made a change to the schedule which will hopefully alleviate any of the concerns that people might have had going into the tournament season. “Hey Fortnite World Cup Competitors,” Producer at Epic Games Matt ‘Loomin’ Layman said. “We are rescheduling the Week 10 Fortnite World Cup Online Open. The Semi-Finals will now take place on Thursday, June 20th. The Finals will take place on Friday, June 21st.” Moreover, Loomin said that the “start time for each region will begin one hour later than the regular scheduled tournaments,” so players will want to keep that in mind to show up on time. Finally, the prize pool for Week 9 and Week 10 will be doubling to a total of $2,000,000. But it’s important to note that the schedule and timing for Week 9 will stay the same. Ninja, Cloak and more had major issues with Fortnite World Cup scheduling During his May 3 stream, the world’s most famous gamer Tyler ‘Ninja’ Blevins expressed his ire against scheduling and even explained why he wanted out of the Pro-Am. “I’m trying to get out of it,” the Detroit native said. “It’s a whole thing dude. I’m not trying to get out of it, I still want to be a part of it, but in a way that I can still play on Sunday.” Cloak wasn’t agreeing with the scheduling either, as he and many others pointed out the conflicts between the two events on social medias. Now that Epic Games have pushed back the dates of their qualifiers, hopefully that’ll mean the pros will be able to lock in and perform their best on both events.

Epic Games Provides Update on Length of Downtime for the New Playground LTM in Fortnite UPDATE (June 28th, 10:55 AM EST): Epic Games announced via Reddit that they will be making ‘major improvements’ to their matchmaking service to help bring back Playground Mode, and are hoping that it will go live ‘later today’ (Thursday, June 28th.) “Heya folks, Yesterday we launched the Playground LTM. So many of you rushed in to create and play that our matchmaking service fell over. We’ve since separated the Playground matchmaker from the one that affects the default modes and made large improvements to assist with the number of players. We plan to push these changes and improvements live later today to bring the Playground LTM back online.We’ll give you more updates and a timeline as soon as we have one. Thanks.” Original Article There was extra hype surrounding the v4.5 update in Fortnite on June 27th, as it was to launch the highly anticipating Playground Limited Time Mode. However, much to the chagrin of the game’s vast player-base, the LTM was disabled merely hours after its release due to issues in matchmaking services. While it initially seemed that the delay was not going to be for too long, it now appears that players will have to wait much longer before they can try out the Playground. Epic Games announced on June 27th via Twitter and Reddit that the new mode was to remain disabled through the night as their team worked through some of the issues. We know you want to get back out to the Playground LTM. We’ve got multiple teams working to get this mode back into your hands so you can let your imaginations run wild. We want to inform you that the Playground LTM will remain closed for repairs for the night. We’ll have more information available tomorrow. We know you want to get back out to the Playground LTM but it will remain closed for repairs for the night as we continue working on a fix. More details: https://t.co/57i9A8cmq9 — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) June 27, 2018 While “for the night” is a relatively ambiguous estimated period of time, this likely means that the new LTM will be available for players to enjoy sometime during June 28th. However, queue times could potentially become rather long during the early moments of its reinstatement, especially if it is enabled during a time of the day when there are a lot of players online. Read More: Leaked 3D Models and In-Game Audio of All New Skins, Gliders, and Back Blings That Are Coming Soon to Fortnite – Launched alongside the v4.5 update early on June 27th, the Playground LTM offers players the chance to play alongside their friends and do whatevery they like in a private, low-pressure environment with the full Fortnite map at their disposal. For full details on the new mode, you can read its description as provided by Epic Games in the v4.5 patch notes here.

When is Duel mode coming to Fortnite Battle Royale? Epic provide update on 1v1 mode Epic GamesEpic Games, developers of the massively popular Fortnite Battle Royale, have confirmed that they are working on a 1v1 practice mode and have teased that “big” things are coming to Creative. Will there be a 1v1 mode added to Fortnite Battle Royale? Initial interest regarding a 1v1 mode was piqued in late March 2019, when an Epic employee, Reddit user ‘darkveil’, replied to a question on an ‘ask me anything’ regarding the Creative mode in the game. In response to the question, which regarded the potential of a 1v1 mode in Fortnite Battle Royale, the Epic Games staff member said that they were “planning to add ‘Duel’ mode support for 1v1, winner stays on.” 600When will Fortnite Battle Royale’s “Duel” mode be added? This initial Reddit response from Epic Games went somewhat unnoticed, but community interest rose again last night as they provided another update. A lot of large games have incorporated 1v1 modes of late. For example 2017’s Call of Duty: WWII had a specific 1v1 arena built into the headquarters social space, harking back to Modern Warfare’s inclusion of ‘Cage Matches’. Given Fortnite’s unique building aspect and the extra skill level this brings, there have long been calls to incorporate a 1v1 mode. “The Duel feature is still a little ways out,” explains darkveil, “but a big piece of tech needed is coming in the next Creative update — we’ve added support for games to have multiple “rounds” and scoring/victory handling for that.” Judging by the response, it seems like there will be a large Creative update coming soon, with the 1v1 Duel mode following at some point after. At the time of writing, there are roughly two weeks of Season 8 left, meaning that Duel mode will probably be added with the start of Season 9, or someway through that season. Reddit users were understandably excited, with one saying “Can I kiss you?” whilst another simply went for “flair this man”.

Epic Games Provides Update About the Mysterious Footsteps Heard After Fights in Fortnite Epic Games has commented on the current issue in Fortnite that is causing mysterious footsteps to be heard after fights. According to the developers, a fix for the bug has already been put in place and will go live in the game once the v5.2.0 Update is launched. After the launch of the recent v5.1.0 Update, players began reporting that, after finishing gunfights and eliminating the enemy player(s), they would hear footsteps around them, even though there was nobody nearby. This can obviously become frustrating and annoying as it creates a false alarm for players who had just finished their previous engagement. Read More: Competitive Solo Showdown LTM is Returning Soon in Fortnite – Format, Rules, Prizes, and More! – Reddit user ‘m4t5u’ posted about the issue on the FortniteBR Reddit page. Everytime the fight is over i hear like 1 or 2 more footsteps after the last kill while theres nobody there. Anyone else got the same bug? Edit; tnx guys.. i knew i wasnt crazy. The post got the attention of Epic Games, and representative ‘MrPopoTFS’ had this to say about the matter: I’ve gone ahead and tossed this over to our QA team so they can dig into this. We’ll also keep our ears to the ground for additional audio issues. Update: A fix was just put in for this issue that will be applied once the v5.20 Patch arrives. The official release date for the v5.2.0 Update has not yet been announced, but it will likely be during sometime next week. Whenever it does go live, we now at least know that it will include a fix for this ghost footsteps bug that has been haunting players in recent days (no pun intended).

Epic Games Provides an Update on Fortnite Servers Cashing Since V.5.2.1 Patch Players have reported various issues with Fortnite: Battle Royale following the release of the V.5.2.1 patch. On Wednesday, August 15, Epic Games took to Twitter to announce that they are aware of ‘crashes’ happening more frequently on Fortnite after the V.5.2.1 patch was released on the same day. Epic mentioned that they have identified the particular bug that has caused the repeated issue, and that they are currently working on a fix. The full Tweet can be viewed below. @FortniteGame At the time of writing, it is unknown when Epic Games will release a fix for the obstacle or exactly what the root of the issue is. More: right here. –

Epic Games Employee Provides an Update on the Playground Mode Downtime, Explains Why It’s Taking So Long Epic Games has posted another update about the eventual return of Playground Mode but it still isn’t good news for Fortnite Battle Royale fans. As one of the most highly anticipated additions to Fortnite in recent memory, the Playground Limited Time Mode should have been a massive success. Unfortunately it was disabled just hours after it launched on June 27th as part of the V4.5 patch that also introduced the Dual Pistols. The game’s developers later stated that they needed to “continue testing our matchmaking improvements” but sounded confident that an issue would be found in the near future. Unfortunately, almost a week since the initial problems, Playground Mode is still not available for the Fortnite community to enjoy and Epic Games’ MrPopoTFS has now taken to Reddit to reveal that the wait will continue. Although tests over the weekend were “promising”, the post explains that the developers still need to investigate further and states that it is “hard to know whether we’ll have to make any additional system changes in order to meet our test goals right now” MrPopoTFS has also linked earlier posts where another employee (Jshredz) went into more detail about why it’s taking so long to get Playground Mode back online and what the issues currently are. The first one, posted on June 28th, explains that the Playground LTM launch was extremely popular and put too much of a strain on the matchmaking system. The next post expands on that explanation and reiterates how difficult it is to make matchmaking function “up to 100 times faster than it needs to for the base modes”.

Epic Games Provide Update on Close Encounter LTM in Fortnite, Bring Back Solid Gold Mode Epic Games has clarified the reasoning for the removal of the ‘Close Encounters’ limited time mode in Fortnite Battle Royale, replacing it with the fan favorite ‘Solid Gold’ mode. The Close Encounters mode has had a rocky introduction to Fortnite, being removed and re-added on a couple of occasions as devs tinker with the balancing. The mode only features shotguns and new limited time item Jetpacks, but has ‘encountered’ its fair share of issues, making it not work out quite as Epic intended. Until now, players were unsure why Fortnite was in a state of limbo with mode, with some players not even getting a chance to play it, but Epic Games has now clarified the reasoning. It turns out that the issue caused by ‘sky bases’ was ruining the playability of the mode, due to the constant jetpacks and removal of fall damage. In regular modes, players need to be cautious when building sky bases (building high into the ‘sky’ of the map to gain a major height advantage) because falling from such heights would almost certainly result in death. But with jetpacks and no fall damage, players were perhaps overusing sky bases, making ‘close encounters’ gameplay not work out quite as planned. We heard your feedback about Close Encounters and will be evaluating the effect sky bases have on this LTM. To replace this we’ve brought back Solid Gold after seeing how much you enjoyed it. Happy Weekend! An example of a sky base in Fortnite, a problem in the Close Encounters LTM Solid Gold has been a staple LTM in Fortnite Battle Royale, dropping only the legendary (gold) tier of weapons on the map, giving all players maximum firepower. As for Close Encounters, it remains to be seen if the Epic Games team can tinker with the settings to make it a more viable mode. Source: Reddit

Epic Games provide grim update on siphon and stretched resolution Epic GamesEpic Games have addressing the controversy surrounding the siphon mechanic and stretched resolution in Fortnite Battle Royale, and things aren’t looking good. Much of the negativity that’s surrounded Fortnite BR of late has been due to two major factors – the removal of the siphon mechanic that awarded players health/shield and materials after each elimination, and not allowing players to use stretched resolution in competitive modes. Despite all of the backlash they’ve received, Epic have confirmed that they’re standing by those changes, explaining why in their April 26 Competitive Development Update. Siphon and material change According to Epic, giving players health/shield and materials after every elimination inspired too many players to start playing more aggressively. Read More: Will Fortnite Season 10 really start right before the World Cup? Season 9 end date revealed – While this worked out favorably for the highest skilled 10% of players, increasing their engagement, the remaining 90% of players were becoming to frustrated and starting to play less. Epic contend that having the siphon mechanic in regular modes made it not enjoyable for many players. Many players stated that the game had gotten “too intense to be enjoyable,” and started playing the default core modes less and less. As a result, Epic decided to remove the siphon mechanic from the core modes and leave it exclusively in the competitive modes, such as Arena, offering the best of both worlds to players. Stretched resolution and field-of-view (FOV) On the topic of stretched resolution, Epic pretty much confirmed that they had two reasons for removing it as an option for players – poor viewing experience and gameplay advantage. They claimed that the stretched nature of what was on the screen “detracted from Fortnite as an entertainment experience for all.” Many competitive Fortnite BR players had to stop using stretched resolution after the new World Cup rules was implemented. As for gameplay, the developers really didn’t want to have an optional setting that was giving the players a “significant gameplay advantage,” which is likely referring to the fact that screen resolution cannot be changed on console. In an effort to help mitigate the loss of stretched resolution, Epic have instituted a FOV of 80, which they claim helps with the following: The current default FOV of 80 is a tradeoff to accommodate: Varied engagement ranges, favoring a low FOV and thus a closer view of enemies. – Minimizing potential motion-sickness in players further away from their screen. The further a player’s head moves from the center of the in-game field of view, the more negative the reaction. – Minimizing jarring transitions when aiming down sights. – Visual fidelity. – Performance. –

Epic Games provide update and fixes following first Fortnite Alpha tournament Fortnite’s tournament mode got underway officially on October 16 when the ‘Alpha tournament’ went live, but there were a few bugs and gameplay issues affecting some players’ experience. Worst of all was perhaps the incorrect score glitch, were players would not earn their points due to a matchmaking error, but the game gave no indication of the error. There was also other issues with matchmaking too, some of which were caused by the sudden influx of players when the tournament started. Epic Games have now addressed these issues and more in a Reddit post, outlining some fixes which they have already made and others which they are monitoring, with a fix forthcoming. They also spoke about players exploiting the kills point system, whereby simply going to Tilted Towers to rack up as many kills as possible and then ‘suiciding’, players can earn more points faster than playing the match out. Epic’s esports rep u/SkyzYn says they’re “keeping an eye on it”, but believe that once matchmaking is working as intended, this will be less of an issue. Here’s the full update from Epic Games after the first day of Alpha tournament mode. Alpha Tournament Status and Known Issues Hey all ~ Earlier today we launched the in-game tournament system and hosted the first session of the Alpha Tournament on the EU server. We’d like to provide an update on several known issues, what we’re still investigating, and what you might expect as we iron out issues within the system throughout the week. Server Capacity The sudden influx of players attempting to search for matches at the start of the tournament caused some issues with our matchmaking services as they attempted to balance match assignment in response to the demand. We are updating our matchmaking strategy to better accommodate the rush of players at the start of a tournament. Schedule & Tournament Regions An issue was identified where often the ‘Tournament Region’ displayed in the Events tab would indicate a player was viewing the event list for ‘North America’. This is a visual bug only, each region has their own tournament schedule and all times displayed inside of the Events tab are correct based on your local timezone and system clock. Incorrect Scores We have a couple known issues around incorrect scores: Scenario one – players did not receive any points because they were not being matched into the tournament correctly – despite it appearing as if they were. Restarting the game would fix this issue and allow you to earn points. This should now display an error if you try to matchmake with this issue, and we’ll be fixing in a future release. Scenario two – players may incorrectly either receive a point or not get credit for reaching an elimination or placement goal. However, the correct score would be shown after a 2-3 minute delay or the next time a player returned to the Lobby. We’re actively investigating a fix for this, but your score should be correct at the end of an event currently. Unfortunately, any points lost during this event will not be recoverable. Matchmaking The tournament system is intended to match you against players with similar score during the session, becoming less strict in its search over time to ensure you find a match eventually. Players who have higher scores should expect longer matchmaking times and tougher matches, while players with lower scores should expect an easier time as many of the higher scoring players filter out. Currently we’re finding that this isn’t working correctly and is resulting in matches that are more mixed in score than we intended, especially when it comes to players with high scores during the event. We’ll be continuing to iterate on this to provide a better matched experience, so expect this to fluctuate regularly. ——————————- We’re also keeping an eye on feedback for things like tournament scheduling, scoring formats, and visual presentation to help inform future development after we’ve gotten everything working as intended. Dive into the tournament system blog and announcement video for some insight into where we’ll be taking the feature going forward. UPDATE (7:43 ET): We’ve identified and fixed an issue during the NA Alpha Tournament which was preventing points from being awarded. Source: Reddit

Epic Games pay tribute to Fortnite World Cup winner Bugha in-game Epic GamesKyle ‘Bugha’ Giersdorf netted himself a cool $3 million from Epic Games after securing 1st place at the Fortnite World Cup, and now he’s being immortalized in the game itself. Out of 40 million competitors total in qualifiers, Bugha came out on top when the final 100 players went head-to-head in the solo tournament in New York City on July 28. He won himself the largest prize pot for a single esports player in history, and instantly elevated himself to new levels of fame. :movie_camera: @GhostGaming: A Fortnite World Cup Story by Dexerto :starstruck: Ep.1: Motivations :fire: Ft. @Ghost_Bizzle, @aydan, @seanpcc, @GhostSaf w/@elgatogaming | #FortniteWorldCup pic.twitter.com/DFvpFJm3gN — DEXERTO.COM (@Dexerto) August 12, 2019 His landing spot, aptly named ‘Lucky Landing’, was the location from which he would start all of his six matches at the finals, and now Epic Games has commemorated his victory with a special, personalized addition. A replica of Bugha’s trophy now sits in the center of Lucky Landing itself, after being added in the v10.10 update on August 14. As well as Bugha, duo champions Nyhrox and Aqua have also been commemorated, with their trophy located at Happy Hamlet. Not only is Bugha recognized in-game, he’s become an overnight superstar out of it too. Immediately after his big win his following on all social media skyrocketed, and he is currently the fastest growing streamer on Twitch, by some distance. He’s remained down to earth though, and has even spoken out against Epic Games due to their addition of the BRUTE mechs in Season 10, which has caused anger among the competitive community especially. :trophy: Episode 2: Expectations :movie_camera: @GhostGaming: A Fortnite World Cup Story ⭐️ Starring: @Ghost_Bizzle, @aydan, @seanpcc, @GhostSaf, @ghostissa7 w/@ElgatoGaming | #FortniteWorldCup pic.twitter.com/D54xTQHuuj — DEXERTO.COM (@Dexerto) August 13, 2019 His new found fame has also had some drawbacks too of course, most notably having armed police show up at his family home after a successful ‘SWATting’ attempt. Thankfully, the situation was resolved quickly without anyone coming to harm. Other trolls also hacked into his Twitter account almost immediately after he won the World Cup, though that situation too was resolved swiftly.

Epic Games Provide an Update on Fortnite: Battle Royale Release Time for Android, Customizable HUD, and Other Changes to Mobile Epic Games have released a new ‘State of Mobile’ for Fortnite: Battle Royale update which covers topics such as the Android release time, a customizable HUD, and much more. After being released in September of 2017, the ‘Battle Royale’ portion of Fortnite gained immense notoriety across the gaming community for its unique spin on the popular genre. The ‘free-to-play’ game was made available for platforms such as the PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC, along with a highly-anticipated release on iOS devices months later. More: TSM’s Myth Discusses the Origins of His Name, Build-off Battle vs Ninja, and More in Latest Q&A – However, fans on Android wondered when Fortnite would make its way to their mobile devices as well, with no official release date provided following its confirmation by the studio. On Friday, May 18th, Epic Games released a ‘State of Mobile’ update on their website, which announced that Fortnite will be coming to Android ‘this summer’ at the time of writing, along with various other changes and plans for mobile in general The full post can be viewed below. Hi all, Since launch, we’ve been working to make the experience better, including a number of quality of life and performance improvements. CUSTOMIZABLE HUD We’ve heard your requests for the ability to customize the HUD and, earlier this week, we added this feature to the game. Try it out and let us know what you think. We’re excited to get this into your hands! Customizable HUD In-game Epic Games Customizable HUD Blueprint VOICE CHAT We know that communication is key when you’re squadding up for that Victory Royale, so we’re working to bring voice chat to mobile. On top of that, you’ll be able to chat with your teammates regardless of platform! We’re also looking to make it really easy to mute yourself, other players, or open up all communications with a simple tap. There will be a button on the screen that lets you mute yourself, mute everyone in your party, or go back to open-microphone. GAMEPLAY AND CONTROLS We’re continuing to work on improvements. Some upcoming examples include improving Autorun and adding better ways to fire. Once we roll out these changes, we’ll add options to the settings so you can try them out and see what works best for you! INSTALLATION SIZE AND UPDATE EXPERIENCE We are aware of the large installation size of Fortnite on mobile and are working to reduce that size. Over the next few updates we’ll be compressing the size down while maintaining performance. We’ll be making overall patch sizes smaller and adding the ability to download the content in the background! ANDROID Fortnite is coming to Android! We are targeting this summer for the release. We know many of you are excited for this release, and we promise that when we have more information to share, you’ll hear it from us first. GAME PERFORMANCE We see some areas where game performance can can be improved. We’re fixing code to optimize the experience (e.g. increase graphic quality), as well as adding a Battery-Saver mode which will allow you increased performance if you choose to lower the graphic quality. It’s our first implementation of this option and we’ll continue to improve upon it. STATS Many of you have asked for stat tracking on mobile. We are working to improve our stats servers so we can handle many more players, including those on mobile. We’re looking to enable this sometime this summer, once we are confident the improvements are performing up to our expectations. STABILITY Finally, stability is still one of our chief concerns. With every update we’re working to fix crashes and other issues as you report them. If you’re regularly running into stability issues, please let us know using the “Feedback” button in-game. Thank you for all of your support and feedback! Thanks,The Fortnite Team

Epic Games Partners With Funko to Create Fortnite Collectibles and Merchandise Epic Games and Funko have announced a new partnership to create Fortnite toys and merchandise for release later this year. Funko says that the new collection will feature numerous new product lines. These will include the Pop! Figures, Pint Size Heroes, Pop! Apparel, and more. Brian Mariotti, the CEO of Funko, says that the company is thrilled to collaborate with Epic Games and looks forward to expanding the collection. “This collection will be a true celebration of Fortnite’s incredible popularity and cultural significance, and we believe our Funko Fortnite collectibles will strongly resonate with fans of the game. We look forward to expanding this collection and combining our leading product capabilities with our strong retail platform. Ultimately our goal is to create a powerful merchandise strategy for the Fortnite™ brand, as well as bring these amazing collectibles to fans around the world.” The Vice President of Epic Games, Mark Rein, echoed Mariotti’s sentiments, stating that the company hopes that Fortnite players will be excited about the partnership. “We’re all big fans of Funko’s collectibles, so we were thrilled when we had the chance to partner with them on the Fortnite collection. We hope our players are as excited as we are about all of the cool stuff that’s on its way.” Funko produces products for a variety of high profile brands and companies, including Marvel. The news that Fortnite toys and collectibles are on the horizon will come as no surprise to anyone that has followed the game’s meteoric rise in popularity over the last year. The 100 player Battle Royale version of the game has taken the world by storm with its innovative building mechanics and its fast paced, addictive gameplay. Known for creating a variety of pop culture collectibles, Funko’s most famous lines include the Pop! Figures and bobbleheads.

Epic Games officially turn Fortnite into a high school and college sport Epic GamesEpic Games and software company PlayVS have officially revealed Fortnite’s first officially sanctioned series of competitions for U.S. high school and colleges. The series will be the first time Epic has officially sponsored high school esports, and is the first time Fortnite’s college players will see a set format with a national championship at the end of the season. PlayVS is a software company that provides leagues, scheduling, and infrastructure for high school esports in America – according to its website. PlayVS has previously partnered with Rocket League developer Psyonix to hold competitions, but the duo with Epic will be their first time operating at the collegiate level. The high school competitive series will be spread over six conferences, one for each time zone of the United States: Eastern, Central, Mountain, Pacific, Alaska, and Hawaii. For the college set, there will only be one conference for the entire country, and each one (high school and college) will crown a winner at a final championship event. High school registration for varsity competition starts February 17, and sign up for the collegiate circuit starts Feb. 24. Both high school and college players will compete in an eight-week season, starting on Feb. 26 for the former, and March 4 for the latter. Players will compete each week as duos in private lobbies against other duos from the same conference over a period of two hours, or a maximum of seven games. In these matches, teams will acquire points each week according to the scoring formula provided by Epic Games and Play VS: Scoring format Victory Royale: 10 Points 2nd – 3rd: 7 Points 4th – 7th: 5 Points 8th – 12th: 3 Points Each Elimination: 1 Point Tiebreakers will be determined in the order presented here: (1) total points scored; (2) total Victory Royales in the session; (3) average eliminations in the session; (4) average placement per match in the session; finally (5) total seconds survived across all matches; and finally (6) a coin flip. -Epic Games and PlayVS Top four teams in each conference, each week, will earn a playoff spot up to a total of 32 teams, with another 18 teams who were the highest-scoring non-automatic qualifiers joining them in the playoffs. It’s clear Epic isn’t shying away from expanding Fortnite esports following the success of the 2019 World Cup, and it will be very interesting to see how the new high school and college competitions work out.

Epic Games could bring back overpowered vaulted weapon for upcoming Nexus event Epic GamesFortnite players are anticipating the buildup to the Season 8 major event, but it looks like Epic Games are also preparing to give their fans a way to take weapons like the Drum Gun out of the Vault. The Fortnite Vault is filled with a vast array of previously released weapons or vehicles that the developers felt should be taken out of the game for various reasons. When an item ends up in the Vault, players typically expect to never seen it in the game again. But Epic Games have previously re-released a few weapons to the main game, and it seems like there’s going to be an entire mechanic introduced to facilitate those kinds of changes. The Vault could open up to reinstate a controversial gun A batch of leaks on April 27 introduced the plans for the “Nexus” event which will feature a laboratory at Loot Lake with six monitors hanging on the wall. Now one of those monitors is showing an unmistakable image of the Drum Gun that has been in the Vault since the v5.40 update on September 11, 2018. Before going into the Vault, the Drum Gun was a popular pickup for basic loadouts since it was able to deal a ton of fire with its insane 50-bullet magazine. Even though the gun was terrible for long range battles, the script quickly flipped when getting at a closer range making it a hassle to deal with. What is the Nexus event? Major Fortnite leaks have given players reason to believe that Epic Games are building up to an event that will resurrect one or some weapons that have since been taken out of the game. Though specific details of how the event will take place in Fortnite has yet to be revealed, the leaks show other Vaulted items possibly coming back to the game. It seems like there’s going to be a voting system in which Fortnite players will be able to bring back one of the weapons offered. It’ll be interesting to see how many of these voting sessions takes place throughout the event, and if the items they produce will have nerfs or tweaks from their original Vaulted forms. Though information is sparse, the Drum Gun appearing on one of the Loot Lake monitors will have players excited to possibly get that or another Vaulted item back into the game.

Epic Games announce change to new Storm Flip for Fortnite World Cup qualifiers Epic GamesEpic Games have announced on June 6 a big change coming to the Week 9 iteration of the Fortnite World Cup Online Open that will disable a major new component to the game. The Fortnite devs introduced the Storm Flip in the v9.20 update, and while it added a new dimension to how players maneuver in the zone, it looks the tournament organizers are keeping it away from official competitive matches. The Epic Rarity throwable item lets players create a sphere-shaped zone upon impact that either provides for a safe haven in the storm or a storm in the safe zone. In a Reddit post, Producer at Epic Games Matt ‘Loomin’ Layman didn’t give much of a reason for the item being disabled, but notified the fan base of where they can expect to see the Storm Flipped disabled. “We will be temporarily be disabling the Storm Flip for this weekend’s tournament,” Loomin said. “All regions will play the Week 9 Fortnite World Cup Online Open with the Storm Flip disabled.” Furthermore, the Storm Flip is going to be disabled in Arena playlists for the time being, at least “until the weekend tournament concludes.” We’ve disabled the Storm Flip in Arena and the Week 9 Online Open this weekend. More details here: https://t.co/FWgD4HBUBe — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) June 7, 2019 Plenty of members of the community welcomed the change, but were perplexed to see how the Fortnite Battle Royale devs didn’t have the foresight to “That’s good I guess,” Reddit user ‘kinsi55’ said. “But somebody has to ask this question: How could you not possibly realize that this is completely broken without even having released it.” 600Storm Flip joins list of items previously disabled in the Fortnite World Cup Even as the Storm Flip introduced a ton of potential strategies for teams to incorporate, it seems like the developers have decided to keep it away from the upcoming competitions. The quick turnaround didn’t come as a surprise to many as controversial items in the past have been disabled for Fortnite World Cup matches. Read more: How to watch $20,000 Friday Fortnite on June 7 ft. Ninja, PewDiePie, & more – stream, bracket, players, format – Previously, items like the Drum Gun and vehicles had been disabled prior to official qualifiers due to balance issues or heinous glitches that made them more of a liability than a tool to use. Either way, players should take note of the change seeing as it doesn’t look like they’ll be able to get their hands on the Storm Flip for the next qualifiers.

Future Fortnite tournaments might ditch the battle royale format entirely Epic Games are considering the idea of hosting Fortnite tournaments without battle royale modes, according to Team Liquid’s Jake ‘POACH’ Brumleve. Fortnite by nature is a battle royale title, with 100 players jumping out of the Battle Bus, landing on the map and searching for weapons and items as they attempt to eliminate enemies and be the last person or team standing. But with the the introduction of Fortnite’s Creative mode, players can now take part in custom modes that are seperate from the main battle royale mode, and Epic Games could use those special custom modes in future tournaments. During his Thursday, February 21 livestream, Fortnite pro player Jake ‘POACH’ Brumleve stated that the developers were discussing the possibility of future tournaments being played away from the battle royale format. “Fortnite has a lot of possibilities outside of battle royales,” POACH told his viewers. “I’ve talked to the developers about it, and it’s something they are considering. With Creative being added, more tournaments could be based around stuff that isn’t battle royale.” While it’s possible that Epic Games hosts tournaments with different modes in the future, the developers are about to hold a battle royale tournament at the ESL Katowice Royale, although some of Fortnite’s biggest names such as Turner ‘Tfue’ Tenney and Dennis ‘Cloak’ Lepore look set to pull out of the event. What these future Fortnite tournaments will look like is unknown, but it’s possible we could see modes like Team Deathmatch or Capture the Flag introduced as competitive formats for Fortnite esports.

Epic Games announce nerf for newly released Burst SMG Epic GamesFortnite Battle Royale players have been noticing that the game’s newest weapon, the Burst SMG, might have been too dominating when it launched on May 29, and now Epic Games is issuing a fix to the gun. The Fortnite Battle Royale developers tend to keep their game fresh and exciting by adding in weapons that bring new elements for players to work around. But their latest drop has been frustrating some of the player base since its a bit too overpowering. While some have been loving the new gun, there has been a particularly strong opposition to how the Burst SMG tends to bleed through walls which is giving headaches to a lot of players. 600In a May 2 tweet, the Fortnite devs announced that there’s going to be a major change to the new weapon that will be bringing down its damage dealt to structures. “Burst SMG damage to structures has been reduced from 25/27/28 to 23/24/25,” the Fortnite devs said. “Damage to structures now matches the base damage to players.” Players should notice the reduction in damage especially in build battles where the Burst SMG would eat through mats while sneaking some bullets through with little counterplay. Hopefully the speedy change will mean that the Burst SMG will still be a strong close-quarter option, even without the quick work it makes out of builds. We’ve released a hotfix to adjust structure damage for the Burst SMG. Burst SMG damage to structures has been reduced from 25/27/28 to 23/24/25. Damage to structures now matches the base damage to players. — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) May 30, 2019 Burst SMG could change the Fortnite Battle Royale meta Even though a lot of members in the Fortnite Battle Royale community have expressed their dislike for the new gun, some people thought it was a great addition to the game’s arsenal. Read more: How to complete ‘Dance inside a holographic tomato head’ challenge, Week 4, Fortnite Season 9 – Twitch star Ninja believed the gun had the capability of changing the game’s meta since “the damage, the bullets will push through someone’s wall. It’s kind what the Famas and the Burst were able to do but they removed it.” With that kind of firepower, players would think twice about camping in 1×1’s while relying on the sit-and-wait tactic since there’s a gun that could chew through their structure, opening them up for attacks. But the Fortnite devs have dialed back the Burst SMG’s potency for now and it’ll be interesting to see how players take with the latest version of the new gun.

Epic Games nerf the effectiveness of bunny hopping on Fortnite Epic Games have removed the ability to bunny hop from Fortnite Battle Royale in the V6.20 update released for the game on Wednesday, October 24. Fans of the popular battle royale title had figured out that if you were to use a Shadow Stone and then jump into the Bounce Pits, players could carry the momentum of the opening jump forward as long as they jumped again the moment they hit the ground. This allowed players to travel great distances in very little time, however players were only able to do it as long as their Shadow Stone was still active. Unfortunately for those who practised this skill, it appears that Epic Games have considerably reduced it’s effectiveness. A user named ‘Cyanide814’ tested the technique when the new update officially released, and has reported that it is now impossible to do it, as the game no longer allows you to use your momentum to boost you forward. Cyanide814 also tested it using the Grappler and Shockwave Grenades, but found the same result. He did note that jumping as soon as you hit the ground after using the glider would boost you forward the first time, but would then stop you dead in your tracks the second you landed. The bunny hopping technique was patched in the V6.20 update for Fortnite, which saw the introduction of the new Limited Time Mode, Fortnitemares. The launch of this Limited Time Event got off to a shaky start, however, as Epic Games were forced to disable it just hours after it officially released.

Epic Games Make Big Improvements to Fortnite Emotes Adding Facial Expressions A member of the Epic Games development team has announced via Reddit that the they are making some improvements to the current ’emotes’ in Fortnite Battle Royale. Emotes are very popular shop items in Fortnite, with new dance moves, boasts and funny actions for your character to perform in the main lobby, the spawn island and during matches. The emotes include popular dances such as the ‘Shoot’ dance, and ‘making it rain’, where your character will spray notes from their hands. But as Epic Games continues to look for improvements where possible, they are now adding facial expressions to a number of popular emotes. As opposed to the previous blank stares that the characters held, they will now smile or grimace depending on the type of emote. And Epic also said that all future emotes added to the game will have facial expressions too. “We’re always working to improve those cosmetics you throw on before hopping into a match, and one way we have added to our emotes is through facial animations. A few of our current emotes have received a makeover featuring new expressions that were previously blank stares.” The full list of emotes which now have facial expressions: True Love – Tidy – Breaking Point – Pure Salt – Kiss Kiss – Face Palm – Jubilation – Finger Guns – Disco Fever – Fresh – Take the L – Make it Rain – Hootenanny – Squat Kick – Step it Up – Flippin’ Sexy – An example of one of these expressions can be seen below, as the character sticks their tongue out on the ‘Freestylin’ emote.

Epic Games make ANOTHER major change to Mounted Turret in Fortnite Epic Games have rolled out yet another update to the infamous Mounted Turret item in Fortnite. According to a tweet put out on November 16, the availability of the Mounted Turret has been reduced, meaning that players will come across the item at a less frequent rate than before. This nerf has been applied to the default modes, which are Solo, Duos, and Squads, which leaves the item unaffected in the Playground and other Limited Time Modes. According to the tweet, this change was made as a result of player feedback, as Epic continue to demonstrate the value that they place on what the community has to say. We’ve reduced the availability of the Mounted Turret in all default modes (Solo, Duos, Squads). Drop in now and continue sending us your feedback. — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) November 16, 2018 It’s clear that Epic are in full damage control mode now when it comes to the Mounted Turret, despite that fact that it’s only been in the game since November 14, This is the second major change that the developers have made to the new item in as many days; a massive hotfix was rolled out for it on November 15 that significantly nerfed the health of its floor and overall structure. The item continues to receive mainly negative feedback from many within the player-base, with videos of its flaws popping up all over the internet. The introduction of the Turret, coupled with the removal of the Glider Re-Deploy feature, has even led to some calling the recent v6.30 update in Fortnite the worst in recent months. While the future of the item is not yet clear, its fate could already be sealed and players may even see it vaulted from default modes as early as next week’s update.

Epic Games literally deletes Fortnite ahead of leaked Chapter 2 Epic Games, the publisher and developer of massively popular battle royale game Fortnite, appears to have wiped the title from existence from their website in the wake of the Season 10 ‘The End’ event. Taking the event’s name slightly more literally than everyone expected, Epic have deleted Fortnite from pretty much everywhere on October 13. The game is no longer mentioned on the official website, which now takes visitors to a live stream of the black hole instead. The publisher also removed all channels on their official Discord server. EPIC HAS DELETED ALL THEIR CHANNELS ON THE OFFICIAL FORTNITE DISCORD SERVER WTF IS HAPPENING (Via @FNBRUpdates) pic.twitter.com/Ewf1lvrSxZ — Fortnite News :goat: (@FNBRHQ) October 13, 2019 Their social media for the game went completely dark, with a blacked-out avatar and a livestream of the blackhole pinned on their Twitter profile. Furthermore, all of the tweets on their official twitter page have also been deleted except for one – the livestream for The End event. Of course, this isn’t the end of Fortnite – rather, quite the opposite. As was leaked on the iOS app store a day early, Fortnite ‘Chapter 2’ is expected to launch, although at the time of writing, details are still unknown. What we can expect is a new map, and possibly a major overhaul to the game’s core mechanics and gameplay systems. For now though, everything has gone dark – literally. The game itself was sent to a black hole after the Season 10 event ended, and players were left scratching their heads as to what was next. Our first glimpse of Chapter 2 comes from the leaked image on the Italian iOS store, which appears to show a sliver of the new map. Even livestreaming platform Twitch itself – which suffered a major (unintentional) blackout of its own due to the overwhelming surge in viewers for the event – joked about the situation. Fans were quick to meme about the disappearance of their beloved game, joking that they had now spent all that money on a game that deleted itself. Me telling my grandkids the story of how I spent thousands of dollars on a game that deleted itself. #Fortnite pic.twitter.com/LxEet9G0uR — Fortnite Funny :jack_o_lantern: (@FortniteFunny) October 13, 2019 Top streamer Ninja joked that Epic was simply paying back all the game’s detractors for “non stop complaining and trash talking” about the game. I mean to be honest after all the non stop complaining and trash talking every day on fortnite… what did we expect to happen? :disappointed::thinking_face: — Ninja (@Ninja) October 13, 2019 Other users found that they couldn’t even login to their Epic Games account – although it’s unclear if this was part of the event, or a bug due to the overflow of players. You can’t even login on the Epic Games site pic.twitter.com/QdhB2vodLQ — Fortnite News :goat: (@FNBRHQ) October 13, 2019 For now, we’ll have to wait and see what Epic Games have in store for chapter 2. Stay tuned to Dexerto for all the latest updates, as the next chapter of Fortnite Battle Royale is set to commence.

Epic Games Made a Record Breaking Amount from Fortnite in May It is no secret that Fortnite is making a lot of money. In February, it generated $126 million, In March, $223 million and then $296 million in April – and has outdone itself once again in May. After initially launching the battle royale mode in September of 2017, Fortnite was an instant hit. Within a couple of months, it surpassed the then most popular BR game, PUBG, and soon after every other game in the world. It owes its success to a number of factors, but in terms of revenue made it likely comes down to two things – availability and content. Unlike most games, Fortnite Battle Royale is available on every platform – PlayStation, Xbox, PC, Mac, iOS and recently Nintendo Switch (Android users will have their hands on it soon). And Fortnite does content like no one else. Almost every week it seems there is a new skin, glider, emote or ‘back bling’, and everything is available to purchase with V-Bucks – there are no ‘supply drops’ or ‘loot boxes’ involved. The content is cycled in the store daily, meaning players can only buy a particular item on a particular day, so players are more inclined to do so when they see something they like. All of this means that finally, developer Epic Games has hit the $300 million mark in a single month, in fact, they smashed it, raking in a whopping $318 million in the month of May according to a new report from SuperData. “We estimate that Fortnite made $318 million across all platforms in May, up 7% from April. The majority of growth came from console, with mobile and PC both coming in flat compared to April.” While Fortnite doesn’t make the top grossing titles on the mobile list, this is likely only due to not being available on Android, which is expected to change soon. Fortnite continues to break records for the most additional content revenue, proving that the free-to-play model can work brilliantly if executed well. With its success, it is no surprise to see so many other battle royale games releasing soon, but for now, Fortnite has a firm grip on the market. Source: SuperData

Epic Games is suing popular Fortnite YouTubers for cheating Epic Games is continuing to clamp down on cheating in its flagship game Fortnite, taking legal action against two prominent YouTubers who are accused of using and selling cheats. YouTuber Brandon ‘Golden Modz’ Lucas, who has over 1.7 million subscribers, and Colton ‘Excentric’ Conter are accused of being in breach of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. By sharing videos on YouTube using and promoting the cheats, Epic say they breached the terms of service and user agreement, committing “tortious interference”. The lawsuit accuses both Lucas and Conter of copyright infringement, by “injecting unauthorized cheat software (‘cheats’ or ‘hacks’)” into the game code. As well as using the cheats in videos, Golden Modz is accused of selling them through his own websites, which are promoted in his content. “Lucas is operating these websites and selling these cheats and accounts for his own personal enrichment. He posts videos of people using the cheats for the same reason. His ill-gotten gains come at the expense of Epic and members of the Fortnite community.” Epic has requested that several videos from the two YouTubers be taken down, meanwhile Golden Modz doesn’t believe he is in the wrong. In a video titled ‘I am getting sued by Fortnite…’, he says: “I’m almost kind of feeling I’m being discriminated against by Epic Games you know I’m just a kid that’s making YouTube videos and a lot of people were enjoying this.” Epic want the accused to pay damages, attorney’s fees and “costs related” to the lawsuit. It is not the first time they have sued cheaters either, including when they filed a complaint against a 14 year old supposed cheater. Source: Torrent Freak

Epic Games is Shutting Down Fortnite Servers Due to Major Game Issues [UPDATED] UPDATE – 7:59 PM PT Epic Games has announced that the issues with game services have been resolved and all of the servers are back online and functional. Developer Epic Games has announced that Fortnite servers are being shut down due to several issues with game services. Some of the services being impacted include matchmaking, login, joining parties and messaging on Playstation, and voice chat. The announcement that servers are being taken down came at 5:55 PM PT / 8:55 PM ET via a post on the Fortnite Twitter page. We’re taking servers down to further investigate the root cause, we’ll keep you updated on the status as we dig in. — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) July 13, 2018 This came after Epic tweeted out about the issues several times on July 12, noting that their team is in the process of investigation the problems with hopes of coming up with fixes soon. We’re currently investigating issues with our game services, which include matchmaking and login. Follow our status page for updates: https://t.co/3y0X6buriO — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) July 13, 2018 You may run into issues partying with your squad on Playstation. We’re currently monitoring and we’ll let you know when that resolves for PS4 players! — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) July 12, 2018 The status page on the Epic Games website currently shows the condition of each of the game’s services are at each given moment, and there are a lot of things that are currently indicated in red. It is not yet clear what the cause of these issues is, or when they will be resolved and the servers will be reinstated. However, with the highly anticipated Season 5 having launched earlier on July 12th, this sort of development was to be expected, considering the high volume of players attempting to hop into matches and check out the in-game changes and additions. We will keep you updated whenever Epic Games releases more information, and when the servers are turned back online.

Epic Games is Starting to Ban Data Miners Who Leak Fortnite Content It appears that Epic Games is starting to ramp up its effort to crack down on Fortnite users who do not follow the rules. On August 22, numerous users, most of them data mining accounts, began reporting on social media that their account had been disabled. When trying to logon to Fortnite, these banned users were met with a notice that explained that their account had been disabled due to one of three reasons. Account Disabled Your account has been disabled. Accounts are disabled for one of the following reasons:– The account owner requested the account be disabled – Fraud – The account has been banned for misconduct in one of our games One account that has been subjected to a ban is that of ‘FNBRLeaks,’ a popular and trusted source of Fortnite news and updates on Twitter. It is now normal procedure for data miners to go through new game files after every major update and leak new cosmetic items, game modes, in-game weapons and items, and more, sometimes even weeks ahead of when they were schedule to be released. However, judging by FNBRLeaks’ tweet, they, and likely other major data miners, have some back-up plan in place in preparation of something like this happening.

Epic Games Is Investigating an Issue With Fortnite Caused by Norton Antivirus [UPDATED] UPDATE – 08/06 1:56 PM PT A Norton Spokesperson has reached out to let us know that the issues causing some Norton Antivirus users to not be able to log into Fortnite have been resolved – “We have identified and resolved the matter affecting some of our customers’ ability to log into Epic Games’ “Fortnite.” Epic Games is looking into an ongoing issue that has been causing login issues for Fortnite players since a recent Norton Antivirus update. The antivirus software has reportedly been detecting Fortnite, or Unreal Engine 4, as a trojan file and blocking the game from running. Epic released a short statement saying “we are aware that some players are experiencing login issues after receiving an update from Norton Antivirus” and that they are in the process of helping Norton’s employees with their investigations. If you don’t want to wait for Norton to fix the issue, you can exclude the pakchunk0-windowsclient.sig file from Norton’s auto protect or quarantine zone. Natewad on Reddit explained how to do this in one of the numerous threads related to the infuriating issue: It is currently unknown why Norton’s software is making the mistake of detecting the file as a trojan but it appears to have affected thousands of players worldwide. Norton has also acknowledged the issue after Max Rayner on Twitter said “Millions of over-anxious children around the world want to know: do either of your companies have a comment on why Norton flags one of Fortnite’s files as a Trojan?” A Norton support employee responded with “Sorry about the trouble. We are currently looking in to this. Will get back to with more updates”.

Epic Games in hot water over Fortnite security flaw that exposed millions of accounts Epic Games has had a breach in its security giving outside attackers access to millions of accounts’ private date used in the popular shooter Fortnite, per a January 2019 report. Epic Games has a tremendous following with a sizable portion of their players tending to fill a younger demographic that might not be too aware of proper cyber security, making the attack possibly more devastating. In an email from Experian sent to many of its users, the company warned them to update possibly vulnerable and outdated security information for services owned by Epic Games. Say NO to scams! Beware of scam sites offering free or discounted V-Bucks. The only official websites for Fortnite are https://t.co/8CxczhrZwk and https://t.co/zxorPaoiJb. For more information of Account Security: https://t.co/oF57QdfDLH pic.twitter.com/5oTKougmuq — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) May 25, 2018 The hack gave the attackers the ability to log into breached accounts, in turn giving them access to stored credit card information attached to those accounts. “[Epic Games] just announced a security flaw that’s exposed [Fortnite] player information. A bug in Fortnite’s log-in system could have allowed hackers to impersonate players and charge in-game currency to their stored credit cards. Hackers could’ve then moved those purchases to their other accounts,” the Experian reports said. The original research into the hack came from Check Point Research, who had privately notified Epic Games of an exploit that could affect numerous users. Attackers found a way to use a piece of code from a user’s login credential obtained if a player clicked onto a phishing site that exposed them to the vulnerability. Epic Games have advised their user base to take measures against this in the past, but the research group believe that the attacks could have been going on since 2018.

Epic Games looking to introduce another single rider vehicle in Fortnite Fortnite’s Driftboard released on February 19, and players have been loving the single-rider hoverboard. Now, it seems that another vehicle fit for one person will be making its way to the battle royale. Epic Games hosted a Reddit AMA on February 22, where it gave fans the chance to pick the minds of the game’s developers to see what’s in store for Fortnite. In the AMA, Lead Designer Eric Williamson was answering a fan wondering about the planned lifespan of the current Driftboard, when the developer gave a surprising reveal for another vehicle in the same vein. Williamson gave a small peek for a new vehicle to come, while also mentioning that Epic Games would be looking into how both operate alongside each other. Read more: How to watch $10K Code Red Fortnite tournament ft. NICKMERCS, Myth, Vivid, and more – streams, leaderboard, teams, format – “We’re working on a new single-occupancy vehicle, and aren’t quite sure how they’ll play together,” Williamson said. “The Driftboard’s reception has been really positive though, so we’re actively discussing how long it should stick around.” The reply made Driftboard fans go wild, since they can expect to continue their adventures on the futuristic board in the foreseeable future. Meanwhile, other fans were already jumping on the idea of what the new vehicle might be. Some speculated a Motorbike as being the obvious candidate, while others noted that Fortnite has yet to see a water-based vehicle. Although Williamson’s response had others wondering if a day might come where Epic Games will have to choose between the unannounced vehicle or the Driftboard to keep in the game.

Epic Games Hints at Adding Lights for Upgraded Ragnarok Skin in Fortnite It appears that custom lights for the upgraded Ragnarok skin could be coming soon to Fortnite: Battle Royale. A telling comment posted by an Epic Games on the Fortnite Reddit page has turned the Ragnarok lights concept into an in-game possibility. In a feature first added during Season 4, Fortnite gave players who reached a certain overall level the ability to change the color of light for both the Carbide and Omega skins, once they were full upgraded. While the Drift and Ragnarok skins in Season 5 are also able to be upgraded, there is no custom light feature available, which prompted the artist, Mizurio, to create concept art for it. While Fortnite concepts are commonly found on Reddit, this one has drawn a lot of extra attention due to the fact that Epic Games Design Lead ‘EpicEricSW’ replied to the post with this comment. How would you earn/unlock the different colors? The reason why Epic cannot just have the lights unlock the same way as before is because the new Season 5 skin upgrades are now offered past the end of the Season, which was not the case for Season 4. However, Reddit users ‘Grandwhish‘ and ‘ALilParasite‘ replied to Epic’s comment, offering their own suggestions for how the lights could be unlocked. But how about a set challenge for each specific colour? Like Red: 15 eliminations with every gun type, AR, sniper, pistols, shotguns and smgs. Purple: win 5 matches Green: Unlock red and purple to see last challenge or something mysterious like that.Edit: Numbers and such doesn’t need to be what I wrote but same concept. Edit 2: Added that the 15 eliminations is with every gun type and not with every gun, as that would be rather frustrating. – Blue is standard, red should be like 500 kills. Green 20,000 materials harvested, purple like 30 wins.

Epic Games Have Made It Impossible to Double Pump with New Shotgun Nerf The ability to use two shotguns in quick succession is over for Fortnite players following the mega-update for Season 5. The brand new season began on Thursday, July 12 with a host of new changes implemented, including a new desert themed map, a squad-sized golf cart and of course, new player skins. One of the biggest gameplay adjustments involves the shotgun, with the development team creating a short amount of time between switching between two of the weapon. “After firing a shotgun, another shotgun cannot be fired for a very short time.” Those familiar with Fortnite will know that switching between two shotguns has become a staple of the elite who play the game, allowing for multiple up close shots in quick succession to down an opponent. In previous editions of Fortnite it was possible to rapidly switch between shotguns to make it act like an automatic weapon, but Epic stamped that out in early 2018 after it began to be abused. The latest change to Shotguns for Season 5 doesn’t have everyone convinced. Team SoloMid’s Daequan Tweeted out that he was confused why it had been nerfed when using a Shotgun and SMG was more effective. Shotgun + SMG has been superior to double shotty for a long time; Yet they still nerf double shotty. Lol zzzzzzzz oh well. I got plenty of things in mind still dumb af though that they would remove what so many people have tons of fun doing when it’s not even the best. — Daequan (@TSM_Daequan) July 12, 2018 You can read the full patch notes for the Season 5 update by clicking here.

Epic Games hint at Fortnite BRUTE nerf Epic GamesFortnite Season 10 introduced the B.R.U.T.E. mech and it has grown increasingly polarizing among the playerbase and now Epic have finally been forced to address it. With a single stomp, the mech is able to dish out 75 damage, which means three stomps could take out any opponent in the game. On top of this, the BRUTE shreds through builds with its stomps, making it an almost unstoppable killing machine, especially in solos. Having 1000 HP is just icing on the cake, but that could all be changing. Epic addressed the BRUTES in a post on Reddit by revealing they are looking at the mechs and keeping a close eye on their performance across every mode. “Right now we’re evaluating B.R.U.T.E. gameplay, as well as observing how it performs across all modes and skill levels,” read the comment. “We are also working to fix movement-related bugs with the B.R.U.T.E. to address exploits. We will continue closely monitoring and keep you updated!” There are a variety of ways Epic could nerf them whether that’s lowering the health or simply nerfing the damage they do. The rocket barrage is deadly to buildings and opposing players, giving them no real way to defend against it outside of impulsing or jump padding away from the action. The new season is still very young so Epic likely wanted to give the mechs some breathing room but it became clear there were issues. Some of the problems go beyond the mechs themselves, as they can actually allow for teaming. An enemy player can jump in the gunner seat while you drive and just lay waste to a solo lobby. It will be interesting to see what Epic decides to do with the mech because it’s clear in its current state there a lot of issues. With some simple tweaks, the BRUTE could be balanced and find a better home in Fortnite. However, it’s really hard to argue for keeping it at its current strength so a nerf will be welcomed.

Epic Games Has Announced That Several New Building Adjustments and Weapon Balancing Changes Have Been Made in Fortnite Epic Games has announced that it has implemented new building adjustments and weapon balancing changes to Fortnite: Battle Royale. These changes have already been enacted, and have been officially added as part of the v4.3 Content Update, which went live early on June 5th. The announcement for this news came via a post on the official Fortnite Twitter page on June 5th. We’ve just made some adjustments to building as well as weapon balance changes. Full details: https://t.co/aLRZjsZKfO — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) June 5, 2018 Here is the reason that Epic Games has provided as to what were the reasons why the developers decided to implement these adjustments. We are making the following changes to address a few top concerns, including: Rocket Launcher and Grenade Launcher dominance in the late game, Minigun effectiveness, and overall resource availability. We will be closely monitoring these changes when they are live to assess the impact and re-adjust as necessary. They have also provided the following patch notes for these recent changes, which have also been added to the Fortnite webpage containing the original v4.3 Update notes. Supply Llama Decreased material stacks from 500 to 200 per resource. – Explosive Ammo removed. – – Damage fall-off vs. structures removed for Rifles, SMGs, Pistols, and LMGs. – Floor loot materials adjusted Material drop chances in floor loot reduced by 33%. – Material stack sizes in floor loot reduced by 33%. – – Ammo availability adjusted Light Ammo stack sizes increased from 12 to 18. – Explosive Ammo availability decreased 50%. – – Minigun adjusted Accuracy increased by 10%. – Light Ammo spawn increased from 60 to 100. – Damage against structures increased from 25 to 30. – – C4 structure explosion radius increased from 400 to 600. – Teams of 20 Storm Damage per tick adjusted. Storm circle 1 damage per tick decreased from 10 to 1. – Storm circle 2 damage per tick decreased from 10 to 2. – Storm circle 3 damage per tick decreased from 10 to 4. – Storm circle 4 damage per tick decreased from 10 to 8. – – Most of these adjustments are in line with what the majority of Fortnite’s player-base has asked from Epic Games, especially regarding explosive weapons and building. This is yet another example of how the developers continue to allow the community to lead the way, and why Fortnite continues to dominate the popularity charts of the online gaming world.

Epic Games Has More Bad News Regarding the Downtime for the Playground LTM in Fortnite – “We know waiting is the worst.” Epic Games has provided another update regarding the downtime for the new Playground Limited Time Mode in Fortnite: Battle Royale and it is more bad news for those waiting to try it out. The developers have announced that the downtime will be extended through the weekend, meaning that the mode will not be enabled again until the start of next week at the earliest. This update was provided via two tweets posted on the official Fortnite Twitter page on June 29th. We’re still unable to resolve issues preventing the launch of the Playground LTM. We are holding the release until next week to continue hammering away this weekend. We’re sorry we haven’t been able to get you in the LTM, and we know waiting is the worst. We’ll update you with any additional information on Monday, July 2. We’re still unable to resolve issues preventing the launch of the Playground LTM. We are holding the release until next week to continue hammering away this weekend. We’re sorry we haven’t been able to get you in the LTM, and we know waiting is the worst. — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) June 29, 2018 We worked out those issues and 50v50 is now enabled. Get out there! — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) June 29, 2018 Although Epic mentions July 2nd as the next date for when they will provide additional information, there appears to be no set timetable for when the downtime will actually end and and the mode gets reinstated. Unfortunately for those who have been eagerly waiting to play the highly anticipated LTM, the initially announced one day delay period has grown further and further ambiguous. Launched alongside the v4.5 update early on June 27th, the Playground LTM offers players the chance to play alongside their friends and do whatevery they like in a private, low-pressure environment with the full Fortnite map at their disposal. For full details on the new mode, you can read its description as provided by Epic Games in the v4.5 patch notes here.

Epic Games Has Announced an Issue with Fortnite Match Wins on Console Platforms [UPDATED] UPDATE – 3:54 PM PST Fortnite has announced on Twitter that an update will be released on March 31st to fix the issue with wins not counting on console. – Epic Games has announced that there is an issue regarding Fortnite match wins on console platforms. According to the Fortnite developers, there is a situation where Battle Royale match wins are not properly counting for those playing on the PS4 or Xbox One consoles. This issue was announced on May 30th on the Epic Games status website, as well as the Fortnite Twitter page. Identified – We’ve identified and are actively looking into a situation where Battle Royale match wins for console players are not reporting correctly. We will continue to provide updates as they are made available. We are aware of the issue with wins not being counted for console players. Please watch https://t.co/3y0X6buriO for updates. — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) May 30, 2018 This issue will strike very close to many of games vast player-base who consider wins as one of the incredibly important statistics that make up one’s Fortnite resume. There are numerous statistic tracking websites, including the popular Fortnite Tracker, that players continually monitor to keep track of where they stand in the overall wins leaderboard. ARTICLE UPDATE: At 3:54 PM PST, Fortnite announced additional information regarding the situation, including an impending fix that will be rolled out on May 31st at 1 AM PST / 4 AM EST. We’re releasing a small update to resolve some issues with the latest patch, including server crashes and shopping cart bugs. We’ll have another update tomorrow May 31 to fix an issue with wins not counting on console. — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) May 30, 2018 It is not yet clear as to what was causing the issue, but Epic Games continues to prove itself to be a top level developer as it has once again provided a lightning quick response to an in-game problem with Fortnite.

Epic Games giving out Fortnite V-Bucks in response to class-action lawsuit Epic GamesEpic Games is handing over 1,000 V-Bucks to select Fortnite players as a result of a controversial loot box system that was pulled from the game in 2019. [jwplayer Mx6o4MA0] When Fortnite launched in 2017, its ‘Save the World’ mode was a major focus. While the battle royale aspect steered clear, this cooperative part of the game offered randomized loot boxes. There was no guarantee you’d be able to unlock the specific items you wanted. As a result of universal backlash for this system, Epic scrapped the random loot boxes in 2019. Despite their removal, the developers were still hit with legal action weeks later. Now, roughly 24 months after being sued, there’s a gift waiting for players that were impacted by the issue. In order to make amends for the previous Loot Llamas, anyone who purchased them will be handed to 1,000 V-Bucks. “With preliminary approval for a class action settlement, we’re awarding 1,000 V-Bucks to anyone that purchased a random Loot Llama,” Epic explained in a February 22 blog post. While the legal battles were exclusive to the United States, Epic has opened this offer to players around the world. 1,000 V-Bucks should appear in your account automatically with “no action needed on your part.” “We believe players should know upfront what they are paying for,” they continued on Twitter. “This is why today we only offer X-Ray Llamas that show you the contents before you purchase them in Save the World.” Not only does this new bonus apply to Save the World players, but also those who purchased similar loot boxes in Rocket League prior to their removal. 1,000 Credits will be handed to Rocket Players over the coming days just the same. We believe players should know upfront what they are paying for when they make in-game purchases. This is why today we only offer X-Ray Llamas that show you the contents before you purchase them in Save the World. — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) February 22, 2021 “It’s the right thing to do,” Jeffrey Jacobson of Epic’s legal representatives told The Verge shortly after. “We feel good about the settlement. We hope our players agree with us.” This is a one-time reward for players across both titles. Whether you purchased a single randomized loot box or 100, you’re entitled to the same gift. However, various players are reporting they’ve received the 1,000 V-Buck rewards in Fortnite, despite never having purchased a Loot Llama. Read more: What’s included in March’s Fortnite Crew? – There’s a chance this bonus could come into effect for everyone that completed the tutorial for Save the World, prior to randomized loot boxes being removed in 2019. Epic is starting to roll out 1,000 V-Bucks to all players! It seems that players who have never purchased a Loot Llama in the past also receive the 1,000 V-Bucks! pic.twitter.com/rglIhOhspC — Shiina (@ShiinaBR) February 22, 2021 If you haven’t noticed anything new in your account, keep in mind it could take a “few days” for the Fortnite V-Bucks or Rocket League Credits to appear.

Epic Games gives update to Fortnite players claiming they still haven’t been paid Epic GamesSeveral competitive Fortnite players allege they haven’t been paid their winnings yet and Epic Games responded to those claims and more in a new blog post. With Epic Games leaving so much money up for grabs for players to earn on a weekly basis, many players have thrown their hat into the ring to win a quick buck. However, many players are claiming they haven’t received their payments from Epic Games, leading to them to create a response. Payment improvements are coming According to Epic, improvements to the payment process are coming and they will give updates on when players can now expect their money. On top of that, a more intuitive landing page is being created so players will much more easily be able to track their earned money. This includes Epic sending out email updates and making the tax information process all available in one spot. The above image gives a look at what to expect with the new payment flow, making it much easier to tell when your money will arrive. Epic Games mentions that if you won any money before April 2019, you’ll still have to use the previous payment flow, so you’ll be without all the new added bells and whistles. You can read about the changes much more in-depth in Epic’s blog post here. For new Fortnite competitors, it sounds like you won’t have to worry about Epic losing track of your payments anymore. While this isn’t a direct response to complaints among players, it does help alleviate many of the concerns players had. With thousands of dollars being offered each week, it’s important to make sure there’s a fluid payment process and it looks like Epic Games is working towards fixing that.

Epic Games gives update on sub-region matchmaking Epic Games has given a long-awaited update on sub-region matchmaking, confirming the feature has been enabled for select regions around the world. Matchmaking has always been a hot topic within the Fortnite community, as players battle with ping issues on a daily basis, including during the Summer and Fall Skirmish events. First mentioned in a State of Development post back in August, Epic Games has finally shed light on the specifics of sub-region matchmaking and announced that the feature will first hit the Asian, European, and NA-East regions first. Sub-region matchmaking “is a new feature [Epic Games has] implemented that will find data-centers that are available in your region, determine which one provides you the healthiest connection, then place you in a queue that is pinged to that location to give you the best available connection.” The Asian region got the feature first in September, and Epic has recently added it to both the Europe and NA-East regions. When asked if the feature would be coming to other regions anytime soon, community manager Sean ‘MrPopoTFS’ Hamilton stated he has “no further details on that.” While some regions might have to wait a bit longer to enjoy the benefits of the new features, those in the highlighted regions should see “significantly better service” from here on out. Epic Games’ full statement can be found below. Sub-region Matchmaking Hey there! We mentioned in the August State of Development blog that we’ve been working towards adding sub-region matchmaking. We enabled this feature for the Asian region in September and have just recently also added it to both Europe and NA-East. Follow the link above for all the technical details and read more below for additional information. What’s sub-region matchmaking? This is a new feature we’ve implemented that will find the data-centers that are available in your region, determine which one provides you the healthiest connection, then place you in a queue that is pinged to that location to give you the best available connection. Depending on your location, players will experience varying improvements to their ping and other network related performance. When will this feature be implemented? As of September 10, we launched the Singapore data-center and implemented the logic that allows for sub-region matchmaking. More recently we also added both Europe and NA-East to regions that use this functionality. Will I always connect to the closest sub-region? No. Not in cases where the player population for any given platform/playlist combination is not sufficient to guarantee a reasonable matchmaking queue time. In cases like this players will be defaulted back to the “primary” data-center for the region for that match. So you may notice a difference in your in-match network conditions if you ping better to “Location A” than “Location B” depending on the time of day you’re playing, the platform you play on, and the playlist you select. We will be monitoring this feature closely and make adjustments as we find the right balance between network performance and match wait times. What if I’m in a party? When in a party, if you are in a region where sub-region matchmaking is supported, it will prioritize the location of whoever the party leader is. What are our goals? Our final vision and goal for sub-region matchmaking is to allow players for each region to automatically connect to the data-center which offer them the best possible network experience. As we expand this functionality to other regions, we will be able to both provide significantly better service to underserved areas as well as optimize the experience for players in regions which already operate out of multiple geographically distributed data-centers. We’ll continue to determine which regions would best benefit from additional data-centers and keep you updated on these new locations as we add them. Please continue giving us your feedback on this feature and let us know what you think!

Epic Games reveal Fortnite World Cup’s “record-setting” success Epic GamesFortnite World Cup with new data showing just how “record-setting” the event truly was. The ramp up to Epic Games’ New York City tournament saw a ton of big names miss out on the chance of becoming the first Fortnite World Cup Champion. But that didn’t stop 19,000 fans from showing up to the Arthur Ashe Stadium throughout the three-day event. Even though not everyone might be a fan of Fortnite or its competitive formats, the success of the World Cup is a great sign for the growth of esports as a whole and is a humble reminder of its current state. In a July 31 announcement, the Fortnite team gave insights to the huge numbers generated over the weekend that saw a peak of over 2.3 million concurrent viewers tuning in to watch the Solo Finals. “On Sunday during the Solo Finals,” the announcement reads. “Concurrent viewers peaked at over 2.3 million across YouTube and Twitch, making the Fortnite World Cup the most-watched competitive gaming event (excluding China) of all time.” While that’s an impressive feat on its own, the company did note that those “numbers do not include fans watching in-game and on other streaming and social media platforms.” Even though not all went well for every competitor at the Fortnite World Cup, the event produced a legendary sum that propelled 16-year-old winner Kyle ‘Bugha’ Giersdorf to the higher echelons of esports winnings. Competitive Fortnite is evolving Following the events of the wildly successful World Cup Finals, it looks like Epic Games have bigger ideas in store for the progression of the competitive Fortnite scene. The company has announced the Fortnite Champion Series that will debut amid Season X of the popular battle royale. The tournament will be played “weekly with the goal of becoming Fortnite Season X Champions.” With millions of dollars on the line, players will be able to use a leaderboard to see where they are compared to their competition in the race to become the Season Champs. The first Fortnite World Cup is certainly one for the record books, and it looks like that’s only the beginning for the scene’s future potential.

Epic Games further cracks down on Fortnite data miners Content creators who specialize in Fortnite leaks will soon have a tough time doing so with Epic’s latest attempt to combat leaks. Like clockwork, data miners get to work each week when Epic Game releases new updates for Fortnite Battle Royale in search of new challenges, skins, or anything else they can find. Epic Games has previously issued mass bans for any data miners, but it looks as though they are now taking it a step further with a new method of combating leaks. FNBRLeaks, one of the biggest Fortnite data mining sites around, took to Twitter on November 15 to let their followers know that they soon may not be able to make YouTube videos on leaked content. Looks like you can’t make YouTube videos about leaked content, dope. pic.twitter.com/hG61bqcKXU — Fortnite: Battle Royale Leaks (@FNBRLeaks) November 15, 2018 The message they received asks them to “Please refrain from posting any content of Fortnite is that is not yet released to the public as doing so infringes upon on intellectual property rights and our End User License Agreement.” While this seemingly doesn’t prevent FNBRLeaks from posting the leaks to their website, the move demonstrates that Epic Game is continuing to stay committed to trying to curb the existence of leaks as much as possible. More proof. pic.twitter.com/oQEFsEVkTy — Fortnite: Battle Royale Leaks (@FNBRLeaks) November 15, 2018 While skins and cosmetics are the main things that data miners look out for, they’ve also been known to leak details about upcoming in-game events and even vehicles or weapons. Given the fact that the mystery of what comes next is the heart and soul of Fortnite, it’s not surprising to see Epic vigorously crack down on the existence of leaks. This is likely not the last we’ll see on the matter as Epic will certainly continue doing all it can to protect the secrets of Fortnite.

Epic Games make changes to Fortnite’s ‘Floor is Lava’ LTM – March 29 Epic Games have detailed some minor changes to the newly released Floor is Lava LTM in Fortnite. With Fortnite update v8.20 came arguably the most controversial patch to date. Various Fortnite players, pros and casual players alike, have lamented the change and nearly every tweet is met with calls to revert the update. While players are upset about the changes made to the regular mode and the long queue times of the Ranked Mode, one thing players haven’t talked about a whole lot is the Floor is Lava LTM. The Floor is Lava LTM requires players to avoid the rising lava threat as it slowly, but surely, rises and covers the whole map. Matches will start with little going on in terms of danger but will quickly become overwhelming at players frantically fight to gain the high ground over their enemies and avoid the lava. After only being available for a few days, Epic Games decided to give it some tweaks. We’ve made a few adjustments to the Floor is Lava Limited Time Mode: – Weapons will be Uncommon or better – 30 seconds added to the first Storm wait time – Cannons turned on – Lava damage lowered from 20 to 15Drop in and turn up the heat now! pic.twitter.com/lzx1JcRa55 — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) March 29, 2019 Floor is Lava LTM changes Epic Games didn’t make any insane changes to the mode, but some minor tweaks were done to help make the mode more accessible to players. These changes included lowering lava damage and buffing the weapon drops among other things. Here’s the full list of changes that were made to the Floor is Lava LTM. Weapons will be Uncommon or better – 30 seconds added to the first Storm wait time – Cannons turned on – Lava damage lowered from 20 to 15 – These small changes should be enough to keep the mode fun for everyone but also lower the difficulty of it across the board. Epic Games does listen to player feedback so it’s extremely likely they have heard the what seems to be an overwhelmingly negative response to the new patch so it’s possible we can see some more changes not LTM-related in the future.

New Fortnite skin styles revealed for Season 8 – Renegade Raider, Elite Agent and more Fortnite’s first major update to Season 8 came with a variety of changes and now Epic Games have announced new some variants to older outfits. Season 8 is in full swing in Fortnite but it hasn’t quite captured the excitement previous seasons had so far. Part of this might be due to increased competition from other games and players just getting burnt out on Fortnite. Nevertheless, Fortnite has released a new update adding a plethora of new things to the game. With the release of the v8.10 update, Fortnite has implemented numerous bug fixes, added a new vehicle and introduced some new variants for older outfits. Adding variants to older outfits is something Epic Games has been doing a lot of lately, as evidenced by the Tomatohead challenges, purple Skull Trooper and soon the Counterattack set. When you log into Fortnite today you’ll see the following outfits have been updated: Scarlet Defender – Elite Agent – Renegade Raider – Waypoint – Overtaker – Whiteout – Epic Games says these changes have been made because of fan requests to see the faces behind the helmets on various skins. While it is cool to see what’s underneath the helmets, we can only hope we never see what’s under the Tomatohead as we’re not sure we want to see that. The changes with this patch didn’t stop there as Epic Games also implemented yet another much-requested feature. All of the healing items have all received new animations. Next time you find yourself using a Chug Jug or Medkit just sit back and watch the new animations in action. Epic Games shared all of these changes in a blog post and their thought process behind all of them, which you can read in its entirety below. OUTFIT ART UPDATE 3.12.2019 By The Fortnite Art TeamHey Fortnite community, In the v8.10 update we have a few new styles coming to older outfits, in line with some ongoing Art update work we are doing. When we create outfits for you to suit up in before dropping from the Battle Bus, we’re invested in improving them over time based on your feedback. We’ve seen you being vocal about wanting to see the face behind the masks of some of our helmeted outfits, so we’ve done a pass on previous outfits. You’ll see an updated style for the following outfits with the new update: Scarlet Defender – Elite Agent – Renegade Raider – Waypoint – Overtaker – Whiteout – One of the coolest things about making art for Fortnite is that the game is regularly being updated and that we have the opportunity to work on things we want to polish. As we continue to develop the art of Fortnite, we’ve added new technology for creating cosmetics which enable us to add variety and customizations to existing outfits as well! Another bit of exciting polish coming online is the new consumable animations and effects. In the past when you got to enjoy that sweet slurp juice you had to use your imagination a bit more than we’d have liked during the drink animation. In this update you’ll be able to see your character pop the lid and drink it down. We’re updating all health consumables to make the gameplay feel more immersive than ever. Further into the future,we’ll be working on more outfit styles and other broad stroke improvements to the art of Fortnite. You can expect to see more improvements to lighting and the day/night cycle, improvements to wraps visuals, and much more. Thank you for your dedication to Fortnite and making all of this possible!

Epic Games explain why Fortnite’s BRUTE Mechs are here to stay Epic GamesFortnite’s overall goal for providing people a fun way to play, meaning it might not be leaving the island. The BRUTE was introduced with Fortnite’s 10.00 patch on August 1. While it’s provided loads of entertainment for all kinds of players, the more competitive portion of the community have been slamming the developers since integrating it to the game. Now the devs have given their side of the hot-button issue and explained what they originally had in mind when adding the BRUTEs. Even though there’s a lot of player frustrations, it actually looks like the mechs are actually performing their intended jobs well. In their statement, Epic Games said that the mechs were originally conceived to “provide spectacle and entertainment when playing Fortnite.” Even as the BRUTEs caused a popular Twitter trend with players calling to #RemoveTheMech from Fortnite, Epic Games has doubled down on their decision to keep the destructive vehicle on the battle royale island for now. There’s a lot of concern for the effects that the BRUTEs will have to the esport side of Fortnite. Though it seems the decision was largely to facilitate the entertainment value for the more casual Fortnite audiences. “The B.R.U.T.E. was added at the start of Season X with this mission in mind,” Epic Games said. “Since then, we have seen players who had previously struggled with getting eliminations acquiring more, while the number of eliminations earned by more experienced players remained steady.” Epic Games even gave players a peek inside the number of BRUTE eliminations that players have been racking up since it launched. While the mechs can be a handful to deal with, the devs said they’re “happy” with how the community has been utilizing the machines. The statistics provided show that while there’s a lot of backlash toward the BRUTEs, they’re averaging under eight eliminations per game across all modes. Even though the mechs can get easy kills, Epic Games are focusing instead on the relative impact they have on a particular game. For the full Epic Games statement on the mechs, check out their full statement below. FORTNITE AND THE B.R.U.T.E. 8.15.2019 By The Fortnite Team Heya folks, We’ve heard the frequent discussions (#RemoveTheMech) about the B.R.U.T.E., and decided this would be a good opportunity to explain the Fortnite philosophy. The mission of Fortnite is to bring players of all skill levels together to have a fun experience where anyone can win. For example – everyone having a shot at that first elimination or Victory Royale moment and the satisfying feeling that comes with it. Right now, we know there are players out there who have never had that opportunity. Another part of the mission is to provide spectacle and entertainment when playing Fortnite. Bringing these moments to the game every week means there is always a new way to enjoy and experience the game. The B.R.U.T.E. was added at the start of Season X with this mission in mind. Since then, we have seen players who had previously struggled with getting eliminations acquiring more, while the number of eliminations earned by more experienced players remained steady. B.R.U.T.E. encounters should feel like a unique engagement and not be the dominant experience during a game. We made adjustments to the B.R.U.T.E within Arena, in line with that goal. Specifically for Arena we made the change to spawn rate in order to reduce late-game encounters. This is due to a higher number of players surviving to those circles compared to non-Arena modes. We’re happy with the results and the below graphs represent the current state of B.R.U.T.E. eliminations across both Arena and core modes. Above you’ll see the average number of all B.R.U.T.E. eliminations per game in each mode (Solos, Duos, Squads, Team Rumble, Arena Solos, Arena Trios). Above you’ll see the percent of all B.R.U.T.E. eliminations per game in each game mode (Solos, Duos, Squads, Team Rumble, Arena Solos, Arena Trios). We regularly have and will continue to release content that shakes up gameplay in Fortnite in unexpected ways. And we’re committed to providing a constantly evolving, entertaining and fun experience to all players. -The Fortnite Team

Epic Games finally respond to Fortnite cross-platform matchmaking fury Epic GamesEpic Games have finally addressed the anger among fans of their popular battle royale game Fortnite, after the developers introduced cross-platform skill-based matchmaking to the game. Fortnite is one of the most popular games in the world, with fans jumping into the Battle Bus on a variety of different platforms, including PC, consoles, and mobile devices. Players were furious when Epic Games enabled cross-platform matchmaking, which placed them into matches based on a skill rank, instead of the peripherals they were using, which meant that mobile players were finding themselves in lobbies with those on keyboard and mouse, putting them at a distinct disadvantage. Following the complaints from their player base, Epic Games finally responded to the criticisms aimed at them in a blog post released on October 3, explaining why they decided to implement the feature, and providing an update on any possible changes that may take place. “We’ve seen a lot of discussion about potentially unfair competitive advantages from pooling players together across platforms and input devices,” the post reads. “The new matchmaking system, however, accounts for various skill levels across different platforms and control inputs, and groups players of similar skill levels together. “Our goal with the new matchmaking system is to create fairer matches for all of our players, which includes special considerations for each platform. This means that where similar skill exists, players may be paired against opponents from all platforms – whether they’re using mouse and keyboard, a controller, or touch input.” As for changes to the system, Epic Games say they are “closely monitoring match analytics and feedback,” and will “make adjustments to ensure everyone is playing a fair match,” but refrained from mentioning any possibility of a rollback. The developers also released new information about the literal bots which are coming to Fortnite in Season 11, giving a look at what they will and won’t be able to do in-game, and more information about their purpose.

Epic Games forced to change Fortnite shop after being fined for ‘exploiting children’ Epic Games Inc.The Dutch Authority for Consumers & Markets (ACM) has fined Epic Games over $1.2 million after finding that Fortnite’s microtransactions “exploited the vulnerabilities of children”. This has prompted the publisher to make changes to the game’s shop. Epic Games certainly isn’t the first publisher to receive a fine related to the exploitation of children. This will however be the second time that the company has been penalized for a similar issue. A ruling in December 2022 saw the Fair Trade Commission issue a $275 million fine for violating children’s privacy. That incident also prompted Epic to refund $245 million to their customers. Now, the ACM of the Netherlands has issued multiple fines totaling just over $1.2 million USD for exploitative practices. In response, Epic has announced impending changes to the Fortnite Item Shop to avoid further sanction. ACM fines Epic Games for ‘exploiting children’ The ACM issued a press release outlining the reasons for fining Epic Games over “unfair commercial practices aimed at children in Fortnite”. The article criticized a perceived use of FOMO tactics to pressure children into purchases. Singling out language like “Get it now” and “Buy now” to accuse Epic Games of including “ads that directly exhort children to make purchases”. The statement also directly mentioned the Fortnite Item Shop’s countdown timers attached to “items that were still available even after the timer had reached zero”. “Through various design choices for its offerings in its Item Shop, Epic exploited the vulnerabilities of children,” the release concluded. “This is in violation of the requirements of professional diligence.” The ACM has given Epic until June 10, 2024, to alter the Fortnite Item Shop so that the company may avoid further financial penalties. Epic Games responds to $1.2 million fine with changes to Fortnite Item Shop In its own statement responding to the ACM release, Epic Games announced planned changes but contested the decision. “The findings in the Netherlands Authority for Consumers and Markets (ACM) decision contain significant factual errors about how Fortnite and the Item Shop operate,” Epic’s statement opened. The company outlined recently revealed changes to the Fortnite Item Shop that seem to have been prompted by this legal dispute. Those include: Removing the Item Shop timer to instead display the player’s local time when the Item Shop will refresh and items may leave the Shop. – Removing tiers and colors of cosmetics in the Item Shop. – Adding the date that an item will rotate out of the shop to the Item Description on May 24, 2024. – “While our appeal is pending, players in the Netherlands that are under the age of 18 will not be able to see or purchase items that are in the shop for less than 48 hours, beginning May 24, 2024,” the publisher added. These changes appear to meet the standards of the ACM as it noted in its release. “ACM is of the opinion that Epic will comply with the binding instruction if it implements the above changes,” the organization allowed.

Epic Games finally nerf BRUTE Mechs in competitive Fortnite Epic GamesFortnite Battle Royale developers Epic Games have finally announced that they will take action on the controversial ‘B.R.U.T.E’ mechs in competitive play, after players’ complaints became too loud to ignore. Since being added back at the start of Season 10, the Mechs have done little but aggrevate much of the player base, deemed far too overpowered, with high-damage weapons and incredible mobility. Competitive players were particularly vocal about the addition of mechs, as they seriously threatened to ruin tournament games, but at first Epic Games did little to address the complaints. Finally, on August 10, the backlash from players, particularly big name pro players and streamers, likely got too loud for Epic to ignore, and they have implemented a change – but maybe not the one everyone was hoping for. Most players were asking for the complete removal of BRUTE Mechs in competitive, but instead, their spawn frequency will simply be reduced – but not eradicated. Epic have said that they will “impact of this change in advance of next weekend’s Champion Series event.” We’ve lowered the spawn rates of the B.R.U.T.E. per Storm circle in Arena and Tournament playlists. We will continue to monitor the impact of this change in advance of next weekend’s Champion Series event. Find full details on the new spawn rates here: https://t.co/iG5UDJJD8G — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) August 10, 2019 In their Reddit post, Epic explain exactly how the changes will affect spawn rates in Tournament and Arena playlists: Beginning of Match 21.5% chance that between 1-3 B.R.U.T.Es will spawn Previously was 100% chance that between 2-4 B.R.U.T.Es would spawn – – Storm 1 44% chance that between 1-4 B.R.U.T.Es will spawn Previously was 100% chance that between 2-4 B.R.U.T.Es would spawn – – Storm 2 40% chance that between 1-2 B.R.U.T.Es will spawn Previously was 100% chance that between 1-3 B.R.U.T.Es would spawn – – Storm 3 40% chance that between 1-2 B.R.U.T.Es will spawn Previously was 66% chance that 2 B.R.U.T.Es would spawn – – Storm 4 10% chance that 1 B.R.U.T.E will spawn Previously was 50% chance that 1 B.R.U.T.E would spawn – – Storm 5 3% chance that 1 B.R.U.T.E will spawn Previously was 10% chance that 1 B.R.U.T.E would spawn – – The change is an improvement, but it’s unlikely to completely satisfy most players, who would certainly rather the mechs were simply removed instead. For regular casual matches, it seems Epic has no immediate plans to nerf or remove BRUTE Mechs – despite the wave of criticism.

Epic Games facing lawsuit for making Fortnite too addictive Epic Games/Unsplash: Alex HaneyEpic Games, developers of the incredibly popular game, Fortnite, are apparently facing a lawsuit over making the game too addictive, particularly given its target audience of young people. The lawsuit reportedly originates from Montreal, Canada, and pertains to two minors, aged 10 and 15 respectively. CBC reports that the documents included in the lawsuit liken the game’s addictive effects to cocaine. Allesandra Esposito Chartrand, an attorney at Calex Légal (a Canadian law firm) states that the firm realized they have a strong case on their hands, particularly given the World Health Organization’s recent ruling that video game addiction is a disease. The comparisons to cocaine will undoubtedly be received with a significant degree of scepticism, but the argument is that Fortnite causes the brain to release dopamine; in the same way as a recreational drug. The need for this dopamine fix is what encourages players to keep returning to the game, in the same way drug addictions are formed. Furthermore, the game’s target audience is alleged to be young people, who are more vulnerable to the addictive effects of Fortnite. The firm was reportedly approached by the minors’ parents, who claim that their children are addicted to the game, and are seeking reparations. Much of the case is apparently based on a 2015 ruling from the Quebec Superior Court, that found tobacco companies were not sufficiently warning their customers of the addictive effects of tobacco or the dangers of smoking. The case is reportedly set to argue that Epic Games have not done enough to disclose the addictive side of Fortnite, particularly given the duty of care that comes with such a juvenile player base. There is no word – as of yet – as to the amount of money being sought in compensation, but the case has reached headlines thanks to the high-profile of Fortnite. Read More: Tfue responds amid Ninja Fortnite feud – There have been arguments about the classification video game addiction as a disease, with some feeling it could contribute to a negative stigma towards gaming in general. We will continue to update you on this story.

Epic Games finally changing approach to Fortnite updates before big competitions Epic GamesEpic Games is going to be changing its approach to competitive Fortnite and will no longer be releasing brand new content a day before competitions. The developer has published a statement on its official website, reassuring professional players that mistakes of the past will be reconciled during the course of 2019. Epic has recently attracted heavy heavy criticism from the pro community, following the sudden arrival of new features such as the Infinity Blade and X-4 Stormwing attack planes just before the $1 million Winter Royale tournament and – more recently – Boom Boxes before From the Australian Open onwards, Epic Games promises to give competitors some time to get used to new content before playing in tournaments, which would be between a few days and a week. “We value the ability of players to adapt to the game changing over time. We also believe these changes keep Fortnite fresh for everyone including players, competitors and spectators. “However, we want to provide reasonable time for you to adjust strategies following large gameplay impacting changes, for example prior to official Fortnite competitions.” The full statement from the Fortnite Team can be found below: Ali ‘Myth’ Kabbani had previously called for pro players to unionize in order to create a platform of communication between community and developer. “I don’t want to influence Epic’s decisions when it comes to how they want to run or develop their game” Myth explained. “At the end of the day, I know we don’t have any control over that. I think their lack of communication is daunting, and that’s really all I want to address with this union.” Whether or not his – and other players’ – concerns have been fully addressed by this ‘change’ remains to be seen.

Epic Games exploring new looting system in Fortnite After a fan suggestion on Reddit, Epic Games have said they will investigate a new looting method for Fortnite, that would drastically change the way weapons and items are equipped. The new looting system would be particularly important for the early game, when players still have empty slots in their inventory, as it would allow players to directly swap weapons rather than new pickups being placed in an empty slot. All players have five slots for weapons and items, and when a new item is picked up it will always be placed in the first available empty slot, however, this can cause the occasional problem. Players will often have a preferred slot for each type of weapon (i.e. shotgun in slot 1, rifle in slot 2 and so on), and when an item is placed in the incorrect slot, players will need to manually move it around. A very simple suggestion from u/sasseries would solve this problem, by allowing players to directly swap whatever weapon they are holding with a weapon/item on the ground. Epic Games’ very own Eric Williamson, design lead on Fortnite Battle Royale, saw the suggestion and was intrigued, saying that the team would ‘investigate’. The news will be a pleasant surprise to many Fortnite players, considering the looting system has generally remained unchanged in the battle royale mode’s history, despite almost every other aspect of the game having evolved. Epic Games sometimes hint at these changes but never act upon them, so it must be noted that despite Williamson’s comment, this suggestion may never actually come to fruition in game.

Epic Games face class-action lawsuit for hacked Fortnite accounts Epic Games / FreepikFortnite Battle Royale developers, Epic Games are facing a class-action lawsuit after player’s accounts were hacked in January. On January 26, Epic Games revealed that a bug in Fortnite may have exposed players’ personal information due to an issue with the game’s log-in system. Months after the company received massive backlash for their error in security, they have now been hit with a class-action lawsuit involving the players who were affected by the gap in Epic Games’ security measures, according to Polygon. With Epic Games’ sizable portion of young players who regularly play Fortnite, many were concerned over the failure to prevent the data breaches and to detail users on what had occurred. The hacker’s successful attempts to access the Epic Games accounts led to a security breach, which may have possibly exposed the data of millions of users’ accounts and personal information. The class-action lawsuit was filed by Franklin D. Azar & Associates in U.S. District Court in North Carolina, and they claim that Epic’s “failure to maintain adequate security measures and notify users of the security breach in a timely manner” was cause for the suit. The lawsuit also states that Epic Games failed to directly notify those who could have been affected by the breach, claiming, “Epic Games has not yet directly informed or notified individual Fortnite users that their personally identifiable information may be compromised as a result of the breach.” Despite the fact that Epic Games quickly acknowledged and fixed the security issue, the lawsuit states that there are “more than 100 class members” who have decided to take action against the popular battle royale game’s developers. The plaintiff, as well as other class members who are involved in the lawsuit, have expressed that they “have an ongoing interest in ensuring that their personally identifiable information is protected from past and future cyber security threats.”

Epic Games Explains Why the Fortnite Battle Royale Servers Have Gone Down for the Third Day in a Row The Fortnite Battle Royale developers have released a statement to explain why the servers have gone down for maintenance yet again on June 1st. Players of the incredibly popular Epic Games title were left disillusioned late on June 1st when they logged in and found that the servers were down for the third day in a row. The V4.3.0 update was released on May 30th, introducing the all-new Shopping Carts and various bug fixes but servers went down again 24 hours later as a number of issues related to the patch had to be addressed. However, it looks like there were still some issues and Epic Games’ Mark Imbriaco took to Reddit late on May 31st to reveal that the servers would be going down once again at 04:00am ET (08:00am UTC) on June 1st. The reason for the downtime is apparently down to the ongoing difficulties with “scaling the backend MongoDB database we use for much of our account and matchmaking system”. Imbriaco says that the Fortnite Battle Royale team has been working on rolling out a “brand new, horizontally scalable, session tracking service to manage sessions for matchmaking” but that there have been numerous issues with this and they are now reverting to the old system for the time being. Matchmaking is currently disabled as we undergo service maintenance. Stay updated here – https://t.co/GAC2fAgMFC — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) June 1, 2018 The full statement can be found below. Hi everybody! We wanted to give you a heads up that we’re planning another maintenance window tomorrow, June 1, at 4 AM ET (8 AM UTC). During this time, matchmaking will be unavailable for Fortnite Battle Royale. This will be the third day in a row that we’ve had a scheduled maintenance window. I can explain. We mentioned back in February scaling the backend MongoDB database that we use for much of our account and matchmaking system has been a challenge. We’ve made a ton of progress and our database has never been in a better place than it is right now, but we knew that it wasn’t the right fit to handle our continued growth and new types of LTMs. The Playground LTM v1, for example, has a maximum of 4 players per game which means we’ll need a lot more game instances and matchmaking sessions to support that mode than we do a mode like Battle Royale that can support up to 100 players per instance. Over the last couple of days we’ve been working on rolling out a brand new, horizontally scalable, session tracking service to manage sessions for matchmaking. Despite extensive testing over the last few weeks, we ran into some problems when we attempted to put it into production. First, we ran into an issue with the way the system handled the case of many thousands of empty game servers, just waiting for people to drop at Tilted, that caused a lot more data to be returned by queries to the service than we expected. We solved that problem and tried to deploy again this morning, and while performance looked good we ran into a problem with the way our dedicated server auto-scaling systems interacted with the session tracker that required us to revert to the previous system again. We’d like to offer a huge thank you to the community for being so patient when we’ve had to take maintenance windows — we know you’d rather be playing and we really appreciate all the support. We’re looking forward to seeing you continue to surprise us with your creativity in Playground soon! Thanks, Mark Imbriaco Technical Director, Operations & Reliability

Epic Games Explains Why Some Objects in Fortnite Now Have Lower Health After the release of the v5.20 Update early on August 7, players began noticing and reporting that some of the objects in the world of Fortnite: Battle Royale had less health than usual. Despite the fact that there had been no mention of this change in the Patch Notes, several of the objects and structures were being destroyed much faster, thus yielding less resources. Reddit user ‘Fawfulz’ demonstrated this undocumented health change by pickaxing some of the cabbages in Fatal Fields, which he posted a video of online. Players began reporting similar changes involving some other objects, including the flags, weapon racks, and bowls in Viking Village. As the post began gaining traction, an Epic Games representative named ‘EpicDustyDevo’ posted a comment in reply, saying that the reason why there was no mention of these changes is because they were fully unintentional. Hi guys. All of the undocumented health changes to various objects in the world (beds, cabbages, etc.) were unintentional. If you’re curious, they were the result of some work we had to do to make wall health values distinct & tune-able when compared to Save The World. I think everything should be back to normal by the 5.3 build. Fortnite players need not panic as these unintended changes should be reverted with the launch of the v5.30 Update, which should take place sometime in the next two weeks. However, until then, players should keep in mind that any object they try to destroy for resources could potentially yield less than normal.

Epic Games explain why they’ve added explosive damage through structures in Fortnite Epic Games have offered further insight into their thought process behind the addition of the new explosive damage system in Fortnite Battle Royale. The recent v6.21 update, which went live early on November 1, implemented a new system which allows 25% of explosive damage to penetrate through structures and the environment. As a result, any explosion caused by items such as grenades and launchers can now cause damage to players through structures, whether the structure is built by the player or naturally spawning. With there being a strongly negative reaction to this massive change, Epic has posted a message the further clarifies why they implemented it. Read More: 15 new sky structures have appeared in the Playground mode in Fortnite – Pirate Ships, Battle Arenas and more – Essentially, the main motivational factor was that the developers felt there was an imbalance in play-styles that needed to be addressed. “Building as a defensive measure is hugely important, and the safety net it provides is something we don’t take lightly,” they wrote. “However, in general, we feel like there’s a bit of an imbalance between aggressive play and defensive tactics.” The post then reveals that the massive feedback has been heard, and that this new system is merely an experiment, such as the recently added glider re-deploy feature. Players are encouraged to offer their feedback about this new system, and the post even includes specific question guidelines players can use when providing their input: Is 25% the right amount? What if it were lower? – Should all material types have the same damage reduction? That is, should metal have a higher mitigation than wood? – Is the aggressive/defensive balance right currently? What other methods might make sense for countering overly defensive play? – Considering how negative the feedback regarding this change has been, and the fact that Epic are essentially acknowledging that by posting this update, players may expect to see further adjustments made soon, or the change to even be reversed completely. Source – Reddit

Epic Games explain why they vaulted the Infinity Blade in Fortnite Fortnite announced on Friday, December 14 that the Infinity Blade would be headed to the vault after the community lashed out about the weapon being incredibly overpowered. The first Mythic weapon in Fortnite was introduced on Tuesday, December 11, the same day as the start of the NA Winter Royale Finals. After the weapon ended up taking center stage for basically being a free ticket to win, many were calling for it to either be put in its own game mode or to be vaulted altogether. On December 14, Epic Games seemingly took the community feedback to heart and simply vaulted the weapon while it re-evaluates the place of it and future Mythic items. Heya folks, We messed up and rolled out the Infinity Blade overpowered / without good counters, especially in the end game. The Infinity Blade has been Vaulted and we are re-evaluating our approach to Mythic items. Thanks for calling us out on this! — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) December 14, 2018 The move was immediately met with widespread acclaim, as many found it refreshing to see Epic admit to having made a mistake with the introduction of the weapon. All hope for any changes seemed lost when Epic Games announced a small nerf to the weapon on December 13 while also hinting at more Mythic weapons to come soon. It seems that the immediate and incredibly negative backlash from that move was the final thing that tipped the scales and forced Epic’s hand on the matter. How to find the secret Fortnite Banner for the Week 2, Season 7 Snowfall challenge – Battle Star replacedIt will now be interesting to see what the next move from Epic is on the subject of Mythic weapons. Will more be added to the main game mode in the future? Or will they be added in as LTMs, like many in the community have suggested? Only time will tell.

Epic Games Explain Everything Wrong with Fortnite Summer Skirmish Week 1 – Lag, Eliminations, Format and More Epic Games has released a complete ‘postmortem’ of the first week of Summer Skirmish, which saw a $250,000 duos tournament cut short due to various issues. The main problem was the lag which affected nearly all players and made the experience very difficult for both the participants and viewers. On top of the lag however, the format itself was also criticized, with not enough emphasis placed on eliminations many complained that the action was not as aggressive and fast paced, with competitors playing for the win at all costs. In response to the criticizms, and ahead of the second week of Summer Skirmish (rumored to be a $500,000 solos tournament), Epic has provided a complete breakdown of what went wrong and how it will be improved. More: Friday Fortnite Set to Clash With Epic Games’ $500K Summer Skirmish Tournament as KEEMSTAR Hits Out on Twitter – SUMMER SKIRMISH WEEK 1: POSTMORTEM Hey Fortnite folks, Let’s talk about Week 1 of Summer Skirmish – it did not go as planned, but we definitely learned a lot! It represented the first time we’ve been able to bring together a high concentration of some of Fortnite’s most talented players and community creators all in one game. We experienced many pain points from a server performance standpoint and feel we under delivered for the premiere of online competition in Fortnite. While we often run tests to learn how the servers will perform, having significant prizes on the line changed gameplay behavior significantly. In addition, since we chose to highlight the streams of players in the event, most players stayed in the game to spectate after they were eliminated. The combination of these two things led to a gameplay experience that was much worse than we expected. So let’s unpack what happened, what we’ve learned, and what’s next … Server Performance We believe that there are number of factors that caused the poor server conditions during this event. This includes the number of players still alive in the later circles, the number of players that stayed connected to spectate until the end, and the amount of dense building that occured late in the matches. Our top priority now is to understand and optimize server performance in these situations. For example, when an explosion damages a large number of building pieces, and each piece needs to send that event to a large number of connected clients, we get a big spike in server CPU load. We have a lot of ideas about how to handle cases like this better, and are working on that right now. We also think that this work will improve server performance for other intense modes like 50v50. Live Environment Elimination Curves vs. Skirmish Week 1 Players Left by Circle Radius (Density) Callouts – Where normally 10 people alive, 50 in skirmish. Where normally winner, 30 alive in skirmish We launched Summer Skirmish ahead of the competitive systems we are actively building and establishing as a way to both highlight the amazing talent in the Fortnite community and to explore the possibilities of competitive Fortnite while those systems are being developed. The learnings from the competition are great indicators for what features and formats we need to improve or rework. At the Fortnite Pro-Am event we unveiled our Spectator feature, which is not currently available on the live environment. The combination of these factors created a broadcast that relied on highlighting community members that are streaming their point of view for the event. We love the broadcast format because we have the opportunity to spotlight different individuals in the community. The format doesn’t however, allow for the same contextual storytelling that is available through the Live Spectator feature. It’s incredibly apparent in situations where there’s a lot of building going on in the final few circles. Building Meta Week 1 also illustrated some of the difficult player vs. player engagement scenarios with so many talented builders under one roof. Complicated, snaking tunnels make it difficult to follow the action, but also amplify the lack of it (action). We’re thinking carefully about how to address late-game building for long-term health of competitive play. Placement and Eliminations We’re eager to mix up formats to keep things exciting and entertaining during the Summer Skirmish series. Each week we’ll get to see how incentivizing different elements of the format influences competitor’s decisions. The key takeaways for any formats are the learnings gained in understanding differences in play patterns between public match play and the Private Match environment with a lot of talented players playing against each other. We are curious to see how more elimination heavy incentives influence play, though we want to retain the core values and play experiences that everyone else can relate to in-game. Creating complicated scoring systems can be confusing and anticlimactic if they’re not a part of the core play experience. The one-life survival dynamic creates tough real-time decisions for competitors. Each engagement against similarly skilled opponents presents a risk assessment scenario that is typically not apparent for those competitors (or viewers) when observed in public matches. Competitors generally need to expend a lot of resources (ammo, health, materials) when attempting to eliminate their opponents. And in team-based play (Duo or Squads) they’re also required to spend additional resources to secure the elimination against a downed opponent. Tactical play becomes more beneficial than flashy play – and that’s where we’ll need to strike the balance. For week 2 we’ll be exploring a public server format where we’ll be tracking competitor’s performance over a period of 10 games. We intend to pick back up on Private Match play in week 3 of the Summer Skirmish series while we work on server performance issues we experienced this past weekend. We’ll have full details available on the format and list of invited players available on Friday! Source: Epic Games

Epic Games explain why some Fortnite players are seeing higher ping than usual Epic Games have released an explanation that provides clarification for Fortnite Battle Royale players who have been experiencing high connection ping recently. Ping, usually measured in milliseconds, refers to the network latency between the player’s game and the server they’re connected to, essentially measuring how long it takes for a certain in-game action to take place after it’s been initiated. One major issue Fortnite players have been having lately is their user interface showing a ping value that’s much higher than what they’ve been used to in the past. Some players have even reported major inconsistencies between the ping value shown in the UI and the connection page in their settings menu. A lot of these ping-related complaints began surfacing heavily on March 12, coinciding with the release of the v8.10 update earlier the same day. So my ping has doubled in Fortnite and I am at a pretty consistent 10-20% download packet loss for the first 5 minutes of each game. :X — Ninja :usa: (@Ninja) March 12, 2019 Fortunately, Epic Games have provided a bit of clarification as to why players have been seeing a higher ping value on their UI. As it turns out, the whole issue is a visual glitch and not an actual connection one, meaning that for most players, their actual ping should be right around where it was before the issue popped up. Read More: Popular Fortnite streamers share positive reactions to v8.10 update – ft. HighDistortion, Nick Eh 30 and more – “At this time, we believe that the increased ping values being displayed in the debug UI are primarily a visual only issue,” Epic tweeted. “While we are continuing to investigate reports, we’re actively working on a fix for later this week.” At this time we believe that the increased ping values being displayed in the debug UI are primarily a visual only issue. While we are continuing to investigate reports, we’re actively working on a fix for later this week. — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) March 12, 2019 Interestingly enough, a lot of players who have been complaining about seeing higher ping have also claimed to experience laggy gameplay, which begs the question of whether the issue really is only visual or if these players are just being affected by placebo. Either way, the problem is pretty significant, so the sooner Epic can get it fixed up the better.

Epic Games explain “bespoke” Fortnite changes for PS5 release Epic GamesA little bit less than a week ahead of the console’s official launch, Epic Games has done a deep dive into the different ways that Fortnite will be enhanced on PlayStation 5, including how it takes advantage of the new DualSense controller. [jwplayer so0eN9Pk] Gamers will get their hands on the PlayStation 5 on November 12, after months and months of anticipation. The new console is set to bring a slew of enhancements to a number of different games, thanks to all the powerful hardware included in the system. For a while now, we’ve known that the ever-popular Fortnite will take advantage of everything the system had to offer, but specifics have been hard to come by. Now, thanks to a new blog post, we know what makes the battle royale game truly next-gen on the PS5. According to Epic Games, one of the biggest ways the battle royale takes advantage of the PlayStation 5 is through the new adaptive triggers on the DualSense controller. This means that, depending on which weapon you’re firing, you’ll get a different experience. “Trigger pull feedback” will be used for anything that fires immediately once the trigger is pulled and will feature authentic resistance as you pull down on the trigger. This will be used on SMGs, Assault Rifles, Sniper Rifles, Pistols, and Shotguns. “Sustained feedback”, on the other hand, will be used for weapons that don’t immediately fire and need a charge-up time like bows and mini-guns. According to Epic, this will feel like genuine resistance that’s different from the other type. Epic also reiterated that the PS5 version of the game is a “bespoke” version that “allows us to take full advantage of the new hardware’s power.” Fortnite will take advantage of 4K output and 60 FPS across all modes, as well as dynamic visuals. The game will will also be incredibly fast on the PlayStation 5, thanks to its unique SSD, meaning players won’t have to wait as long in loading screens. All in all, with all the changes the new version has to offer, it seems like PS5 is going to be the definitive place to play the battle royale for the foreseeable future. While the PC version obviously has faster loading times and framerate, the new DualSense controller seems to put this above the rest.

Epic Games dev finally responds to backlash over updates and communication Epic GamesEpic Games, developers behind the massively popular Fortnite Battle Royale, may finally be about to respond the community backlash that has surrounded their game for the past month, at least if a Reddit reply is anything to go by. Why have people been critical of Epic Games? The game developer has received criticism recently for a number of different reasons. A lot of it can be traced back to the v8.20 update, which was introduced on March 27. This update reversed a number of popular changes from Season 7, including a bonus 50HP granted on elimination, a minimum of 50 of each material dropped on elimination, and an increased farming rate of 40%. On top of this, Epic Games’ reluctance to add a FOV [Field of View] slider has received condemnation, as well as their decision to remove the possibility of playing on stretched resolution. 600Many members of the community have been quick to lament Epic’s silence, contrasting it to the failed implementation of the ‘Infinity Blade’ into base game modes of Fortnite, when Epic quickly responded and apologized. Now, though, a response from an Epic Games engineer suggests they are about to finally respond to the backlash. Epic to change communication On April 20, Reddit user ‘Rhymne’ posted a screenshot of their response to Epic Games’ April Survey, showing that they had answered with ‘strongly disagree’ to the statement ‘Epic Games listens to feedback from players’. This prompted the vice president of Engineering at Epic Games, Dan Vogel, to reply, stating: “General feedback and sentiment is not lost on us – we should have communicated intent, motivation, and reasoning behind various changes to allow proper dialog.” The response concludes by saying that they [Epic Games] “plan on changing our approach to communication next week.” As a result of this, it looks highly likely that Epic’s silence will finally end soon. However, some Reddit users were sceptical of this comment, worried that a response to justify the unpopular changes will not necessarily lead to changes in game, but will just cause more community unrest as Epic cements their position.

Epic Games executive claims to have tried to add Nintendo characters to Fortnite DexertoEpic Games executives explained that they have tried adding Nintendo characters to Fortnite but have yet to be successful. Fortnite has become known for its historic collaborations with TV shows, celebrities, movies, and other video game titles. The metaverse has allowed players to represent their favorite characters and franchises in a world that would not have been possible before. After the most recent Big Bang event, Epic Games revealed it had plans for even more collaborations in the upcoming season. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Family Guy, LEGO, G.I. Joe, and The Weeknd were all leaked or announced within the first few days of the new chapter. With Fortnite continuing to add popular franchises in the game, some players are beginning to wonder why one category specifically was missing from the lineup. With iconic characters like Link, Princess Peach, and Ash Ketchum, Nintendo lacks representation in the game. Nintendo has not shown interest in Fortnite collaboration Epic Games executive Saxs Persson revealed the reason why Nintendo has not been on the list of collaborators with Fortnite. The desire is seemingly a one-sided affair from Epic’s end. “I don’t know what the word for, like, making diamonds is,” Persson allegedly said when asked about how hard Epic had been pushing Nintendo. “Nintendo has their strategy, and we have our strategy, and we hope at some point to use their characters. Our players would love it.” Fortnite is only continuing to expand its creative universe and make more collaboration efforts. Persson also said that the rating change due to a partnership with LEGO has allowed them to explore new collaborations that they once couldn’t. Epic Games and Fortnite have not commented on future collaborations or working with Nintendo.

Epic Games drop new hints on future of Pump Shotgun and pullout delay Epic GamesEpic Games have revealed new information about the future of the Pump Shotgun and shotgun pullout delay in Fortnite Battle Royale. The Pump Shotgun was one of the earliest weapons to be added in Fortnite BR, surviving for nearly eight whole seasons before being vaulted at the start of Season 9. The weapon was widely considered to among the most powerful in the game, especially in the competitive meta, and thus its removal caused quite a stir and outrage in the community. In their May 31 competitive AMA on Reddit, Epic mentioned the Pump in one of their answers, dropping a hint that it could potentially return in the future. “The Pump Shotgun is still available in Creative,” they wrote. “And always has the potential to be unvaulted.” What about the shotgun pullout delay? The reason they were talking about the Pump Shotgun in the first place was because they were asked a question about the future of shotgun pullout delay in Fortnite BR. The pullout delay was first added at the start of Season 5, in order to mitigate the effects of the ‘double Pump’ – a popular strategy that allowed players to speed up the fire rate of the Pump by switching back-and-forth between two shotguns while firing. With the Pump now out of the game, players are naturally curious as to whether Epic would consider decreasing or even completely removing the pullout delay. “We’re looking into possible tuning iterations here,” Epic wrote. “The main thing we want to keep in mind is that the Pump Shotgun is still available in Creative, and always has the potential to be unvaulted, so we want to make sure that any adjustments take its unique characteristics into consideration. At the end of the day, as has been proven on numerous occasions, Epic usually do what they want, so players should always expect the unexpected when it comes to the popular battle royale title.

Epic Games employee accused of “mocking” pro player at Fortnite World Cup Epic Games / Twitter: RBK_ConCeaLeDThe behavior of an Epic Games employee at the Fortnite World Cup has been questioned by the owner of Raised By Kings, claiming that they threatened to disqualify Theo ‘LeftEye’ Broman and mocked him at the event. The Fortnite World Cup was a roaring success, with $30 million handed out to some of the world’s best players across a tournament which featured Creative, Solos and Duos competitions. It appears that LeftEye and Raised By Kings had an unfortunate run-in with Epic Games staff though, with the organization’s CEO Joao Nunes accusing an employee at the tournament of threatening to disqualify LeftEye and mocking him for breaking the strict rules about jerseys at the competition. 500The Fortnite World Cup rules stated that any jerseys worn by players could only feature three logos, something that it appears Raised By Kings failed to abide by, leading to the alleged incident with an Epic Games employee. Raised By Kings content creator JLove revealed that the issue was a tag on the bottom of his shirt, which included a small version of the organization’s logo, and the size of the jersey in a tweet just moments after the altercation. For anyone who wants to know what was there, seems a bit out of order to make him cut that off lol. Simply tucking it in should have been fine. pic.twitter.com/G7n0SP2btk — RBK JLove @ NYC (@JLoveFN_) July 28, 2019 With the offending logo situated on the bottom of the jersey, Nunes claims that the Swedish player offered to tuck his jersey into his pants, but was told to take it off or they would be disqualified, even though it had been passed as acceptable on media day. Nunes went on to accuse the staff member of making fun of the pro player, who was forced to cut the offending piece at the bottom of his shirt off, writing on Twitter: “[Epic Games staff] proceeds to mock him for cutting his jersey off right before he goes on the stage.” Wouldn’t let LeftEye tuck his Jersey in so the @EpicGames employee said take it off or I’ll disqualify you. Even tho it was given the ok to be worn on Media day. Proceeds to mock him for cutting his Jersey off right before he goes on the stage. GGs pic.twitter.com/I4LFj5knup — Joao Nunes (@RBK_ConCeaLeD) July 28, 2019 While Nunes was unhappy with the treatment his player was given at the World Cup, he refrained from revealing any more details about the incident between LeftEye and the Epic Games staff member. Dexerto have reached out to both parties for comment. LeftEye finished the tournament in 41st place, taking home $50,000 for his efforts.

Epic Games drop Fortnite caster AussieAntics after he calls player a “loser” FNCS/Aussie AnticsOne of the most beloved faces in the Fortnite community has surprisingly been dropped from the official broadcasting team after he made comments towards a player during a viewing party. Controversy and Fortnite have unfortunately come hand in hand in recent months, recently professional player WavyJacob was banned due to a violation of the family-friendly name rules within the code of conduct. Then, on June 25 it was announced that Australian caster Shaun “AussieAntics” Cochrane, who’s risen to become one of the most well-known names in the Fortnite competitive scene, had been dropped from the official broadcast team due to a violation of the community guidelines. Dropped from the Fortnite broadcast team Aussie surprised everyone in the community when he tweeted he was “Dropped from the official broadcast” just a few hours before we was set to broadcast the final regions of the FNCS All-Star Showdown on June 26. Dropped from the official broadcast. Going live in 5 minutes to explain why. I will be doing a viewing party for NAE Solo FNCS Finals as well. — AussieAntics (@AussieAntics) June 26, 2021 He quickly took to Twitch to explain the reason why he was dropped from the team, and it didn’t take long for fans to start calling the decision a questionable one from Epic Games. In short, he was streaming a viewing party of the Oceanic FNCS All-Star Showdown solo finals on June 25, and one of the players towards the bottom of the leaderboard changed his drop spot to land on someone in the top ten. Aussie noted he was friends with the player getting landed on, and proceeded to call the other player a “loser”, which was apparently the last straw for Epic Games. After a meeting, he was notified that he has been removed from the official broadcast team for the foreseeable future and does not know if he will ever return. He continued on to say how he’ll continue to call out players who he thinks deserve it and says there’s little hope he is going to reappear on the broadcast team with his follow-up comments. This marks the second prominent caster that has been dropped from the official team, as Arten ‘BallaTW’ Esa was removed due to his blog post on why solo’s should not be a competitive event. It’s here. My blog about why I believe solos should be relegated as a focus point of competitive Fortnite. They hold a special place in our hearts, and have given us a crazy bit of excitement/fun. — Ballatw (@Ballatw) August 18, 2020 We will have to wait and see whether or not AussieAntics will make it back on the Fortnite stream in the near future.

Epic disables Fortnite Stark Robots on first day of Season 4 Epic GamesWe’re just hours into Fortnite’s Marvel-centric Season 4 update, and a major new feature has already been disabled, with Epic Games pulling Stark Robots from their battle royale’s competitive playlists. With the start of an all-new Fortnite season comes dramatic gameplay changes as usual. Almost every fresh gameplay element this time around is based around Marvel lore. Eight iconic heroes and villains have taken over the map as the powerful forces come together to fend off Galactus. From She-Hulk to Doctor Doom, each of these heroes are available to unlock in the Season 4 Battle Pass. However, the Marvel takeover doesn’t end there. On top of these skins, huge additions to the gameplay loop can be found across the newly updated map. There are new Mythic abilities, new mini-bosses, and plenty more. One of the main additions to the map was Tony Stark’s very own robots. While these AI enemies dropped a new weapon at the start of the season, they’ve already been disabled. Here’s what you need to know. Stark Robots were placed across the map at the beginning of Fortnite Season 4. These new additions would drop Stark Industries Energy Rifle upon death. However, their location was randomized every match, so there’s no predicting where they might spawn. Not even 24 hours into the season and Epic Games made the move to yoink the new robots from Fortnite. “We’ve discovered an issue with the Stark Robots and are disabling them in competitive modes until we resolve the issue,” the Fortnite Status account tweeted on August 27. We’ve discovered an issue with the Stark Robots and are disabling them in competitive modes until we resolve the issue. We’ll update you when they return. pic.twitter.com/sp4qLrDrAR — Fortnite Status (@FortniteStatus) August 27, 2020 This means that you’ll still be able to spot the powerful robots in regular playlists. But until all problems are resolved, they won’t be added back into competitive play. If you’re banking on using an Energy Rifle to beam down foes on your way to an Arena win, you’ll have to wait for now. Fear not if you’re on the lookout for rapid XP gains at the start of the season, however. You’ll still be able to complete all of the Week One challenges – even those involving the robots – in standard modes. Other AI foes remain in both competitive and casual playlists for the time being. So you can still expect to encounter Doctor Doom among others on the battle royale map. Epic Games has yet to provide an ETA on when the Stark Robots will be back in the mix, so keep your eyes peeled for updates in the coming days.

Epic Games Drop a Hint That the Old Fortnite Menu Music Could Be Returning During the official live stream for this week’s Summer Skirmish Fortnite tournament, Epic Games dropped a potentially major hint that the original menu music could be making a return. As those who have been playing Fortnite Battle Royale since release in late September will recall, the menu music currently in game is not the same as what it used to be. During some point in season 3, the menu music was completely switched up – and the change has split opinion in the community, with some players nostalgic for the old music already. Epic Games has been bombarded with requests for the old music to return on all of Fortnite’s social channels, on Twitter, Reddit and the official forums. Epic has been silent on the issue, but there is no way the constant requests have gone unnoticed, and during the Week 3 Summer Skirmish, fans believe a major hint about the old music returning was dropped. At the conclusion of the tournament, a “Thanks for Watching” screen was displayed – accompanied by the original menu music, sending the viewers in chat into frenzy, as you can see in this clip. The music has been remixed slightly, and is not a direct copy of the original menu jingle, but it is almost identical. With season 5 about to hit its fourth week, it is unlikely that the music is brought in for this season, but it wouldn’t be too surprising if the menu music returned for season 6. However, this could mean nothing at all, and may just be the music they are choosing for Summer Skirmish – but it is a devilish tease from Epic if so, considering how desperate much of the community is for the old music to return.

Epic Games disable the new Shadow Stones in Fortnite [UPDATING] Epic Games have once again temporarily disabled the new Shadow Stones item in Fortnite Battle Royale due to an unforeseen issue. The announcement of this in-game change came via a post on the official Fortnite Twitter page on September 28, and was effective immediately. “Due to an issue with Shadow Stones, they have been temporarily disabled” read the tweet. As of now, it is unclear what the issue is with the Shadow Stones, but it must be considerable if the developers feel the need to disable it while the issue is being addressed. This is the second time in as many days that Epic have disabled the Shadow Stones. They were enabled back into the game briefly on September 28, before being taken out again. We will continue monitoring the situation and provide updates as they are announced by Epic. Found in ‘corrupted’ areas of the map, Shadow Stones temporarily apply ‘Shadow Form’ to players, allowing them to become invisible to enemies while stationary as well as gain increased movement speed, jump height, and fall damage immunity. Additionally, players who consume the item gain a new ability called Phase, which can be activated by pressing the Primary Fire button. Phase allows players to propel forward in the direction they are facing, as well as pass through objects. Source – Epic Games

Why have Epic Games disabled Reboot Vans ahead of World Cup Qualifiers? Epic GamesEpic Games are disabling the Reboot Vans in Fortnite’s competitive modes after discovering a huge problem on April 19 with the respawning mechanic. The ability to come back after being eliminated made its way into Fortnite after the v8.30 patch brought Reboot Vans into the battle royale, but a new bug has forced the developers’ hands by disabling the feature. On April 19, Epic Games announced on the official Fortnite Twitter account announced they were rolling back the Vans just a day before pros are expected to compete in the game’s World Cup Qualifiers for a chance to compete in the $1,000,000 tournament. Reboot Vans will be missing from Fortnite While the Reboot Vans add a new dimension to a competitive match, Epic Games made the call to take them out prior to the April 20 qualifiers. The devs said the Vans were causing an issue with the scoring in the game, leading them to take out the mechanic in totality. “We’ve discovered an issue involving the Reboot Van that could affect scoring in competitive modes,” Epic Games said. “We’ll be disabling the Reboot Van in all competitive modes and are looking to resolve the issue in a future release.” We’ve discovered an issue involving the Reboot Van that could affect scoring in competitive modes. We’ll be disabling the Reboot Van in all competitive modes and are looking to resolve the issue in a future release. — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) April 19, 2019 Swift changes to competitive matches The Fortnite account didn’t offer much more insight into the problem, and it still remains unclear how this will affect the weekends’ Semi-Finals and Finals for Duos or beyond. Though some pros were more concerned with other rising problems that have been integrated in Fortnite, and wondered why the same fast response hadn’t come with problems from things like the infamous Ballers. WHY CANT YOU DO THE SAME WITH BALLERS. JUST DISABLE IN COMPETITIVE MODES UNTIL YOU CAN FIX THEM. LOOK HOW EASY IT IS. ANHAJDNWJDBWJXBWHDBSHSBXJSBDJWBDHSHD — Denial WizKay (@WizKayTV) April 19, 2019 Even though the Reboot Vans haven’t been in the game for long, the sudden announcement could be a game-changing development for teams looking to make deep runs. Though the weekend competitors might appreciate the initiative to take out a problem that could affect the competitions, it comes at an unfortunate time as the major change gives players less than a day to regroup.

Epic Games disable Fortnitemares in Fortnite Battle Royale [UPDATED] Update 2: 10/24/18, 11:15am ET: Epic Games have confirmed that matchmaking is now stable and Fortnitemares has been re-enabled. Players in some regions may experience high ping. Update: 10/24/18, 10:36am ET: Fortnitemares matchmaking appears to be back online. There is no official update from Epic Games, but the server status page now reads “All Systems Operational” Epic Games have disabled the Fortnitemares LTM event – only hours after it was launched – due to matchmaking issues. After a massive build up, the Fortnite community was eagerly awaiting the big reveal of exactly what the mysterious Fortnitemares event would entail. But, before many have likely even had a chance to jump in and see what all the fuss is about, Epic Games have disabled the mode. The first issue was noticed shortly after the event went live, as Epic said they were looking into an issue with particularly long load times for queues after the downtime for the v6.20 update. We’re aware of an issue causing some players to experience long queue times. We are checking into it and will keep you updated. — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) October 24, 2018 More: Leaked skins and cosmetics found in Fortnite V6.20 files – Names and Rarities – Zombie Jonesy and more as Halloween theme continues! – Shortly after, they sent out another Tweet from the official Fortnite account to announce that Fortnitemares has been completely disabled for the time being. We have disabled Fortnitemares in Battle Royale while we investigate issues with matchmaking. Watch for updates at https://t.co/3y0X6buriO — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) October 24, 2018 It is unknown when we can expect the Fortnitemares event to go live again, or what Epic Games’ plans are in the meantime, but we will keep you updated with all the developments. More: Everything you need to know about Fortnitemares 2018: Challenges, Deadfire skin, Cube Monsters, Dark Engine and more – With matchmaking issues, Epic are usually quick to resolve these issues, so you should be able to get back into the game soon. The new event added skins, weapons and all new ‘Cube Monsters’, which are the BR mode’s equivalent to Zombies in the Save the World mode.

Epic Games developer has one major focus for Fortnite in 2019 Fortnite has become one of the most popular games of all time, but that doesn’t mean the developers are content with the current state of the title. One of the things that helps keep Fortnite at the top of the gaming industry is their weekly updates, which regularly add new and exciting items to the game while fixing numerous bugs and issues that pop up. Epic Games do this to help keep the game fresh, as constantly changing the game and the items which players can use means that no style of play can dominate the game for too long. Unfortunately, not every update is a roaring success, and changes made to the editing system in the 7.20 update had to be reverted on Thursday, January 17 as they were causing delays when people were trying to play. While some fans were annoyed by the delays, Fortnite’s Technical Lead PeteNub has confirmed that one of his major focuses on 2019 is to eliminate delays and make the game feel much smoother for those attempting to secure Victory Royales – even if they are on high ping. “That’s one of my focuses this year,” tweeted PeteNub. “Clear out unnecessary delays. Things are fragile though and sometimes I make mistakes.” Yep, not ideal. That’s one of my focuses this year, clear out unnecessary delays. Things are fragile though and sometimes I make mistakes ☹️ — PeteNub (@PeteNub) 17 January 2019 Fortnite fans will happy to ear that this will be a major development goal for 2019, as players have long complained about delays when switching between targeting and building, while those in the Middle East started a social media campaign to draw attention to the huge delays they suffered while playing. PeteNub confirmed that the current issues involving building delay will be fixed in the next patch, currently believed to release on Tuesday, January 22.

Epic Games dev teases Netflix movie character coming to Fortnite Netflix/Epic GamesDonald Mustard, Creative Director at Epic Games, has teased the possibility of Chris Hemsworth’s character from new Netflix movie ‘Extraction’ coming to Fortnite. Extraction dropped worldwide on Netflix on April 24, stemming from the directors of Avengers: Endgame, the Russo brothers. Chris Hemsworth, who plays Thor in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, stars as Tyler Rake, a ruthless mercenary tasked with saving a young boy in Bangladesh. While the film has received generally mixed reviews, many have compared it to the John Wick film series – both directed by stuntmen and featuring barebones action narratives. The comparisons to John Wick are actually what prompted the hints from Mustard. The Russo brothers jokingly tweeted a photo of Tyler Rake facing off against John Wick, with the caption: “Who you got in a fight? Tyler Rake or John Wick?” In reply, Donald Mustard said: “Hey Joe. Maybe we should put Rake in Fortnite and find out”. Fortnite has become known for its ambitious crossover with some of the biggest movie franchises in the world, including the aforementioned Avengers series. John Wick was one of the first film characters added to Fortnite, way back in Season 3 of Chapter One. Hey Joe. Maybe we should put Rake in Fortnite and find out ? https://t.co/oQIlMJtnCO — Donald Mustard (@DonaldMustard) April 25, 2020 The tweets do not necessarily represent official confirmation, but the Russo brothers’ response of “hells yeah” added to the excitement. If it was any game other than Fortnite, we’d tell you to temper your expectations and take the tweets with a pinch of salt. However, we have seen so many impressive crossovers in Epic’s building battle royale that this actually seems possible. Similarly, the fact Epic have collaborated with the work of the Russo brothers in the past makes a Tyler Rake appearance all the more likely. It’s over to Epic to get it done.

Epic Games Dev Says New ‘Eye of The Storm Tracker’ Was Accidentally Added to Fortnite Battle Royale It looks like the surprise new addition to Fortnite Battle Royale was not only a surprise to players, but also to developers Epic games. The new item was found randomly by players in matches, and had not been announced in the recent patch notes or on any of Epic Games’ or Fortnite’s official social channels. Called ‘Eye of the Storm Tracker’, the new item allowed players to see the storm’s future path on their mini-map, thus meaning they could plan well in advance their route around the island. With no official announcement, many players were initially bemused by the new item, and thought it may be a glitch in their game. And it turns out this is partially true, as a leaked message from the official French Epic Games discord claims: “The backpack “Eye of the Storm” was not planned in the game, it will be removed soon. It is not yet fully ready.” So perhaps it was released accidentally as part of the recent v.4.2 content update, which would explain why it was missing from the notes. Image via @Koyamie It was certainly out of the ordinary for a new item, especially one as significant as this, to be added without any official announcement. It is unknown how long it will remain in the game for the time being, so fans will need to be quick if they are to try the new item before it is removed. Whether it will be added back this week is important however, as one of the Week 4 challenges is to ‘Visit the center of different Storm Circles in a single match’, and it was presumed this new item was released to aid with this challenge.

Epic Games demand Apple add Fortnite back after losing 60% of users Epic Games[jwplayer V1LKeZSw] Epic Games have filed an injunction demanding Apple to put the Fortnite app back on the Apple Store following a reported decline in 60% of iOS players. Epic Games first made headlines in August after introducing direct payment—a method of buying V-Bucks through Fortnite’s in-game store. This purchase method eliminates an additional 30% charge that would have been processed through traditional purchase methods such as the Google Play Store and the Apple Play Store. The option received praise as it meant that players would save more money playing the game they enjoy. However, to tech giants like Apple and Android, it meant a cut in their wallets, so they both decided to boot off Epic Games’ mobile version of Fortnite off their respective stores, leading to what has become a messy lawsuit. The most recent chapter of this saga unfolded on September 4, when Epic Games filed a preliminary injunction to the court, demanding Apple to restore Fortnite on the Apple Store. Epic Games proceeded to call Apple’s actions a part of “retaliation” against the American video game publisher. Filed to the United States District Court for the Northern District of California, the developers stated that its “likely to suffer irreparable harm” because of the removal of its game from the Apple Store and called the tech giant a “monopolist.” “Standing up to [Apple] is a necessary step to free consumers and developers from the unlawful restrictions Apple has imposed over app distribution and in-app payment processing on iOS. For too long, developers have not spoken out because they fear Apple’s retaliation. The company’s recent actions show that if you challenge Apple’s monopoly, Apple will attempt to destroy your business.” Additionally, Epic said that it “may never see these users again” after receiving a 60% decline in iOS players. Further calling Apple’s decision harmful towards Fortnite players and customers. the company claims that over 210 million players can’t play Fortnite on Apple devices anymore and that those devices were the only way for these users to access the battle royale. This is not the first time that Epic have tried to get Fortnite reinstated in the App Store; their first attempt, which came near the start of Season 4, was blocked by the court, although the judge did rule that Apple had to reinstate Epic’s Unreal Engine after the tech giants had tried to revoke the developer’s iOS and Mac dev access. The controversy also led to the community-based event called #FreeFortnite, which included a massive in-game spectacle and tournament themed around the controversy. All of your friends. Fabulous prizes. And one bad apple. We’re droppin the #FreeFortnite Cup on August 23. Check out our blog for full info: https://t.co/BFpiMQoWID — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) August 21, 2020 It’s uncertain whether Epic Games’ latest attempt at getting Fortnite back on the App Store will succeed this time around. The court is expected to issue its ruling on September 28, so we’ll just have to wait until then to find out the fate of the battle royale’s mobile version.

Epic Games detail the future of ranked play in Fortnite and what changes may be coming Developers Epic Games have detailed what they expect to have in store for the future of ranked play in Fortnite Battle Royale. Ranked play has been one of the more polarizing topics in the Fortnite community as some players have been eagerly asking for it while others have frowned upon its potential. In the eyes of Epic, ranked play already exists in Fortnite but in the revamped and revolutionized form of the in-game tournaments and competitions, such as the Pop-Up Cup. These are daily tournaments that are available during set hours and award points to players based on their in-game elimination totals and placements. There is an element of skill-based matchmaking involved with these competitions as players who rack up a lot of points are likely to come up against those with about the same point totals. In Part Two of their Competitive Fortnite State of Development, Epic discuss how the way these tournaments are set up is exactly what they envision ranked play to work in Fortnite. “Focused windows of competition allow us to better celebrate the performances of competitiors, promote community activity around the events, and create the highest quality matches possible at all skill levels.” This likely means that the traditional idea of continuous ranked/competitive playlists will not be coming to Fortnite as Epic will continue to have these burst tournaments instead. “We’ll be exploring rotating or staggered tournament scheduled in the future to include more players,” they wrote. “You can expect more details on competitive Fortnite and the Fortnite World Cup in the coming weeks!”

Epic Games consider adding Apex Legends’ respawn feature to Fortnite Fortnite developers Epic Games have confirmed that they are “exploring” the possibility of adding a respawn feature to the battle royale mode, perhaps taking inspiration from Apex Legends. Unlike traditional battle royale’s, Apex Legends allows players to respawn their teammates after they have been fully eliminated, by taking their ‘banner’ (like dog tags) to a nearby respawn beacon. Teammates will then drop back into the map, with no gear or weapons, and have the chance to loot up again and get back in the fight. The feature has been praised in Apex Legends, as it means teams don’t always have to be at a disadvantage if they lose a player, with the ability to bring them back. In Fortnite, and every other battle royale for that matter, once you are eliminated, there is no chance at respawn, and you will have to watch your teammates carry on without you. Producer at Epic Games, u/RZELive on Reddit, answered a fan about the possibility of this respawn feature being added, confirming it is being considered. Epic Games share update on future of Double Pump and Bouncers in FortniteIt might be slightly hopeful to imagine that a respawn feature will be added for the start of the new season, but Epic may consider using an ‘LTM’ (limited time mode) to test out possible respawn mechanics.

Epic Games potentially removing fan favorite LTM from Fortnite Battle Royale Epic GamesFortnite Battle Royale as they prepare their upcoming selection of summer content. The developers have released new LTM’s that fit into their popular title during as a different way to play without needing the 100-player lobbies. The newest release, Horde Rush, has already proven pretty popular and elevated itself to fan favorite status. However, another hugely popular LTM could soon find itself on the chopping block as Epic explore new options in the coming months. After one fan posted in the game’s subreddit about potentially bringing back the Ground Game LTM, Epic’s DustyDevo offered up a surprising response about the future of LTM’s. “Not sure if Ground Game will make the cut, but we are talking about expanding the LTM pool by quite a bit over the summer, so a lot of these that haven’t been in rotation for a while will return,” they said, responding to the post. “We might even switch off Team Rumble here and there and replace it with some of the other large team modes (gasp!).” While the (gasp!) could easily indicate a joke from DustyDevo, some fans wouldn’t be too happy to see Team Rumble dropped out of the rotation – even if it was only temporary. One Redditor replied: “No, don’t switch off Team Rumble. Please make it a permanent mode.” Another, clearly disappointed by the idea of having Team Rumble switched off, added: “Please make Team Rumble perma. There is no better option to do weekly challenges and some practice before (a) main match than Team Rumble.” Despite the reactions, it might not be all bad news for fans of Team Rumble as there hasn’t been any sort of confirmed news from Epic about their summer plans for limited time modes. On the flip side, for those players who don’t dabble in Team Rumble, they may get some of their favorite modes back if the developers open up the pool and offer a wider variety. Sadly, we probably won’t see Blitz make a return as it’s been out of rotation since Season 6.

Epic Games confuse everyone by removing another popular Fortnite Battle Royale feature Epic GamesIt’s been a rocky month for Epic Games, with many players disappointed with a number of updates, and the just-announced end to ‘account merging’ is another example of a decision leaving players confused. Epic Games removed the seemingly beloved ‘siphon’ feature in an earlier Season 8 update, which caused widespread outcry from fans, but Epic said the feature had actually made players play less. They also removed the option for PC players to use resolutions other than the default 16:9 in competitive playlists, angering both professionals and aspiring competitive players. Epic end account-merging Their latest blunder is announcing that the account merging feature will be axed on May 6 – which has confused and angered players in equal measure. As a cross-platform game, players want to be able to use their same account on multiple platforms, keeping their purchases and level progress intact when switching devices. The feature was heavily requested and delayed multiple times, before finally launching in February 2019. Yet, for unknown reasons, Epic is now ending account-merging entirely. The Account Merge feature will be coming to an end on May 6, 2019. Be sure to submit a merge request prior to that date for any eligible accounts. Note: Any “”In Progress”” Account Merge requests will be completed as long as they’re submitted prior to May 6 https://t.co/PkxLcl5WnR — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) May 1, 2019 Responses the announcement ranged from ‘disappointed but not surprised’ to downright vitriol, as Epic gave no explanation, leaving players in the dark as to why a popular feature would be removed. Epic did clarify that account merges currently in progress would be completed, and that players can still submit requests up until the end date on May 6. Presumably, there is a technical or administrative reason for the ending of the feature, but Epic’s announcement doesn’t stipulate that it will be coming back, or that the end to account merging is only temporary – so it looks like after May 6, the option will be gone for good.

Epic Games confirms issue with Fortnite’s Reaper Pickaxe audio, announce upcoming fix [UPDATE] UPDATE – January 16, 2019 Epic Games has officially announced a fix for the Reaper Pickaxe audio introduced with the v7.20 update. In addition to this fix, Epic also corrected the ghost peeking and trap selection issues. We have released a client update to fix some of the current issues. There will be no downtime, but the players will be required to download the update. Fixes in this update: • Trap selection • Ghost peeking with scoped weapons • Scythe pickaxe sounds— Fortnite (@FortniteGame) January 16, 2019 The release of Fortnite’s v7.20 update has introduced new items for players to get their hands on, but it’s also come with its fair share of bugs. When the update went live on January 15, many fans noticed that the audio for the popular Reaper Pickaxe was much different and not at all what it had been prior to the update. While some thought that maybe this was simply just how the Pickaxe would sound from now on, Epic Games calmed everyone’s fears in a simple follow-up Tweet. New sound for the Reaper pickaxe. Bug / New sound – What do you think? pic.twitter.com/9Nyuvc4xRK — Bananik • Fortnite Leaks And News (@FortniteLeaksB) January 15, 2019 Hours after the change was spotted, Epic confirmed that it was indeed an error and announced they’d be working on a fix. There was no timeframe given for when the fix would go live, but fans should no doubt be relieved to find out that the new sound is not here to stay and will soon be fixed. We’re aware that the sound effects for the Reaper Pickaxe are incorrect and are investigating the issue. We’ll keep you updated as we learn more! — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) January 15, 2019 While the Pickaxe is indeed one of the rarest PIckaxes in Fortnite, having been released back in October 2017 when the game was still in its infancy. GIven that it’s so rare and so beloved, it was no surprise to see many players, including TSM’s Ali ‘Myth’ Kabbani, worried about the new sound. Myth even posted his thoughts on the upcoming fix on his Twitter, asking Epic to not boost the sound too much with the upcoming fix. Please don’t make them bass boosted again, I love the reaper but that shit was extremely loud before today’s patch. I’m actually using it now. https://t.co/kaLG24xesR — Myth (@TSM_Myth) January 15, 2019 As soon as we know about when the fix is releasing, we’ll be sure to update this post. Be sure to also follow us @Dexerto on Twitter for all the up-to-date info on everything Fortnite related.

Epic Games confirms they will be suing ‘Fortnite Live’ festival organizers Epic GamesEpic Games have confirmed that they will be taking legal action against the organizers of a disastrous ‘Fortnite Live’ festival in the United Kingdom. The event, which was held in Norwich, attracted international media attention over the weekend after conning people into believing that the event would be all about Fortnite – in order to sell tickets. In actual fact, not only was very little of the festival’s attractions related to the popular battle royale game, but it wasn’t even officially licensed by Epic Games. In an official statement, Epic games have now confirmed that they have started legal proceedings against organizers of the disappointing event. “The quality of our player experience is incredibly important to us, whether it’s inside the game or at official public events like last year’s Fortnite Pro-Am,” an Epic Games spokesperson told Eurogamer. “Epic Games was not in any way associated with the event that took place in Norwich and we’ve issued a claim against the organisers in the High Court of London.” Read More: Fortnite world record for eliminations in Solo vs Squads smashed by Ghost Gaming pro player – Fortnite Live’s organizer, Exciting Events, reportedly promised to bring the festival back to East Anglia in 2020 despite the backlash. However, the Facebook page for the event has since been deleted and it’s highly unlikely that it will take place again.

Epic Games Confirms That Playground LTM is Available to Play on All Servers in Fortnite Epic Games has officially confirmed the return of the new Playground Limited Time Mode in Fortnite. The mode was fully reinstated into the game late in the day on July 2nd, and players across all servers now have access. The news was announced via a post on FortniteBR Reddit page, along with a tweet from Fortnite. Playground LTM – Available Now! Success! We’ve completed deploying our servers containing the improved matchmaking changes. All players can now join in on the fun in the Playground LTM. Please remember to change your region back to “auto select” and verify you’re on your preferred region. There is the possibility that you may encounter an error, as many players are attempting to join this game mode. Just attempt to requeue until you find a match. We’ll be releasing an in-depth and detailed postmortem in the near future to go over the obstacles that we encountered during the process of trying to enable this Limited Time Mode. But for now, drop in and let your imaginations run wild! Success! All players can now join in on the fun in the Playground LTM. Drop in and let your imagination run wild. More details: https://t.co/nSpL6uQDwl — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) July 3, 2018 The confirmation that the LTM was back online actually came close to two hours after it had already been enabled in-game. Earlier on July 2nd, players connected to Asian, Oceanic, and Brazilian servers began reporting that they were able to load into the mode. This was later followed by reports that the mode was available across all servers, despite still no official word from Epic. Read More: Playground LTM Has Gone Live on Some Fortnite Servers, Worldwide Roll Out Appears to be Coming Soon [UPDATED] – Many in the game’s vast player-base will be thrilled and relieved to see the Playgrounds LTM reinstated into the game after its lengthy delay. It was briefly released as part of the v4.5 game update on June 27th but got disabled nearly two hours later, remaining that way until July 2nd. The LTM was highly anticipated because it offers players the chance to play alongside their friends and do whatever they like in a private, low-pressure environment with the full Fortnite map at their disposal. We will keep you updated on the developments when Epic provides a full breakdown of what caused the downtime to be extended for so long.

Epic Games confirm Fortnite PS4 Cup coming soon following $1m Xbox Cup Following the release of the first-ever console only Fortnite tournament on Xbox One, Epic Games have confirmed a similar event will be held exclusively for PlayStation 4 players in the near future. With the $30m Fortnite World Cup event in New York just around the corner, Epic have been keeping players entertained with a variety of different tournaments, including the admittedly disastrous Trios Cash Cup. As well as announcing another trios event, they revealed plans to host an Xbox only solo tournament – the first ever competitive Fortnite tournament to be restricted to console. This allowed the best Xbox players in the world to earn some prize money without having to play against players on PC like in the World Cup qualifiers. The decision was hailed, but concerns were raised as PlayStation 4 players were seemingly missing out on the chance to compete, despite console lobbies containing a mix of players from both platforms. However, Epic Games’ community manager – Nathan Mooney – confirmed on Reddit that the developer has plans to host a PS4 Cup soon. Mooney said: “For the folks inquiring within the thread, we additionally have plans to host a PS4 cup – stay tuned for details.” The move is likely to be well received, with players on both platforms now being handed the opportunity to compete against the best of the best in order to take home their share of a large prize pool. No further information has been released regarding the upcoming PS4 Cup, but it should follow a similar format to the Xbox contest. The solo only event consists of a semi-final and finals, where the top 1500 players from the first day of action will qualify to battle it out for their share of $1 million. Unlike other competitive events, players will not be required to have reached Champions League division in arena to enter the tournament, something which the PS4 Cup is also likely to include. As always, Dexerto will keep you updated on when the event is officially announced by Epic Games as well as information on how to enter and compete.

Epic Games confirm Fortnite Season 4 will not come to Apple devices Epic Games / UnsplashEpic Games have announced that Fortnite Season 4 will not be added to iOS devices for mobile players amid their ongoing legal feud with Apple. Fortnite revealed that they would be continuing their superhero theme for the battle royale’s fourth season, following Aquaman and Deadpool’s appearances. Although this time, it will be entirely based around Marvel and its star characters. However, it seems as if some mobile players are going to be missing out on the superhero action, with Epic Games sharing the bad news to Apple users in a statement on August 26. Epic Games initially filed a request for Fortnite to be reinstated to the App Store ahead of Season 4. But, unfortunately for players with iOS devices, their attempts were denied in court. The judge deemed that Epic was the instigator of the “spat” following their decision to place a direct payment feature in their mobile app, violating the iOS App Store rules, and refused the request. Fortnite’s devs have now issued a statement of their own, confirming to fans that Apple users are no longer able to update the battle royale title, ahead of Season 4. Apple has blocked your ability to update Fortnite on the App Store, and has said they will terminate our ability to develop Fortnite for Apple devices. As a result, Chapter 2 – Season 4 (v14.00) will not release on Apple devices on August 27. More info: https://t.co/O1bgKgkZCp — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) August 26, 2020 “Apple has blocked your ability to update Fortnite on the App Store, and has said they will terminate our ability to develop Fortnite for Apple devices.” Epic Games stated, updating players on their “Free Fortnite” movement. “As a result, Chapter 2 – Season 4 (v14.00) will not release on Apple devices on August 27,” they added, confirming the Marvel-themed Season would not be available on iOS devices. The War to save Reality begins tomorrow! Part 5 in Fortnite now!#FortniteSeason4 8.27.2020 https://t.co/TMEHevmBsq pic.twitter.com/Vnn2d2ErY1 — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) August 26, 2020 Fortnite is already introducing teasers for the next season in-game with Marvel comic books revealing characters such as Wolverine, Thor, Groot, and many more potentially coming in Season 4. For PC, console, and Android users, however, Fortnite’s Season 4 is still expected to be released on Thursday, August 27.

Epic Games compensating wrongfully banned Fortnite players amid Ninja controversy Update: Epic games have now denied they banned the player because of Ninja’s report directly. More information below. Epic Games have begun issuing compensation to some Fortnite fans who were incorrectly banned, amid backlash from the community after a Ninja incident went viral. Ninja, the most popular Fortnite streamer, found himself in some hot water recently after he wrongfully reported a player for stream sniping him. This sparked a debate around the misuse of the report feature, which is intended to be used for players who cheat/hack/stream snipe. Ninja later apologized to the player, and said that despite being such a popular figure in Fortnite, that just because he reports someone, doesn’t mean they will automatically be banned. However, a new incident then surfaced showing Ninja report a player for “having a higher ping than me”, and this player was indeed banned (although Epic has now claimed it was not directly because of Ninja’s report.) Cheraxo, the player who was banned, shows that he was later sent an email from Epic, stating responded to the thread which accused Ninja of having a player banned for having high ping.“We’ve become aware that our processes for reviewing accounts may have led us to incorrectly ban certain accounts. We’ll be unbanning your account and compensating you for our mistake.“ We take the reporting and actioning of accounts very seriously. We treat every report the same and follow the same process to determine what action is necessary. There are two accounts involved in this: Account A which was the account originally reported by Ninja and Account B which is tied to a YouTube video we discovered On Oct 2nd, Account B was disabled for reasons unrelated to player reporting. – On Oct 3rd, Account A was reported by Ninja. It was investigated and not actioned due to lack of evidence. – On Oct 4th, Account A changed their display name away from the name reported on October 3. – On Nov 13th, Account B was re-enabled based on a review of the underlying system. – On Nov 17th, account B changed their display name to match the display name of account A at the time of Ninja’s report. – We became aware of a YouTube video claiming that we banned (and then unbanned) account B based on Ninja’s report, which is false. We hope this clears up the sequence of actions. On November 14, some players began to share that they had had their accounts unbanned and were compensated with 2,000 V-Bucks for the error on Epic Games part. How exactly Epic Games are determining that counts were banned incorrectly in the first place however is unclear, but if you have been banned and feel it was undeserved, you can contact Epic Games support.

Epic Games confirm Fortnite fixes coming in next Season 3 updates Epic GamesEpic Games have revealed a list of some major Fortnite bugs that will soon be fixed following the massive Season 3 update on June 17. Fortnite’s long-awaited third Season introduced many new changes such as a flooded map, new weapons and another battle pass for players to progress through. Along with the major Season 3 changes, there were also some bug fixes added to Fortnite on June 17, with issues, such as damage indicators pointing the wrong direction, now fixed in the battle royale title. Epic Games recently revealed that they had some more bug fixes coming soon, however, posting multiple bugs on their Trello board that will be dealt with in future updates. They shared that missing styles for both the Specialist Pickaxe and Arroyo Pack Back Bling cosmetics would be fixed in the next patch and that emote music would no longer be heard while at the main stage in Party Royale. There are also many battle royale specific issues listed, with a Supply Drop loot glitch and a bug which would prevent players from being healed by a Chug Splash, when thrown near a bush, expected to be fixed in the next patch as well. Sidegrading certain Epic and Legendary SMGs at an Upgrade Bench is another problem that Fortnite devs are aware of, although it is expected to be fixed in a later patch compared to the ones previously listed. Epic Games will also be releasing a fix for a bizarre texture bug, that can turn the map pink, in Fortnite’s Save the World survival mode. The final bug fix is one for mobile players, after they encountered trouble building when switching between combat and build modes, however, Epic has revealed that they are on top of it and that it will be patched in a future update. For more of the latest bug fixes as well other changes that were added to Fortnite on June 17, you can check out the full Season 3 patch notes here.

Epic Games community manager explains why Bouncers were vaulted Epic Games community manager Sean Hamilton gave some insight as to why the Bouncer item was vaulted at the start of Season 6 in Fortnite. Bouncers originally introduced to Fortnite Battle Royale in the V4.3 patch on June 5. The item is a variation of the original Jump Pad that gave a vertical or horizontal boost to players without the worry of taking any fall damage. The item quickly rose in popularity with both the competitive and casual community as it provided for tons of mobility and allowed players to easily reposition during hectic fights. Much to the chagrin of the Fortnite community, however, Bouncers were put into the vault with the release of the V6.0 patch that dropped on September 27. At the time, no reason was given as to why the popular item was vaulted. In a recent Twitter exchange, community manager Sean Hamilton shed some light on the reasoning behind the polarizing move. In response to Hamilton asking players what their favorite Fortnite items were, Twitter user ‘VonEklund’ expressed his concerns about the absence of the item and stating that Bouncers would allow for “a more balanced style between build-fighting, engage/disengage or just the possibility to avoid getting 3rd partied after a huge build fight.” Hamilton started his reply by reassuring VonEklund, and the entire Fortnite community, that “anything that is Vaulted always has the potential to come back.” I appreciate the thought out feedback as to why you’d like them back. 1st, understand that anything that is Vaulted always has the potential to come back. 2nd, we removed Bouncers due to the influx of recent mobility items as well as more that we have planned for the future. 🙂 — Sean Hamilton (@MrPopoTFS) October 2, 2018 Additionally, Hamilton hinted at the possibility of new items, saying that Bouncers were “removed due to the influx of recent mobility items as well as more that we have planned for the future.” Fortnite is no stranger to new items, with Epic adding in fresh weapons and other items to the game on a weekly basis. While there’s no official word just yet on when players can expect a new mobility item, or perhaps simply a modified version of the Bouncers, we hope that the wait isn’t too long.