New research shows just how Epic Games is generating those eye-watering revenue figures every month, with their innovative in-game purchases model driving engagement.
Fortnite Battle Royale is an entirely free-to-play game. It is free to download, every weapon is free and you don’t even need to pay for PlayStation Plus to play with friends online on the console – but Epic Games are still raking in record breaking amounts of money.
In May alone, estimates place the total revenue from Fortnite to be $318 million – a staggering amount for any game, let alone a completely free one.
Fortnite makes its money in a similar way to many of its contemporaries, with ‘in-game’ purchases. Items like character skins, back bling, gliders and emotes all cost real money in the form of ‘V-bucks’ to purchase.
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But how Fortnite differs from many of its rivals, is that paying customers do not rely on chance. There are no ‘loot boxes’ or ‘supply drops’, buzzwords associated with the increasing monetization of gaming.
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Instead, players can simply select the item they want to buy, pay for it and it is theirs, with no lucky dip involved. Players are incentivized to purchase items as soon as they become available due to the ‘daily items’ system, with items up for sale changing each day.
Couple this with players always wanting to have the newest skin or emote, and fans are going wild for every new item added. Research done by LendEDU shows that a Fortnite player will spend an average of $84.67.
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- 68.8% of Fortnite players have spent money on in-game purchases
- Amongst Fortnite spenders, the average amount of money they spent was $84.67
- For 36.78% of Fortnite spenders, this game is the first time they have made in-game purchases
- 25.3% of Fortnite players pay for subscriptions on Twitch, a streaming service that enables them to subscribe to watch other people play Fortnite
You can view the full survey results in more detail from LendEDU here.