To say that Fortnite is a pretty popular game would be like calling Michael Jackson a pretty popular musician. The kind of following and cultural impact that Fortnite has had is something that has not been seen since the days of Super Mario. It’s not just that a lot of people are playing Fortnite, it’s that the game has infiltrated the pop culture consciousness in a manner that is almost unprecedented. A lot of that success comes from the fact that the game is free to pay, which means that a lot more people who wouldn’t normally be interested in shelling out dough for yet another multiplayer are getting hooked on to the game.
There is also the inherent absurdity of the game itself. Most multiplayer games take pride in being as gritty and realistic as possible as they want the players to know that they are engaged in a serious activity with serious stakes. Fortnite flips the script by making the whole thing seem like a fevered, cartoon dream. With each new successive season of the game, we get a gradually unfolding lore, and what the complete backstory behind the game might look like, no one can directly tell, but it will have to include aliens, superheroes, dinosaurs, fifth-dimensional planes, black magic, and teleportation. That’s a pretty tall order to fill for the makers of the game. Before you dive into another round of Fortnite mayhem, here are some awesome tidbits about the game that players sometimes forget, but deserve attention due to their fun and often bizarre nature:
30 Land Faster Via Sea Drop
Here’s a useful little tip if you want to skip the leisurely parachuting onto the area of battle: the glider that you use to reach the combat area needs to be at a certain height before it opens; however, this only applies if you are gliding above a land mass.
Take the glider out over a water surface by flying out of the island. Then, descend to the most comfortable height and release the glider. You can dive towards the land much faster and have more time to gather resources before the new round starts.
29 Loot The Woods And Trees
In most of these types of Battle Royale games, the ammo, medical supplies, and other resources are typically located in towns and cities. Fortnite messes with this trope by also supplying the surrounding forest areas with plenty of loot.
So, if you are looking to pick up supplies for the big battle, don’t think that you need to travel as fast as possible to the nearest town to gather supplies. Head to the woods and start hunting for the things you need the most, and don’t forget about the gold chests hidden in secluded nooks and crannies!
28 Stick To The Main Island
The game battle takes place on an island that is one of the many islands in the surrounding area. With player curiosity being what it is, you will often find a gamer or two completely losing interest in the main battle and will instead keep trying to reach one of the nearby islands, just to see what’s on them.
Nothing is on them. Those other islands are just there for decoration. If you try to get to any of the islands other than the main one, you will fall into the sea and pass away immediately.
27 Start From A High Point
You can tell which player is new to the game when they start the game from the ground and try to enter houses using their doors. The most experienced Battle Royale fighters understand the advantage of falling on a tree or the top of a house at the beginning of the game.
From the tree, jump onto the roof of a house and make your way inside with a pickax. This lets you immediately access the attic, which is usually chock-full of gold chests with all sorts of cool loot for you to raid.
26 Share Resources With Teammates
In the immense competitive environment of the game, players often develop an “every man for himself” mentality, but winning the game is as much about teamwork as it is about personal skill. If your partners in crime are lacking in a particular kind of loot, you can supply it for them.
Simply open your own inventory and look at the stats of the collected weapons. If you have some supplies in access that your teammates can use, throw them out. This will toss the item onto the ground nearby, which your teammate can then pick up.
25 The Friendly Blue Circles
Everyone likes destroying random, inanimate things within the game. This is also a way to get Easter eggs and resources hidden inside the objects. During the course of destroying an item, you may have noticed little blue circles appear over the item.
Many players ignore these circles, but they are actually there to help you. The blue circles act as markers and indicate which parts of the object under attack are most vulnerable to damage. Hitting these critical spots allows you to destroy the object much more quickly while also receiving more resources.
24 Build A Trap
The game allows players to build their own defenses in the form of forts and embankments, but what many players don’t realize is that you can also use your building skills to create traps for your enemies.
Fortnite allows players to build around enemies. What this means is, if you are fast enough, and your enemy is incapacitated briefly in some manner, you can quickly build a room around them. Once you find yourself walled in from all sides, all you can do is wait for the enemy to come and finish you off inside your little cage.
23 Become John Wick
Taking characters from pop culture and putting them in the middle of the game has worked very well for Fortnite. And what better character is there to include in a Battle Royale free-for-all than the Baba Yaga himself, Mr. John Wick.
To get the Wick skin, first, you have to play through a host of challenges in the Battle Pass. After you are able to successfully complete your missions, you gain access to the John Wick look upgrade. Players who have reached tier 100 and completed seven more challenges also gain access to a glider similar to the Mustang driven by Wick in the movie.
22 The Secret Bunker
Imagine how useful an underground bunker would be in a game like Fortnite. Well, you don’t have to imagine it. Such a construction can be found by players who venture into Snobby Shores and find an enormous, orange building with mushrooms in front of it.
Enter the building and find a bookshelf that you can smash into the ground. Behind the bookshelf will be a secret flight of stairs. Head down the stairs to get to the underground bunker, where you will find plenty of ammo and loot. There’s also all kinds of additional survivalist equipment.
21 Become An Architect
There’s really not much you can do with your building skills aside from building basic defensive structures, but what many players forget to do is choose a bunker design from the many choices laid out for you in the blueprints of the structures. This allows the player to play around with the choices and create some unexpected construction.
For instance, inverting the roof of your structure can give you bendable areas to hide behind while shooting at enemies. You have a lot of freedom to think outside the box and create defensive structures that baffle and confound your enemies while you rain down fire.
20 Running Is Counter-Productive
In a Battle Royale scenario, you might think that being quick on your feet would give you an advantage over your less fleet-footed rivals. But, the fact is, running all over the map while trying to take down your enemies can actually make you an easy target.
The reason is simple: you make a lot more noise while running as opposed to walking or crouching when moving forward. Any player with a decent pair of headphones will be able to detect the sounds you make and be ready for you when you do arrive to engage him in battle.
19 Use Headphones
Piggybacking off that last point, it can be very worth your while to invest in a decent pair of headphones for playing the game. Like we said, one of the easiest ways to get tipped off about the arrival of enemies nearby is by listening for their footsteps.
But, you won’t be able to take advantage of this fact if you’re playing the game without headphones and have music on the TV blaring nearby. In order to play the game strategically, you need to be aware of your in-game surroundings as completely as possible, both visually and audibly.
18 Remember The Main Aim Of The Game
Players often get the wrong idea about Fortnite. They treat it like a game of Counter-Strike, where stacking up your stats gives you a special position among the other players. It almost seems illogical to play Fortnite and not try to take out as many enemies as possible. But remember, Fortnite is a game about survival, not increasing your body-count.
You can eliminate 98 other players during a round, but if you get eliminated by the last remaining other player, you will still lose the game. Focus on strategy instead of going in Rambo-style.
17 Playing The Game For Actual Money
It’s no secret that playing video games in the era of Twitch streams for the YouTube generation can make you ridiculous amounts of money. Right now, Fortnite is one of, if not the most, popular game in the world. Naturally, that means the top player of the game can license his skills for some serious dough.
Meet Richard Tyler Blevins, a.k.a Ninja, the most popular Fortnite player of recent times. It has been estimated that Blevins makes upwards of $500k per month just from streaming his gameplay for his legions of fans in return for sponsorship and crowdfunding money.
16 The Reason For The Name
Have you ever wondered why the game is called Fortnite? The answer lies in the gameplay. In British terminology, a fortnight is two weeks of time. In the game, the hardest mode had you trying to survive against hostile forces for two weeks of game time.
Of course, that’s not two weeks of actual time, which is a good thing because we’re pretty sure legions of obsessed players would willingly stop eating and bathing to devote a full two weeks to master the game at its hardest level.
15 Get A Refund On Items
V-bucks are the in-game currency that players can use to buy new items in the game. Now, unlike regular games, these items give you no advantage over players who don’t spend money on items. Instead, the things you buy are mostly there to make you look cooler and flashier than others.
However, you can also get a refund on a purchase if you are unsatisfied with your item. Your game account menu has an option called “unintentional purchases,” and clicking on this items leads you to the list of things you can return and get a refund for. But, it only works three times for each individual account.
14 The Mysterious Meteors
Season three of the game gave players a glimpse of objects in the sky resembling meteors that seemed to serve no greater purpose than looking pretty in the night sky, but fans correctly assumed that the meteors were going to have significance in the next season.
And they were right. In season four, we find out on the very first day of the game that the meteors have struck the map of the game at multiple points. This was an excuse to allow developers to dramatically alter the existing landscape and offer a fresh map for players to battle in.
13 The Pricey Fortnite Font
Fortnite has a special font created for its own use, which is called “Burbank Big Condensed,” and it is the style used to create most of the lettering for the game. Naturally, with the popularity of the game itself, the font has also become a popular choice among players.
Too bad, because it turns out that not just anyone can use the font. The Burbank is now one of the most expensive fonts in the world at $45k per license. That means you need to get special permission and pay to use the font.
12 The Story Of Crackshot
Crackshot’s head may look like a bizarre aberration, but there is a person behind the mask. A man with a tragic past, he was a guy who just needed a job, any job, and he found work at a Christmas place, where the Nutcracker outfit was given to him; however, it made the children scream upon seeing him.
As a result, he quit the job, but the mask proved impossible to remove. Crackshot had to endure trying to breathe through a mask with no air holes for years before joining the Homebase. All of this is revealed in a backstory when you play “Save the World.”
11 Find Chilly Gnomes
Most recently, Fortnite’s Season Seven Week 6 challenge is to find chilly gnomes, seven in total, on the Battle Royale map. These gnomes can be found in the winter biome that dominates the southwest portion of the map.
The way to find a chilly gnome is quite interesting. When you come near a chilly gnome, you will be able to hear it shivering. When you hear the sound, follow the shivering to its source and you will find a chilly gnome encased in a block of ice. The gnomes can be found in the upright position or lying on their side.
