Fortnite Message Board

As Epic told me during GDC, sugar-cereal-colored buildy blaster Fortnite isn’t fourscore feet under, as a) that’d be total overkill and b) it’s doing just fine. After a lengthy period of radio silence, the Unreal Engine mega-maven has finally seen fit to re-reveal the game and begin taking sign-ups for an upcoming alpha. The biggest (noticeable) change so far? Fortnite is now officially free-to-play.

… [visit site to read more]

Before GDC, Epic’s ubiquitous Unreal Engine was a walled garden. But that all changed when company president Johnny Epic waded into the conference crowd while bellowing, “You get an Unreal Engine and YOU get an Unreal Engine” to everyone in attendance. And then he chainsawed a life-size replica of traditional gaming industry business models in half. Or at least, that’s how I like to imagine it happened. I was asleep while John took the bullet of waking up at Ungodly O’ Clock to attend Epic’s presser. The takeaway, however, was obvious: Epic is trying to make its engine more accessible to everyone - full-time developers, part-time indies, and no-time hobbyists alike. I asked Epic engine GM Ray Davis how the studio plans to achieve that (hint: Minecraft) and also about where Fortnite‘s gone because I pretty much had to.

… [visit site to read more]

Generally speaking, Epic’s a company that likes to put its best foot forward. When it debuts a new game or engine, everything’s polished to a gloriously gritty sheen – even if a look behind the curtain tells an entirely different tale. So Fortnite‘s PAX presentation was – for many reasons – a strong reminder that the crayola-colored survivor is Different. It began, for instance, with Tanya Jessen, Cliff Bleszinski, and co running us through very early Unreal Engine 3 prototypes of Fortnite’s combat – complete with desolate checker box backgrounds and near-superheroic levels of Aliasing-O-Vision. But that’s the point: Epic considers its construction-centric opus a “living project,” and it wants fans in on the ground floor.

(more…)

It’s been ages since Epic last took up PC gaming’s banner and affixed some sort of completely bonkers weapon to it. Instead, the Unreal creator has been off duct-taping chainsaws to other platforms while we spill warm tears onto screenshots of Jazz The Jackrabbit. But no more. Epic recently announced that Fortnite – at least, for the time being – will be leading on PC and debuting Unreal Engine 4 to boot. So I had a massive chat with producer Tanya Jessen about that, during which we discussed Minecraft comparisons, the not-so-obvious benefits of Unreal Engine 4, Fortnite’s cartoony art style, online aspects, and why Epic never really left the PC behind. It’s all after the break.

(more…)

Let’s start with some good news, shall we? First off, Fortnite’s looking quite nice and – based on an interview I just wrapped with producer Tanya Jessen (which you’ll see all of tomorrow) – the Unreal-Engine-4-powered survivor is, by and large, taking full advantage of every tool at PC gaming’s disposal. In other words, expect a constant flow of new content, some form of mod support, and impressively open-ended, procedurally generated worlds. It’s not all uncharacteristically colorful cartoon roses, however. At this stage, Jessen told me, a constant Internet connection requirement ala Diablo is still a possibility. She assured, however, that it’d be used first and foremost to improve the game – not as a last line of defense against piracy’s nighttime pillages.

(more…)

After a long, harrowing journey in which he was forced to duct tape an assault rifle and chainsaw together to escape the vacuous innards of a consolebox, Cliff “Don’t Call Me CliffyB” Bleszinski (and, I suppose, Epic’s legion of insanely talented guys and gals) is back on PC. So then, what does the formidable devourer of puppies have in store for us this time? Well, in short, Fortnite‘s an Unreal-Engine-4-powered exclusive that, er, sounds a whole lot like Minecraft.

(more…)

Unreal Engine 4 will, no doubt, power many next-generation video games in the coming years, including those that come out of Epic Games. The first game to use the studio’s new engine technology, however, will be the previously mysterious Fortnite.

We already knew Fortnite was influenced by Minecraft, but what was shown at a panel today in San Diego for Comic-Con sounds like a much more ambitious take on something like the Zombies mode in Call of Duty.

Epic Games is describing Fortnite as a "co-op sandbox survival game." Players spend the day building defenses and crafting items, weapons to defend against enemies at night.

At the moment, Fortnite is shipping on PC sometime in 2013, but designer Cliff Bleszinski has already said that doesn’t mean it’s a PC exclusive forever.

“Fortnite is PC primary and first, but we wouldn't rule out the possibility of other platforms later,” he said on Twitter.

Fortnite’s reveal trailer suggested that the game could be borrowing ideas from Minecraft, Fort Zombie and Team Fortress 2, along with many other things. Now that details are beginning to emerge, Epic have admitted that Mojang’s block ‘em up was indeed an inspiration. Lead designer Lee ‘Unscratch’ Perry took time to broadcast the following messages through his personal Tweet-o-Tron: “Minecraft lets you build ANYTHING, we are focusing on constructing ‘buildings’ specifically”. A later tweet contained this: “Minecraft was an inspiration for sure”. With that out in the open, the obvious thing to do was to ensure Notch backed our demand that the game come to PC. A few more details about the game await below.

(more…)