Fortnite is considered one of the most popular eSports in the world. Since its release in 2017, it has managed to attract the attention of millions of players – especially the ones who have already had some experience in playing PUBG. The rise and fall of this game are very unique because of a lot of controversies that have surrounded Fortnite in recent years.
What contributed to the popularity of Fortnite?
What made Fortnite so special, first of all, was its gameplay. Of course, some similarities could be drawn with other games in the same genre, but there are some differences. Let’s have a look at some reasons behind Fortnite’s exposure to the gaming world.
Speed
The main reason for Fortnite’s popularity is the well-timed battle royale niche in 2017. While others were watching, Epic acted, and in just 3 months they created a game that, in a few days after release, gathered a multimillion-dollar audience of users. Indeed, Fortnite made a breakthrough in gaming.
New content
Fortnite’s update rate is amazing. Many people can’t keep up with Epic, which adds global changes to the game every few months: new mechanics, map updates, and more. In one of the latest versions, a PVE element was used – a map on which enemy objects are displayed, where powerful weapons can be stolen. In addition, every few days, there are small but noticeable content changes, which does not allow the audience to cool down and turn their attention to other games. For example, fishing and boat elements.
The new and original content of Fortnite did not go unnoticed in other disciplines. Since there were some innovations in this esport, the game actually started to establish itself as one of the disciplines that a lot of people started to follow. While it did not have the same range as CS: GO or Dota 2 for example, numerous professional teams were created. Add to that, esports betting on Fortnite became a possibility in numerous online bookmakers, but the number of such betting sites is still low.
Technical capabilities
Fortnite is less demanding on the technical characteristics of devices, runs from all gadgets and performs an order of magnitude better than most premium games. This makes Fortnite one of the most desired and attractive products.
Problems with Stores
As a result of the launch of Epic’s own payment system inside games on Android, iOS, PlayStation, Xbox, Nintendo Switch, PC / Mac platforms the game was immediately removed from the Google Play Store and the Apple App Store – store rules prohibit embedding alternative payment systems. Apple noted that it was not going to create special terms for Epic Games and all applications from all developers must comply with certain rules and guidelines, which Epic Games, however, violated. Apple has expressed hope that Epic will fix the violations and the Fortnite app will return to the App Store.
Epic Games was prepared for this development and immediately after the removal of the game from the App Store, it sued Apple, accusing it of strangling competition and monopoly. The lawsuit again notes the unfairness of 30% of the commission. But the first clause of the claim, in which Epic Games reminds the court about Apple’s 1984 advertisement, looks much more interesting.
Google’s position is similar to Apple: The open Android ecosystem allows developers to distribute applications across multiple stores. With developers choosing the Play Store, they have a consistent policy that is fair for developers and makes the store safe for users. Fortnite remains on Android, but they cannot keep it on the Play Store due to policy violations.
Epic Games has not yet filed a lawsuit against Google at Epic Games at the time of publication. The Fortnite distribution can be downloaded from the game’s website and is available in the Samsung app store (Koreans, by the way, also take a 30% commission, but do not prohibit alternative payment methods).
Experts say that Epic has practically no chance of winning in court, and therefore it turns to players, portraying platform holders as “evil” in the hope that they themselves will make concessions and create special conditions with a reduced commission.
Decline in Popularity
After all these controversies that have surrounded Fortnite and numerous problems that arose with giants such as Apple and Google, we have witnessed a “fall” in Fortnite’s popularity, which is not surprising. Still, a lot of people – especially youngsters go in for Fortnite, but it is not the same one that used to be. It is unclear how everything ends, but Epic Games will certainly have a headache that needs to be solved immediately to avoid negative consequences.
