Over its two year existence, Fortnite has struggled to decide whether it will take itself as a serious competitive game in eSports or gear its platform more towards its younger generation of players. The introduction of gameplay aspects such as siphon (+50 health per kill) and material limitations (1500 total), signaled the game was leaning into a competitive profile, also managing to appease a constantly frustrated and irate pro player community. However, the ongoing battle of siphon's place in the game, changing metas and game strategies (i.e. hand cannon, vehicular ballers, tommy gun), and an overall underdeveloped competitive stage, has left Fortnite in a limbo of EPIC proportions. Add onto this the factor of prize pools ranging in the millions of dollars and viewer counts in the hundreds of thousands, the game is a raging and imperfect machine barreling towards a "Fortnite World Cup Finals" this summer with over thirty million dollars at stake.
A product of game developer, Epic Games, Fortnite is still in its "beta" stage as per their official website and game application, meaning the product is far from a finished product and resulting in an experience riddled with bugs, glitches, and various technical problems. This has been exemplified through players being stuck in vehicles, party connectivity issues, render resolution and quality concerns, and "black spots" throughout the mapped out world among various other things. An imperfect gaming experience to say the absolute least. While this is understandable and Epic Games does work to do their best in immediately solving bugs/issues, tournaments and competitions are still being held under such circumstances. Asking competitors to perform and play under imperfect conditions and within a bugged platform, results in the player base becoming increasingly frustrated with the game, turning professionals further and further away.
Another problem that Fortnite faces at the moment is their feeling of necessity to host tournaments, competitive cups, and various events while pumping in millions of dollars through prizes and cash awards, $100 million just in the 2018/2019 season. As touched on before, the game is a work in progress and riddled with a good deal of problems, but this has not stopped those in charge from pushing out more and more money to its players through competitions. Rather than putting this capital back into the game on further development of software and performance, Epic has rather opted to push its "competitive profile" through a wealth of prizes and steep investment in its player base. And this is where it all comes together for Fortnite.
Tournaments and competitions are giving out millions of dollars in hopes of endearing the current base while trying to entice more people to turn to the competitive stage. Professional players participating in such competitions are being subjected to bugged and imperfect gameplay while waning for a more robust and well-rounded gaming experience fit for the eSports stage. On top of this dichotomy of interests, Fortnite is also attempting to maintain and appease its younger audience as well, as the majority of players fall below the age of eighteen. All of this has resulted in changing metas and strategies, imbalanced gameplay, and a revolving door of bugs and issues.
Fortnite is a game grasping to find its identity while dealing with mass amounts of money and players, struggling to perform under the expectations of an entire gaming genre and the bright lights of the eSports world.
One last grievance to air out before signing off. If Fortnite is going to continue to host major tournaments and competitions, their streaming service and performance needs a sizable upgrade. As of right now, Fortnite is streaming gameplay through the application and website known as "Twitch", a vastly popular outlet for streamers and professional gamers. There is no inherent issues or concerns with the platform, but the way Fortnite has opted to cast competitions has resulted in so many lag spikes and streaming glitches that viewing has become almost unwatchable. While the competitions may be flawed and wrought with imbalanced and bugged gameplay, the least Fortnite could do is make it all watchable for the hundreds of thousands of viewers who are tuning in…for now.
written and edited by Jack Kurtz
