In the ever changing world of gaming, trends will rise and fall faster than any developer can reasonably keep up with. Because of this, developers who want to ride the wave of the currently popular genre often have to be put under serious crunch time or risk releasing a product that ends up being irrelevant and behind the times.
While the modern trends seem to be extraction shooters, and hero shooters before that, turning the clock back to the late 2010s brings us back to when the genre of Battle Royale was all the rage. Fortnite, despite essentially pioneering the genre, has managed to maintain mainstream relevance long after the death of most other games in the genre. It did this through a number of methods, but they all culminated into what can only be described as a masterclass of both marketing and game design on the part of the developer team behind Fortnite, also known as Epic Games.
Fortnite’s ever popular Battle Royale game mode is inching ever closer to its 8th Birthday, but if you’re a regular gamer then you’ve probably hopped on with your friends sometime relatively recently, whether it be to test your skills in Battle Royale or to have some fun in Fortnite Festival. Maybe you eventually stopped playing and did something else like go outside or hop on some live casino games, but it probably wasn’t long until there was a new collaboration or game mode that everyone seemed to be talking about, and you find yourself back on like nothing ever happened. The game’s ability to keep you coming back is almost unmatched, and the characteristics that allow for that to happen deserve to have a close look for the purposes of both education and inspiration.
The ever evolving game modes of Fortnite
In a world in which Fortnite stuck with its original Battle Royale idea and never moved an inch from it, the game would most likely be considered dead or at the very least declining, along with other previous Battle Royale hits. This, however, could not be further from reality and said reality is a key reason how Epic Games has managed to maintain such a high level of relevance over the years. Battle Royale did start out as a game mode in which you dropped in along with 99 other people onto a large map, and you gathered both materials and guns in order to build and fight your way to being the last man standing.
That being said, Epic has performed many different modifications in order to keep the mode fresh and interesting. For one, they will often split the timeline of Fortnite into “Seasons”, in which one season lasts about three months, give or take. Once a season ends and a new one begins, Epic will usually switch out most or sometimes all of the guns and/or consumable items that one can find strewn about the map. Additionally, they will often make small to medium sized modifications to the map from season to season in order to keep things fresh. Because of this, you only have to wait a few months in order to play a heavily different, yet comfortably similar game to the one you were just playing. Additionally, unlockable character and weapon skins, as well as emotes, will often be tied to a season, and Epic has been known to sometimes permanently vault away said skins and emotes once the season they were originally featured in has concluded. Overall, this strategy allows for things to be kept fresh, as well as there is a motivation to play Fortnite in order to not miss out on what might be your only chance to experience the cool things the current season might have to offer.
In addition to Battle Royale, Fortnite has introduced many spin-offs of it, such as “Zero Build”, which is identical to the original in most aspects except for the fact that you can no longer build anything at all. This provides a much more casual experience that new players can pick up much easier, and Zero Build has at times had more players online compared to the original Battle Royale game mode. Additionally, Fortnite Festival is a music-centered game mode that is reminiscent of the old Guitar Hero and Rock Band games, and allows players a nice fresh experience between sessions of building and/or combat.
Fortnite’s Collaborations and how they help it maintain relevancy
Fornite’s other strong suit has been its ultra popular collaborations with celebrities and fictional series alike. Starting all the way back when it collaborated with Marvel to celebrate the release of Avengers: Infinity War, Fortnite has since collaborated with popular celebrities like Ariana Grande and Lionel Messi, as well as popular fictional series like Rick and Morty, Adventure Time, Family Guy, and King of the Hill. The examples provided don’t even begin to scratch the surface of all of the different promotions and collaborations that Epic Games has made into a reality, but hearing that your favorite celebrity or fictional character is playable in a game you’re already familiar with is a good motivator to come back to it and try out what’s new.