[9/26/2022]
Five years. Five years of this game. Also five years of me playing this game, by sheer chance, I just found out that I first opened it up on its launch. Guess I should review it a bit. Of course, it'll only cover Battle Royale, because Save The World has been on life support for years.
Where do I begin? I suppose how it was the game that shot up into the spotlight as the game absolutely everybody knows. 2016's was Overwatch, early 2017 was Breath of the Wild, and late 2017, '18, and '19's was Fortnite. With attention like that, you've absolutely got to make the best of it. Fortnite definitely did. Every handful of months. So much so, that it was the game to push the idea of a Battle Pass into the mainstream. Look where we are now. Thanks, Fortnite. At least it understands the art of the live-service model, though, unlike a LOT of other companies. More on that later.
The gameplay is your typical 100-man battle royale. You scavenge, you shoot, you kill, you win. But the building sets this game apart from others. Most BR games emphasize good positioning to stay alive, but Fortnite's building allowed you to play defense at any given moment. Positioning still plays a big part, but building adds an additional layer that helps those without good positioning and further boosts the power of those who do. Today, that mechanic still exists, but when players have been optimizing it for five years, it creates a skill floor that continues to rise as players get better and better. Not a lot of people want to warm up for half an hour to even begin getting a chance to win. Thank god for Zero Build. The removal of one mechanic just makes you hone the rest.
Describing the rest of the gameplay and how Fortnite as a whole is meant to be played is very heavily dependent on the current state of this game. Fortnite's live service popularized the model, but Fortnite still does one of the best jobs at maintaining its momentum. Alongside the typical drastic shift in loot and map locations at the beginning of every in-game season, Fortnite tends to add more during its course typically on a weekly or biweekly basis. Whether its just a few returning items, or bombshells of content, the season's evolution makes each one wholly unique from the other, with their own experiences and memories associated with them.
So, back to Fortnite becoming the game shot into the center of the cultural zeitgeist at the time. Remember how in May of 2018, they got so big that they collaborated with Marvel Studios to bring the Infinity Gauntlet and Thanos to the game? We thought of it as a once-in-a-lifetime crossover at the time, but that was just the beginning of the massive Pandora's Box known as Fortnite collaborations. We've reached a point where there are more collaboration cosmetics being released than original cosmetics. This, to me, poses one of Fortnite's largest issues. Fortnite's original identity was built upon (pun intended) its less serious style and its defining gameplay feature. Now, it's ended up losing part of that identity in favor of tons upon tons of collaborations. Some make sense, like collaborations with other games. But then you have shit like El Chapulin Colorado and it is just... flabbergasting at how much Fortnite has in it. I think the greatest way to prove that Fortnite's old identity is gone is with the existence of Zero Build. I love Zero Build. But the fact that so many people cheered at the addition of a mode that removes Fortnite's core mechanic that made it stand out and get huge at the very beginning is indicative of two things: 1) The building has gone out of control (undeniably), or 2) The building just isn't that important to Forntite's identity anymore as that identity has shifted to some other component of the game. That component being, of course, the large amount of crossovers.
Fortnite's impact on the gaming landscape is utterly gargantuan. Those three paragraphs before this one all focused on the Fortnite's biggest influences: the popularization of the Battle Royale genre, the popularization of the live-service model, and the popularization of absolutely zany crossovers. Fortnite and the shockwaves that it spread throughout the world are undeniable. If you somehow haven't already played this game, do so. I'm sure Zero Build is very appealing.
Five years. Five years of this game. Also five years of me playing this game, by sheer chance, I just found out that I first opened it up on its launch. Guess I should review it a bit. Of course, it'll only cover Battle Royale, because Save The World has been on life support for years.
Where do I begin? I suppose how it was the game that shot up into the spotlight as the game absolutely everybody knows. 2016's was Overwatch, early 2017 was Breath of the Wild, and late 2017, '18, and '19's was Fortnite. With attention like that, you've absolutely got to make the best of it. Fortnite definitely did. Every handful of months. So much so, that it was the game to push the idea of a Battle Pass into the mainstream. Look where we are now. Thanks, Fortnite. At least it understands the art of the live-service model, though, unlike a LOT of other companies. More on that later.
The gameplay is your typical 100-man battle royale. You scavenge, you shoot, you kill, you win. But the building sets this game apart from others. Most BR games emphasize good positioning to stay alive, but Fortnite's building allowed you to play defense at any given moment. Positioning still plays a big part, but building adds an additional layer that helps those without good positioning and further boosts the power of those who do. Today, that mechanic still exists, but when players have been optimizing it for five years, it creates a skill floor that continues to rise as players get better and better. Not a lot of people want to warm up for half an hour to even begin getting a chance to win. Thank god for Zero Build. The removal of one mechanic just makes you hone the rest.
Describing the rest of the gameplay and how Fortnite as a whole is meant to be played is very heavily dependent on the current state of this game. Fortnite's live service popularized the model, but Fortnite still does one of the best jobs at maintaining its momentum. Alongside the typical drastic shift in loot and map locations at the beginning of every in-game season, Fortnite tends to add more during its course typically on a weekly or biweekly basis. Whether its just a few returning items, or bombshells of content, the season's evolution makes each one wholly unique from the other, with their own experiences and memories associated with them.
So, back to Fortnite becoming the game shot into the center of the cultural zeitgeist at the time. Remember how in May of 2018, they got so big that they collaborated with Marvel Studios to bring the Infinity Gauntlet and Thanos to the game? We thought of it as a once-in-a-lifetime crossover at the time, but that was just the beginning of the massive Pandora's Box known as Fortnite collaborations. We've reached a point where there are more collaboration cosmetics being released than original cosmetics. This, to me, poses one of Fortnite's largest issues. Fortnite's original identity was built upon (pun intended) its less serious style and its defining gameplay feature. Now, it's ended up losing part of that identity in favor of tons upon tons of collaborations. Some make sense, like collaborations with other games. But then you have shit like El Chapulin Colorado and it is just... flabbergasting at how much Fortnite has in it. I think the greatest way to prove that Fortnite's old identity is gone is with the existence of Zero Build. I love Zero Build. But the fact that so many people cheered at the addition of a mode that removes Fortnite's core mechanic that made it stand out and get huge at the very beginning is indicative of two things: 1) The building has gone out of control (undeniably), or 2) The building just isn't that important to Forntite's identity anymore as that identity has shifted to some other component of the game. That component being, of course, the large amount of crossovers.
Fortnite's impact on the gaming landscape is utterly gargantuan. Those three paragraphs before this one all focused on the Fortnite's biggest influences: the popularization of the Battle Royale genre, the popularization of the live-service model, and the popularization of absolutely zany crossovers. Fortnite and the shockwaves that it spread throughout the world are undeniable. If you somehow haven't already played this game, do so. I'm sure Zero Build is very appealing.