Now nobody wants to read another blog post about the craze of Fortnite but I thought as the craze dies out it would be a good idea to analyse where the craze came from, how it became a 9 year olds heaven and if we will see it again.
Fortnite exploded on to the scene in 2017 with a new game mode added to their stylistic survival game. Originally it was just going to be the paid co-op survival game “save the world” but due to the lack of popularity Epic Games decided on a radical new strategy. Micro transactions.
Ok well micro transactions weren’t exactly new or radical but they had never been a big hit outside of mobile. If you don’t know, micro transactions is a money making strategy used by mobile game company’s. The basic concept it that you get the game for free but to get skins, in game currency and other perks you have to pay real world money. Now in console and PC games you can often buy things with real money but they are not as critical to you being good and/or looking good in the game. There’s always a way to get the things you want through actual work not money. This is because it is not absolutely the game companies only source of income as they just got money of off you buying an expensive game.
Anyway back to fortnite’s micro transactions. Epic decided to stray away from the pack and make an absolutely free console and PC game. Everybody rushed to try this new game that was free and apparently a great game. Everybody wanted a new game and it’s free so what’s to lose? Right? Well quite a lot. Fortnite spread like a toxic virus through the gaming community. Everybody had the game and everybody wanted the new skins, dances and gliders Epic had to offer. Nobody wanted to be the noob with a default skin. Unfortunately for every mums credit card out there the only way to get these new things was you guessed it. Micro transactions. This led to a craze of buying v-bucks. People were spending more money than their parents had and it became and out of hand monstrosity.
Other than it’s obvious money issues it was also highly addictive as a Victory Royale was highly sought after. Especially as the competition of who had the most wins continued. The whole thing was a vicious cycle that insnaring 125 million people in its trap. It’s rapid popularity overshadowed many game releases and set other companies back millions. It seemed for a while there would only ever be one game. Fortnite.
Unfortunately For Epic Games Fortnite had one downfall, it’s meme potential. It became a meme but in the worst way possible. Those that played it were shunned as childish sados as Fortnite became more and more of a laughing stock. The game started becoming less and less popular and now there are more anti-Fortnite memes than videos of people buying v-bucks. It’s certainly on there way out and the uprise of better battle royale games isn’t helping. Many say they will switch to COD Black Ops 4 : Blackout when it come out. Fortnite by October will be well and truly dead.
Now the question is will we see another Fortnite? Probably not. The craze for a free console and PC game is probably over. Its popularity was mostly of off circumstances and is very unlikely to be repeat. Epic will probably try to replicate their luck with another free/not free game but it probably won’t work and they will have to swap to paid games. Unfortunately I don’t think Fortnite’s success could be replicated with a paid game. It may be the end of Epic Games but Fortnite will always go down as the second most popular one hit wonder. After Minecraft of course.
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