Is Fortnite Dying? – Asking the important question
Is Fortnite dying? It’s a question that’s probably been asked since roughly half an hour after the release of Fortnite. Any game with an active community with inevitably be declared dead fairly often. There are often reasons for this morbid speculation though. As a game ages, it is natural for some people to view declining interest or the novelty of something new wearing off as a sign their favorite game is dying or dead.
There is near-constant debate about the health of an ongoing game like Fortnite. At the moment, Epic is having big successes with large live events. However, some of the best Fortnite players are moving on from the game, which isn’t the best news for their competitive scene. Chapter 2 breathed new life into the game. Although, both seasons of the new chapter have been extended quite far past their normal expiry date, leaving a lot of players a bit bored. With the same content for months on end and stale tournaments, a lot of players end up asking is Fortnite dying.
A lot of the time these conversations over is Fortnite dying are spurred on by a big name playing complaining about the death of the game. Most recently SypherPK has weighed into the debate about Fortnite dying.
© Fortnite
Is Fortnite Dying?
The argument that Fortnite is dying tends to come from those who are bored with the game. Looking at this from an objective viewpoint, the viewer numbers for their live events and revenue figures each year show pretty conclusively that Fortnite has a huge player base and continues to make quite a lot of money. This means people are playing, and they’re spending enough money to motivate Epic to keep the game updated and active. These are about the two only real tests for the activity of a game, does it have a player base and is it currently maintained by the developer.
Beyond that though, if Fortnite is dying is a little more open to interpretation. If is Fortnite dying is taken to mean a more general decline, then it is debatable. Pro players like SypherPK and Ninja have discussed this.
They mention an idea that the old version of Fortnite is dead. This is fine in of itself and could explain to a certain degree the constant speculation over its health. Fortnite moving from an old version to a newer can give the impression it is dying to fans of the older game. Those who invested enough time to learn its intricate mechanics and use the best Fortnite settings might feel the game is dying just because they’re no longer interested. However, when the new version maintains a really high player count, it is hard to argue this is really death.
Is Fortnite’s Competitive Scene Dying?
This is just a common a question as is Fortnite dying. This one is a bit harder to dismiss out of hand. It is hard to ignore that Epic’s competitive events are drawing fewer viewers and causing less excitement. They can be forgiven a little for this though if you put things into context. The Fortnite World Cup is very much the bar that competitive events in-game are now measured against. However, this isn’t really a fair comparison.
The World Cup was a big one-off event. This kind of scale and success wasn’t intended to be sustained through week on week of the Fortnite Champion Series. This year’s world cup has now been delayed, so we might see even less competitive Fortnite until 2021. There is little excitement for Fortnite betting right now, but big events aren’t everything. Fortnite’s big events are the exception and not the rule. If you judge the competitive scene to be dead as it lacks tat huge focal point, you’d have to judge the entire scene as dead before that tournament too.
Fortnite has a large and active player base. That player base might be made up of different individuals than it was this time last year though. As players move on, new players with great skills become well known. Fortnite isn’t dying just yet. No game lives forever with an active community, but it is pretty premature to declare Fortnite dead already.
Read next: Can You Win Fortnite by Doing Nothing?
