So what’s new in V10.10 Content Update?

Dusty Depot is back but don’t get your hopes up it is only back as a prefab in creative mode. The full list of Prefabs and galleries is:

• 5 New Prefabs
  • Dusty Depot Blue Warehouse
  • Dusty Depot Gray Warehouse
  • Dusty Depot Red Warehouse
  • Dusty Depot Visitor Warehouse
  • Dusty Diner
• 2 New Galleries
  • Dusty Depot & Diner Gallery
  • Dusty Depot & Diner Prop Gallery

What’s new in Fortnite Save the World?

There is a new rocket launcher. The V6 Rocket launcher which is a 6 shot rocket launcher and part of the Rat Rod Weapon set. It does not consume ammo but has very low durability.

A new quest has appeared so make sure you run Hit the Road to activate your weekly quest!

There have been some bug fixes:

• Mission details now correctly update when switching between different Missions with a controller.
• Resolved an issue where objective information was not displayed for the current Mission.
• Added some information that was missing from the Command and Armory tabs.
• Fixed an issue where the map was not loading properly after changing tabs.
• Game no longer crashes when launching a Mission through the “Play Now” button in the quest log.
• The Record Dash quest no longer states to find five records instead of four when in a full party.

What has changed in Fortnite Battle Royale mode?

This is what most people are here for. The additions to the BR mode are as follows:

1) There is a new throwable item called the Junk Rift. It creates a rift in the sky that objects fall out of the sky and destroys things they land on. When thrown it breaks on contact with something (hopefully another player). It generates two types of damage.

1. Direct Damage – It does 200 damage to players and knocks them back a little.
2. Shockwave Damage – This causes a small damage radius that does 100 damage and immediately destroys vehicles and destructible objects.

The Junk Rift has Epic Rarity and max stack size of 4. it will be available from Floor Loot, Chests, Supply Drops, and Llamas.

2) Glitched Consumables: appear at the explosion site (explained below) and randomly switch between forageable items. The following items are included:

• Apples – Grant 5 Health.
• Mushrooms – Grant 5 Shield.
• Coconuts – Grant 5 Effective Health (sum of a player’s Health + Shield).
• Peppers – Increase player movement speed for a short duration.
• Hop Rocks – Decrease player gravity for a short duration.

Shadow stones were supposed to be included as a Glitched Consumable but had a bug and have been removed.

The Rift Beacon at the Rec Center has malfunctioned, which has caused an explosion and crater. This is where the Glitched Consumables spawn.

There has been a change to the Green Toy Wrap which means players can get a refund on the Toy Soldiers Wraps bundle if they do not like the changes. Players have 30 days from their next login to get this refund.

This week Epic Games has finally come to their senses and have nerfed the B.R.U.T.E.

We’ve made adjustments to the B.R.U.T.E. in all game modes and temporarily removed the Junk Rift from Arena and Tournaments playlists.

This update is rolling out to all servers now, read the full details on these changes here: https://t.co/Xm3YIQJBaI

— Fortnite (@FortniteGame) August 22, 2019

Why are they Nerfing the B.R.U.T.E ?

The B.R.U.T.E is a mech that was introduced a few patches ago and was insanely overpowered. This was shown when Harrison  Chang AKA “Psalm” who came second place in the Fortnite Solos World Cup used the B.R.U.T.E devastate the field. He got to a high vantage point then proceeded to take out players from across the map.

What are the nerfs to B.R.U.T.E?

• Decreased the maximum amount of rockets fired by the B.R.U.T.E. in a single charge from 10 to 6.
• Decreased the rate at which the rockets are fired from the B.R.U.T.E. by 56%.
  • Our goal with these changes is to increase the back and forth between the users of the B.R.U.T.E. and the players they face. These changes allow the players on the receiving end of the missile volley to have more time to react and protect themselves.
• Decreased the radius of the B.R.U.T.E.’s rocket explosion by 42%.
  • Our goal with this change is to improve consistency and understanding around focused barrages of missiles. B.R.U.T.E.s will continue to be a strong option against structures, but less lethal against players.
• Increased the dash cool-down from 3 seconds to 5 seconds.
  • The previous dash cool-down not only increased the B.R.U.T.E.’s mobility, but also made the B.R.U.T.E.s a harder target to hit from distance than we’d like. The adjustment here reduces the ability to close gaps quickly while in the B.R.U.T.E. while also increasing the ability to land shots on target for players facing the B.R.U.T.E.
• Decreased the velocity gained from boosting while in air by 33%.
  • We want to reduce a B.R.U.T.E.’s ability to engage and disengage at long distances to encourage a more strategic approach to an encounter. In general we hope to shift B.R.U.T.E.s away from being highly mobile and put more emphasis on their already defensive nature.
• The B.R.U.T.E. no longer grants materials to the driver and passenger when stomping or dashing through the environment.
  • Note: This change should roll out shortly following the other changes.
  • Our goal is to add more tension between being in and out of a B.R.U.T.E. as well as reduce instances where players can farm faster than intended without exposing themselves to danger.
• Adjusted the variability of spawn rates for storm phases 1, 2, and 3 in core modes. Arena spawn rates will remain unchanged.
  • Storm phase 1
    • New spawn rates
      • 29% chance to spawn 0.
      • 14.3% chance to spawn 1.
      • 14.3% chance to spawn 2.
      • 14.3% chance to spawn 3.
      • 14.3% chance to spawn 4.
      • 14.3% chance to spawn 5.
    • Old spawn rates
      • 33% chance to spawn 2.
      • 33% chance to spawn 3.
      • 33% chance to spawn 4.
  • Storm phase 2
    • New spawn rates
      • 25% chance to spawn 0.
      • 25% chance to spawn 1.
      • 25% chance to spawn 2.
      • 25% chance to spawn 3.
    • Old spawn rates
      • 33% chance to spawn 2.
      • 33% chance to spawn 3.
      • 33% chance to spawn 4.
  • Storm phase 3
    • New spawn rates
      • 25% chance to spawn 0.
      • 25% chance to spawn 1.
      • 25% chance to spawn 2.
      • 25% chance to spawn 3.
    • Old spawn rates
      • 33% chance to spawn 1.
      • 33% chance to spawn 2.
      • 33% chance to spawn 3.
  • Previously, the early stages of a match were guaranteed a minimum amount of B.R.U.T.E.s. We’d like to provide a little more variance to that experience so that matches don’t always play out the same way. The overall average number of B.R.U.T.E.s per game is reduced slightly.
• Decreased the material cost of using the gunner’s overshield from 200 to 75.
  • Our goal is to further emphasize use of materials for positive defensive benefit.

• 

  Increased the Health of the B.R.U.T.E from 1000 to 1250.

  • With the above changes, users of the B.R.U.T.E. need to play a bit more strategic than before, so we want to give a little bit longer of a window to do so.

Other changes

Epic games had  temporarily disabled the Junk Rift for the FNCS tournament and Arena playlists until the 10.20 update. the reason they are doing this is because of an Audio bug that occurred when the portal was high above the player.

Is Season 11 Ever Going to Start?

As you probably know by now Fortnite has disappeared into Black hole. There is speculation that it will never come back but let’s be real. This is the most popular and possibly the most profitable game of all time. Would Epic Games really shut it down?

While Fortnite is still popular, the lustre has started to tarnish on the game. When the office managers 12 year old says he would rather watch Shroud play Apex you know that Fortnite is not flying as high as it once was. Maybe Epic should end the game on a high? but no that will not happen

What we are witnessing here is one “Epic” (pun intended) Fortnite promotion. Epic Games needs to get the world buzzing about Fortnite again and what better way to give the game a kick in the pants but to stop the players from playing their favourite game? Even if they are playing something else at the moment.

The biggest Twitch streamers like Tfue, Dr Lupo and Myth have been staring at a black hole for the last day or so but there has been some movement but over at Epic Games.

But of course as we write this THE GAME SERVERS HAVE COME UP!!! GO PLAY LADIES AND GENTLEMAN!!

What is a Battle Royale Game?

The term “Battle Royale” was first popularized by the 2000 Japanese movie Battle Royale directed by the late Kinji Fukasaku. The movie was based on the book of the same name by Koushun Takami.  The film centers on a group of high school kids that are forced to fight each other to the death on an island that has been split up into a number of “death zones“. All the students are fitted with explosive collars to try and ensure that they fight each other. If a student disobeys this directive the collar is detonated and the student is killed.

In BR games there is a storm or circle of energy or similar that slowly restricts the playing area, forcing the players together. This technically doesn’t happen in the movie but does bring us to the next talking point.

What makes a BR Game different from a standard First or Third Person shooter?

Come along as we will delve a little into the history of BR games.

Other than BR there are a few styles of First/Third Person Shooter games.

Death match style games like Unreal Tournament. Where the goal is to get as many kills on the other players in the game.

In a standard First Person Shooter (FPS) there are usually 2 or more teams fighting each other. A good example of this is CS:GO. CS:GO is published by Valve Entertainment and is one the longest continuously running FPS games on the internet. In this type of shooter game one team will win if either of the following conditions occur:

• •  It kills the whole of the other team.
  • Completes an objective like planting a bomb or defusing a bomb.

Both Unreal tournament and CS:GO have long heritages that stretch back into the 90’s. However the history of BR games really only goes back to 2013 and the release of Arma 3. The team that developed ARMA 3 built it to be modifiable by the player base and modify it they did. the two biggest mods that came out of Arma 3 were Dayz which is a huge Zombie survivalist mod and the one we are interested in is “PlayerUnknown’s Battle Royale”. PlayerUnknown ( AKA Brendan Greene) is now famous for role in the development of PUBG (PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds).

Brendan Greene is a huge fan of the Battle Royale movie and decided that it would make a great mod for Arma 3 which he was playing heavily at the time. He admits to not being a great coder but he cobbled together the battle royale mod for Arma 3 and the game was an instant success. he went on to help with the development of H1Z1 which is another standalone third person Battle Royale game. In the mode a

So how did Fortnite become a Battle Royale game?

Fortnite was never conceived as a Battle Royale game. Originally the only mode was called “Save the World”. In Save the World players have to cooperatively fight zombie-like creatures to achieve various missions across a number of different maps. In this mode “the Storm” from the BR mode actually caused the death of 98% of the world’s population.  players gain rewards by completing missions and their characters level up and improve.

Fortnite was never going to be a Battle Royale. It was actually conceived as cross between Left 4 Dead and Minecraft. The unique building element of the game was designed to be somewhat like Minecraft. Suffice to say this mode was not very popular.

So how did Fortnite morph into a Battle Royale? Epic Games had what was reportedly a consultative role in the development of PUBG. PUBG is built on Epic’s Unreal Engine. PUBG was pushing the limits of what the Engine could do so Epic was consulted heavily in technical elements of the PUBG implementation. It was at about this time that Epic got the idea to add a Battle Royale version of Fortnite. Bluehole, the developer of PUBG, sued Epic over infringement of intellectual property but that lawsuit was dropped around June 2018.

It has to be said that Fortnite adding a Battle Royale element at about the same time as helping out with PUBG can’t be a coincidence. No intellectual property was stolen, but you can’t help thinking the seed idea of Fortnite BR mode germinated at about this time. Epic might have gotten the idea from Bluehole, but the Fortnite implementation of Battle Royale went on to dominate the gaming world.

Why are Battle Royale Games so Popular?

It has to be the gladiator effect. The gladiator effect is that feeling a player gets when they are the last person standing. Knowing that 20, 40 or even 100 people dropped into this game, after all the many battles that have taken you are the last person left alive at the end is one of the best feelings ever in gaming history.

Another phenomenon has arisen at the same time as battle Royale games and that is Streaming. Twitch is the most popular live streaming service and twitch’s growth in traffic has developed  a definite spike since the introduction of the battle Royale formulae. Streamers like Ninja, Myth and Timthetatman almost exclusively stream Fortnite battle royale games. Streamers like Shroud stream other battle royale games almost exclusively. These streamers have millions of followers collectively. no other gaming genre comes close to matching these viewer numbers.

We can’t finish without talking about The Storm

What is the storm in Fortnite? It is a ring around the playing area that reduces in size as the game progresses. It’s main job is to force players together to encourage fights and to finally leave on player standing. In the history of BR games the storm has had many variants. In PUBG it is called simply the Blue Zone, which causes varying amounts of damage depending on how far the game has progressed. In H1Z1 it is called the gas. In Apex it is usually only referred to as the circle. Whatever it is called in the Battle Royale you are playing there is one thing they all have in common and that is the storm has the most kills. More than even the best player. Beware of the Storm.