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'Fortnite' now lets you use a Bluetooth controller to play on your phone
Epic Games is helping to level the playing field for Fortnite players on mobile with its latest patch. The update brings support for Bluetooth controllers to iOS and Android versions of the hit battle royale game (as promised back in November). Switching from touchscreen to an external gamepad should make the experience less fidgety on the go. And that could be critical when you're locked in a cross-play battle with PC and console players.
Fortnite’s legal battles probably won’t result in big payouts
As Fortnite continues its astronomical rise, the legal troubles keep piling on for its developer, Epic Games. With more than 200 million players on Fortnite: Battle Royale (which reportedly earned over $1 billion in 2018), the title isn't just a cultural phenomenon -- it's also a serious cash cow. And, as the great Notorious B.I.G. once said, "mo' money, mo' problems." For Epic, those problems have been caused by Fortnite's Emotes, a collection of real-world-inspired dance moves that players can use with their avatar in the game.
You can finally gift items to your friends in 'Fortnite'
Just in time for the holidays, Epic Games is introducing the ability to gift items to other players in the unfathomably popular Fortnite: Battle Royale. The feature is part of update version 6.31 -- unless you play on iOS, in which case you won't be able to gift items because Apple policy prohibits it. For now, it will just be a test run that will be available in-game for one week, though it's expected that the feature will be fully available sometime in the near future.
‘Fortnite’ streamer Ninja is the first to 10 million Twitch followers
As Fortnite has taken over the zeitgeist, its high tide gave rise to someone else: Tyler "Ninja" Blevins. The streamer has more or less become the unofficial face for the game, appearing in tournaments, racking up sponsorship deals, playing Epic Games' free-to-play cultural phenomenon alongside celebrities. He makes $500,000 a month from streaming. Blevins also crossed a major threshold: He's the first to tally 10 million followers on Twitch, as spotted by Dexerto. This didn't happen overnight, though.
'Fortnite' players are having too much fun with Playground mode
Fortnite's Playground mode might have been designed as a testing ground for newcomers, but that hasn't stopped players with irrepressible creative streaks from constructing things that are a little more niche. From Nintendo 64 monoliths and Mario Kart racing tracks to giant galleons, 8-bit Links and a gorgeous Loot Lake re-imagining, there's a plethora of inspiring content to behold.
PlayerUnknown believes ‘PUBG’ doesn’t need to beat ‘Fortnite’
Brendan "PlayerUnknown" Greene is in an unenviable position at the moment. His namesake game, PlayerUnknown's BattleGrounds was the surprise hit of 2017, going from being an obscure work-in-progress game in Steam's Early Access section to racking up over $60 million in sales in mere months, averaging 2 million daily players on PC and getting a console port via the Xbox One -- all before it hit version 1.0. By all accounts, it looked like the game's continued success was guaranteed. Then Fortnite: Battle Royale happened. This week, Fortnite developer Epic Games announced that in just nine months time, its free-to-play spin on battle royale had accrued 125 million players. (Weeks earlier, PUBG's parent company sued Epic for alleged copyright violations.) But Fortnite isn't the only competition for PUBG. Giants of the FPS world like Call of Duty and Battlefield have announced they're joining the fray, and others will surely follow. Greene couldn't talk about the pending lawsuit, for obvious legal reasons, but when I spoke to him at E3 this week he was candid about the competition and his team's plans to differentiate PUBG from everyone else. Oh and to get this out of the way up front, don't expect PUBG to go free-to-play any time soon. Greene said that the team hadn't discussed it "at all." This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.
'Fortnite' is bringing Thanos to its cartoony battle royale
If you thought Avengers: Infinity War was the ultimate pop-culture mashup, the Marvel Cinematic Universe has another cameo up its sleeve. Franchise villain Thanos will make a limited appearance in Fortnite: Battle Royale starting May 8th, according to Entertainment Weekly.
Blizzard and Epic take 'Overwatch' and 'Fortnite' cheating very seriously
Game-makers have had a field day making examples out of cheaters the past few weeks. Most recently, a pair of Overwatch hackers were charged in South Korea as a result of a year-long investigation by the region's police. Working with Blizzard (translated), the Seoul National Police Agency Cyber Security Department arrested a baker's dozen hackers total, according to Kotaku,
Pro gaming team signs 13-year-old ‘Fortnite’ player
Among the four members making up pro gaming organization Team Secret's new European Fortnite squad, one stood out: 13-year-old Kyle "Mongraal" Jackson. Almost immediately after the team was introduced today, news outlets jumped on Jackson's youth. Even if he may not hold the record (some say the then-12-year-old Jun "TY" Tae Yang was picked up to play StarCraft in 2006, noted Cybersport.com), the Fortnite ace is one of the youngest ever signed to pro team.
'Fortnite' is coming to China
The popular battle royale game Fortnite is coming to China, thanks to a partnership between its creator Epic Games and Tencent. The Chinese tech giant, which owns over 40 percent of Epic, will handle distribution and publishing. Tencent will reportedly spend $15 million on Fortnite in China on marketing to its domestic playerbase and clamping down on piracy and illegal clones, the latter of which is a problem in the country.
'Fortnite' is back online after a day-long blackout
The popular game Fortnite is finally playable across all platforms after a server outage and emergency update took it offline for almost a day. According to a Reddit post by a company employee, a "critical failure with one of [the] account service databases" made the login and matchmaking systems unstable. But for their trouble, Epic Games is giving players of both the game's battle royale and tower defense modes free in-game loot.
'Fortnite' has been down for hours, but don't tell Twitch
Yesterday Epic Games delivered the big 3.5 patch for its popular battle royale game Fortnite, but within hours users started having trouble logging in. Around 6 PM ET yesterday the servers went down for good, and later the team tweeted "We're bringing the servers offline for emergency maintenance. We apologize for this inconvenience. We currently have no ETA on when servers will be back up." The game's status page has been updated several times since then referring to a database problem, but there's still no word when it will be back up. With the outage nearing half a day, anxious gamers worldwide have been itching to get back to the action, not to mention the many people who live stream for others. As of 3 AM ET, the Twitch category for Fortnite showed nearly 50,000 viewers, who were mostly watching archived replays or streamers just hanging out chatting. Record holding streamer Ninja logged out after averaging 80,000 viewers even during the outage. So if you're still up, let us know how you're dealing with the down time. Are you heading back to PUBG, watching old archives or just finding something else to do entirely? Update: After nearly 24 hours, Fortnite is back up, albeit without the new 50v50 mode.
'Radical Heights' is Cliff Bleszinski's free-to-play battle royale game
That didn't take long. After announcing that LawBreakers wasn't living up to expectations (and making enough money), and teasing a new project on Friday, developer Boss Key has revealed the "passion project" it teased. Try to feign surprise when you find out that it's a free-to-play battle royale game. On the surface, Radical Heights stands out from the crowd with a vibrant, quasi cel-shaded, retro-futuristic game-show vibe that hearkens back to the '80s. Meaning, there are a lot of extreme pastels and hot pink triangles complementing its over-the-top Saturday morning cartoon tone.
‘Fortnite’ is now available for all iOS users
If you've enviously watched friends playing Fortnite on their iPhones but couldn't snag an invite during its slow public rollout, fret no more: The mobile version of the battle royale game is finally available for each and every iOS user. Unfortunately, there's still no word on when it will be out for Android devices.
‘Fortnite’ wants to put your dance in the game
The free-to-play Fortnite: Battle Royale has become a cultural sensation with a wide-ranging playerbase. How do we know? Because professional sports players won't stop mimicking the game's weird dances in real life. Maybe one day they'll be doing one of your dances -- because Epic Games just launched a contest for players to submit video of their smooth moves, with the best one making it into Fortnite.
'Fortnite' hot streak grows with a record-breaking YouTube stream
Fortnite's Battle Royale mode continues to be a cultural phenomenon, and YouTube just provided some stats to back that up. To begin with, the company's Ryan Wyatt has revealed that a Battle Royale event set a record for the largest single live game stream, with 1.1 million simultaneous viewers watching ElrubiusOMG in action. Drake and Ninja have some catching up to do. That same event racked up 42 million unique views across the 100 creators involved.
'Fortnite Battle Royale' is coming to phones and tablets soon
Fortnite has rapidly gained ground on the battle royale-style champ, PUBG, and now Epic Games has announced it will launch a mobile version on iOS and Android. Amazingly, it's supposed to be the same 100-player PvP game we've seen on other platforms, and there's even a promise to support cross-play and cross-progression with the PC and PS4 versions. Unfortunately, the Android version is coming "in the next few months," but sign-ups to play on iOS will open Monday with invites to play rolling out soon after. Minimum compatible iOS devices include iPhone 6S/SE, iPad Mini 4, iPad Pro, iPad Air 2 and iPad 2017 running iOS 11.
Epic is shuttering ‘Paragon’ following success of 'Fortnite'
Last week, an Epic Games representative explained Paragon's uncertain future on the game's subreddit, which worried fans -- especially as it confirmed that developers had been siphoned off to assist with the massively successful Fortnite. It turns out those apocalyptic concerns were correct: Paragon is getting shut down on April 26th. To make up for it, every player, on all platforms, can apply for a refund.
‘PUBG’ rival ‘Fortnite’ adds 50 v. 50 team deathmatch
Fortnite: Battle Royale may have caught some flak from the makers of PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds, but that didn't stop it from becoming an instant hit. To build on that success (and steal some of PUBG's thunder, ahead of its arrival on Xbox One), the free-to-play title is adding an insane new game mode. Instead of a 100 player free-for-all, it will be two squads of 50 scrapping it out till one team is left standing. The free mode is available until December 17th on PS4, Xbox One, PC, and Mac.
Alleged ‘Fortnite’ hacker's mom fights anti-cheating lawsuit
The fight against people cheating in online games is getting ugly. Specifically, Epic Games is suing 14 year-old Caleb Rogers for allegedly modding the game and causing the developer to lose profits from his activity in the free-to-play "Battle Royale" mode for Fortnite. Rogers' mother filed a letter with North Carolina's US District Court saying that Epic "has no capability of proving any form of modification" because her son merely installed cheats he downloaded from Addicted Cheats, versus altering the game's source code himself.
