Fortnite
Fortnite
Tfue blames Fortnite World Cup audio for his lack of eliminations
Olivia Richman
Many were shocked by the poor Fortnite World Cup Solo Finals performance of Turner “Tfue” Tenney. The FaZe Clan player was able to consistently start in his prefered zone, The Block, but placed 67th after only scoring seven points. But now Tfue is saying that he wasn’t completely at fault for that forgettable showing. Speaking on Twitch, he discussed missing at least one opportunity to kill another player due to …
Fortnite
Fortnite World Cup winner Bugha talks esports with Jimmy Fallon
Olivia Richman
Following in the footsteps of famous actors, politicians, and singers, Fortnite World Cup Solo winner Kyle “Bugha” Giersdorf went on Late Night With Jimmy Fallon to discuss the event and his sudden rise to celebrity. The 16-year-old millionaire represented esports well on camera. Fallon started out the night by placing the apparently heavy championship trophy on his desk. He asked Bugha what he plans to do with the trophy, and the …
Fortnite
Fortnite World Cup attracts over 2 million viewers for solo finals
Nina Forneloza
The viewership figures for the Fortnite World Cup have been calculated and they are impressive. While the first-place performance of Kyle “Bugha” Giersdorf earned a record-breaking $3 million payout, that wasn’t the only record that got broken at the event. According to a tweet by Rod “Slasher” Breslau, viewership for the event reached over 2 million. That makes it the largest ever concurrent audience for a single esports event. The …
Fortnite
Dusty Depot, Visitor, and more could return in Fortnite Season 10
Syed Mujtaba Naqvi
Fortnite’s Season 10 was teased during the final day of the Fortnite World Cup Finals in New York. Along with the announcement of the Fortnite Championship Series, Epic Games has teased the upcoming season of Fortnite with an image that suggests the return of the Dusty Depot. A day later another image was published, and it seems to show the return of The Visitor. The first image teaser shows what …
Fortnite
Elimination of notorious Fortnite cheater excites crowd at World Cup
Olivia Richman
Fans in the Fortnite World Cup audience cheered so loud when Damion “XXiF” Cook was eliminated that the audio had to be muted. Earlier this year, XXiF was found guilty of cheating by Epic Games during a World Cup qualifiers match. Though he was initially stripped of his spot in the World Cup, Epic left the door open for him to regain his spot following a two-week ban. This allowed …
Fortnite
16-year-old Bugha wins Fortnite World Cup, takes home $3 million
Olivia Richman
Fortnite player Kyle “Bugha” Giersdorf is $3 million richer after becoming the first Fortnite World Cup Solo champion. The 16-year old player who represented Sentinels beat 99 other qualifiers, including many well-known streamers and signed professionals. “Today was definitely the day,” Bugha tweeted immediately following the win. The Solo finals started with a concert by DJ Marshmello, who had a very popular in-game concert earlier in the year. Fans …
Fortnite
Fortnite Championship Series set to shake up Fortnite esports
Steven Rondina
Fortnite esports might look a lot different going forward. During the World Cup Solo Finals, the Fortnite Championship Series was announced. Few details were given, but all signs point to this being a major shakeup to the structure of the game’s competitive scene. “Competitive Fortnite isn’t going anywhere. Once Season 9 wraps up and we move on to our next season, we will be debuting the Fortnite Championship Series,” Fortnite …
Fortnite
Fortnite World Cup Duos won by Aqua and Nyhrox, rewarded $3 million
Olivia Richman
Fortnite duo David “Aqua” Wang and Emil Bergquist “Nyhrox” Pedersen won this weekend’s World Cup Duo finals, taking home $3 million. The 17 and 16-year-old Fortnite competitors scored 51 points during the finals’ six games, which were largely dominated by lesser-known players. The only popular players that performed especially well were Kyle “Mongraal” Jackson and Dmitri “Mitr0” Van de Vrie, who placed sixth. “I’ll remember this moment for the rest of …
Airwaks and RL Grime become two-time Fortnite Celebrity Pro-Am champs
Steven Rondina
Fortnite
Karim “Airwaks” Benghalia and musician RL Grime are Fortnite Celebrity Pro-Am champions once again. The duo came out on top of the Fortnite World Cup’s installment of the event, winning $1 million for charity following a four-game series. With the victory, they became the first two-time Celebrity Pro-Am champions following their previous first-place finish at the second installment of the event, which took place in June. Game one started …
Epic reverses course after denying warm-up time at Fortnite World Cup
Syed Mujtaba Naqvi
Fortnite
Competitive Fortnite players were furious to find out Epic Games had structured the Fortnite World Cup Finals 2019 in a way that provides no time for warm-up ahead of matches, only to see Epic reverse course on the decision just before the start of the tournament. Despite the high amount of money it awards to players, Epic Games is continuing to build a negative reputation within the competitive community. In …
Gen.G opens new training facility for CoD, Fortnite, and Apex teams
William Davis
Fortnite
Gen.G has completed construction on a 13,000 square foot practice facility in Los Angeles. The facility will be home to the Gen.G Call of Duty, Fortnite, and Apex Legends teams. The Seoul Dynasty, and Overwatch League franchise also owned by Gen.G, will practice at the facility before moving to Korea for the upcoming third season of the OWL. It’s to be the first season in which teams will compete primarily …
Ninja and Airwaks will meet at the Fortnite World Cup Celebrity Pro-AM
William Davis
Fortnite
Epic Games has announced the duos for the Celebrity Pro-AM at the Fortnite World Cup Finals. 50 duos consisting of pro players and celebrities are competing for part of the $3 million prize pool for charity. The lineup includes the reuniting of previous Pro-AM champions. The Celebrity Pro-AM will take place on Friday, July 26. The 50 duos will take over the stage and compete in different rounds. The duo …
Fortnite World Cup to be streamed in-game for Fortnite players
William Davis
Fortnite
The Fortnite World Cup is right around the corner and Epic Games has announced a new in-game feature in support of the event. The biggest Fortnite competition of the year is coming to New York on July 26. The Fortnite World Cup will gather the best players in the world for a three-day event. Those watching from home will now be able to enjoy the action and play Fortnite at …
Ninja discusses break from streaming, mental health woes
Olivia Richman
Fortnite
One of Twitch’s most popular personalities, Tyler “Ninja” Blevins, surprised fans by taking a two-week break from streaming. After heading to the NFL Player Social Summit in Los Angeles in early July, Ninja decided to take time off from from work while in California despite Red Bull hooking him up with a studio to stream in. His followers were not aware of why he suddenly slipped away from Twitch until …
Natus Vincere picks up new Fortnite roster of World Cup
Syed Mujtaba Naqvi
Fortnite
Natus Vincere hasn’t been satisfied with the results of Viggo “Bowman” Hahnsson and Daniel “AlphaAmons” Johnsson during the current Fortnite season, so it has made a decision to change the team’s roster ahead of the Fornite World Cup. Bowman and AlphaAmons are being replaced by two young Dutch players, Levi “lnuef” Edelijin and Quinten “Quinten” Van Der Zijpp. The new players and 15 and 17 years old, respectively, and have …
Fortnite patch 9.41 adds new sniper rifle, celebrates birthday
Syed Mujtaba Naqvi
Fortnite
Fortnite is now two years old and Epic Games is celebrating the occasion with the version 9.41 patch. The update includes new challenges, bug fixes, and content for Battle Royale, Creative, and Save the World modes. The highlight of the update is a new weapon, the Storm Scout Sniper Rifle. The new gun is available epic and legendary forms and has a unique weather map component. The weather map will …
Fortnite viewership disappoints during new Monster vs Mech battle
Olivia Richman
Fortnite
Robot versus monster sounds like an attention-grabbing headline, but Fortnite’s Season 9 event failed to deliver the views. With 606,000 concurrent viewers at its peak, Saturday’s event wasn’t even in Fortnite’s top 10 most-viewed Twitch streaming moments. In fact, it was one of the game’s least-watched Twitch events according to GitHyp. The large-scale fight only served to further illuminate Fortnite’s slowly dwindling viewership this past year. While the one-time battle …
Ninja Returns to Lollapalooza for Red Bull Outpost event
M Alzamora
Fortnite
Tyler “Ninja” Blevins is going to be in attendance for Lollapalooza. The popular streamer will be hanging out at the annual music festival’s Red Bull Outpost in Chicago from August 2 to 4. A few lucky gamers will have the chance to square up with the Fortnite star at the event. Fans can enter to win VIP tickets and a personal meet-and-greet opportunity with Ninja himself. The lucky winner will …
New Storm Scout rifle details leaked through Fortnite data mining
M Alzamora
Fortnite
Storm stragglers in Fortnite may soon find it even more difficult to survive. Data miners have uncovered an exotic new sniper rifle that could spoil their storm-exploring fun. Evidence of this “Storm Scout” sniper rifle exists within the game files for Fortnite Patch 9.40. There was no available description for the new rifle’s capabilities, but there is early speculation that the sniper rifle will make it easier to look into …
Endretta joins Misfits ahead of Fortnite World Cup finals
Syed Mujtaba Naqvi
Fortnite
Misfits Gaming has welcomed Norwegian player Endre “Endretta” as an addition to its Fortnite World Cup squad. Endretta qualified for the Fortnite World Cup Finals in the ninth week of European qualifiers, where he achieved the highest number of points in the solo tournament. He is considered to be one of Norway’s top competitive Fortnite players. He has previously played for Xypher Esports, a European Fornite team that represents more …
Fortnite has come a long way over the course of the game’s lifespan. What began as an upstart early-access title with base-building mechanics would eventually transform into the world’s most popular and lucrative video game, capturing the attention of millions upon millions of players across the world and entering into the mainstream cultural lexicon.
But how exactly did that happen? How did one of many games released by developer Epic Games manage to transform in real-time into something with such potential, and to what extent did Fortnite really grow? The answers are indicative of what it takes for a game to go from new and struggling to becoming a global phenomenon.
The original vision for Fortnite was very different compared to the game that is so widely popular today. Developers at Epic Games intended to create a game that would merge base-building mechanics with the popular shooting gameplay that the company was best known for, from its experience releasing such titles those found in the Unreal Tournament and Gears of War franchises.
While that vision was altered even prior to Fortnite’s initial release, with a darker creative look becoming brighter and more reminiscent of children’s cartoons, the first release of Fortnite did feature that original focus. Titled Fortnite: Saves the World, this was a paid early-access release that met moderate fanfare and player enthusiasm.
A follow-up release would do far better. That follow-up was Fortnite Battle Royale, a free-to-play version of the game that featured the core mechanics and experience players most associate with the Fortnite name today. The battle royale game mode, thrown together in just a couple of months by developers, was at the time a relatively new concept. A multitude of players would be dropped onto one map to do battle with each other, accruing resources and weaponry in an open-world environment to better equip themselves for combat. Eventually, the game’s playable map size would shrink over time, forcing players to engage with each other until only one winning player was left standing.
It’s a simple concept, but in 2017 it was fresh and new. Players quickly flocked to try this early battle royale game, and within weeks of its free-to-play release, Fortnite Battle Royale was playing host to millions of players.
First and foremost, the success of Fortnite can be seen in the extreme revenue numbers generated by the game for maker Epic Games. Just a few short years after its release, Fortnite had already led to billions of dollars in revenue for Epic. This success was enough to send reverberations throughout the entire video game industry. Dozens of clones would follow, trying to recapture the battle royale magic that Fortnite had so successfully crystallized, but it proved difficult for most.
Money wasn’t the only marker of the game’s ascendance, however. Fortnite broached popular mainstream culture in a way that few video games ever have. Popular streamer and former Halo pro Tyler “Ninja” Blevins was at the fore of this wave of popularity, co-streaming with rap superstar Drake and appearing on numerous television talk shows to discuss the game and the craze surrounding it. Popular musicians beyond Drake also got involved with the game, as Travis Scott and Marshmello hosted live, in-game concerts to both popular and critical acclaim.
The Fortnite World Cup raised the game’s profile even further in some circles. Held at the famous Arthur Ashe Stadium in New York City, the event awarded $3 million to 16-year-old phenom Kyle “Bugha” Giersdorf, who then found himself paraded through mainstream media circles just as Ninja had been before him.
While its apex may have come and gone, Fortnite remains one of the most popular and successful games in the world today, continuing to play host to many millions of players while generating major revenues for Epic Games.
