Fortnite has just finished their first competitive series (I mean tournaments lasting over weeks) called ‘Summer Skirmish’, which rewarded a total of $8,000,000 to competitive players over 8 weeks. How the tournament worked was for 4 days out of a week, Epic Games would compile a group of 100 players into a private match, where the competitors would battle each other for points. Points were earned differently each week, with different modifiers to change the scoring system. For example, week to week there are different point multipliers added and taken away, like the Kingpin bonus, which gave you a 3X multiplier for getting a Victory Royale, and in the same week you could get this bonus called a Wrecking Ball bonus, that gave you a 2X multiplier for getting 7 kills. The competition’s modes were solo and duo depending on how Epic Games wanted to do it that week. The 8,000,000 dollar prize pool was given out every day to the top performers of the player pools, and the rewards varied depending on the week. But, over 8 weeks, there was life changing checks given out to competitive players of different backgrounds, and the final week a little known streamer named Morgausse earned $225,000 for winning the heat games, qualifiers, and finals to top the charts over the top competitive players globally. Truly heartwarming things seeing someone that isn’t mainstream earning life changing money over a game of Fortnite, a simple Battle Royale game with Pink Teddy Bears, John Wick, and Burger shop mascots with the floppiest tongues I’ve ever seen.
Summer Skirmish was a huge success, and it seems they are looking to repeat this with Fall Skirmish. Epic Games continues to improve their competitive scene and overall gameplay in their free Battle Royale mode.