Success boosted by streamer Ninja
Fortnite, the popular video game produced by Epic Games, has passed the $1bn revenue mark in the Battle Royale version.
Fortnite has two main modes: Save The World, the purchasable version of the game where the player fights against hordes of zombies in order to save the world, and Battle Royale, the free-to-play version where gamers fight against each other to be the last man standing.
Mor than 125 million people have downloaded Fortnite Battle Royale since its October 2017 release, according to Epic Games. With 40 million people playing every month, the game has broken numerous records and is currently one of the most popular games, behind League of Legends, which counts 67 million monthly players.
While the game is free-to-play, huge sales of cosmetic items (only purchasable through real money) and advertising helped by celebrity endorsement, helped Epic achieve this milestone.
Ninja, one of the most popular Fortnite streamers, has helped the game to grow rapidly. In March, Ninja and the rapper Drake, broke Twitch records with its 635,000 concurrent viewers. As a result the game made $614m in March and April combined.
As well as Drake, Ninja has played with many other celebrities, such as Harry Kane and Marshmello, which has helped to promote the game to a wider audience.
Fortnite hasn’t just helped Epic Games; it has boosted the gaming industry as a whole. SuperData Research, a data analyst firm, says it has brought more players to console and popular streaming services such as Twitch.
A total of 700 million hours of battle royale content was viewed in May with Fortnite accounting for 83 per cent of those hours, demonstrating how popular the game is.
Due to the success of the battle royale genre, many games have moved to adopt it. Call of Duty and Battlefield, two of the most popular games, will soon have battle royale mode. The genre is expected to make $12.6bn in revenue this year across all games, up from just $1.7bn in 2017. The future looks bright for battle royale, with revenues expected to grow to $20.1bn in 2019.
