PLAY SPEAKS WITH KEY MEMBERS OF THE DEVELOPMENT AND BUSINESS TEAMS AT EPIC GAMES TO INVESTIGATE THE INCREDIBLE RISE OF BATTLE ROYALE, THE STATE OF SAVE THE WORLD, AND WHAT THE SUSTAINED SUCCESS OF THESE TWO TITLES COULD MEAN FOR THE FUTURE OF THE GAMES INDUSTRY
Fortnite was never supposed to become a global attraction. Then again, few creations ever are, and few videogames ever do. From casual players to seasoned gamers, for school children and celebrity icons, Fortnite: Battle Royale has become something of a genuine obsession. It has reached a plateau reserved for those special few videogames that are able to confidently pierce the consciousness of the general public while still igniting a spark of imagination in the minds of players around the world. The Fortnite IP has found itself in a position that few in the industry ever imagined it was capable of reaching – and that includes its creator, Epic Games.
It would be easy enough for this level of attention and success to act as a rush of blood to the head, but the veteran game creator and engine maker is humble in its assessment of the cultural compulsion it has found itself at the heart of after a whirlwind seven months. “We’re really lucky that we’ve become a part of this cultural phenomenon,” Kim Libreri, Epic Games’ chief technical officer, tells us as we attempt to navigate the storm that is currently enveloping the influential studio. “We just wanted to entertain people, but we’re a part of the zeitgeist now, just like the community that is playing the game.”
“So, where has it [the success] all come from? I don’t know, was it the chicken or the egg?” laughs Libreri, though he failed to elaborate any further on the analogy, so stick with us on this one. The egg, we surmise, is Fortnite: Battle Royale itself; the chicken, the players that have appeared in their millions to play it; the two utterly inseparable from one another when considering 2018’s most unlikely success story.
But that success is there, and it is clear for all to see. There are YouTube and Twitch streams viewed millions of times over; we’ve seen confused cable news anchors scramble to process its impact, and it has pushed politicians and pundits to crawl back out of the woodwork to once again decry the influence of videogames on society. The industry hasn’t seen anything on this scale for quite some time, and it’s electrifying to witness it in real-time.
It has even surprised Epic’s founder and CEO, Tim Sweeny – a creative force that we’d suspect has just about seen it all after his 27 years at the forefront of the industry. Sweeny is watching on with interest, eager to see where Fortnite could possibly go next. If he’s certain of anything though, it’s that it isn’t going far without the support of the community that has formed around it. “I have to say, because I really do wonder, but who are the real developers of Fortni
