Fortnite and Mixer star Tyler ‘Ninja’ Blevins became emotional while live on May 21, as he explained to his followers why he misses Fortnite’s original map so significantly.
Fortnite Chapter 2 has, despite initially being seen by many as the next boom stage for Epic Games’ building battle royale, promptly lagged into frustration for a number of the game’s most prominent players.
Skill-based matchmaking, drawn-out seasons, and lack of patch notes are all sticks players have used to beat Epic with. Ninja, despite regularly defending Fortnite from criticism, has grown increasingly frustrated with the game’s new map, a point he explained during his May 21 live stream.
“Quiet man,” Ninja said. “Quiet Fortnite. They [Epic Games] gotta do something about this, mid-game. So many people were being held in the storm because the zone was moving so fast and the map was so big and there was no rotation… and their fix to that was to make it like a four and a half minute storm circle close… all that does is just draw this sh*t out.”
Essentially, Ninja was arguing that the flow of the average Fortnite match has been thrown off by the introduction of the new map, and the imbalance between mobility and map size. This was not a criticism he had of the old map.
“I haven’t seen or heard a shot in like five minutes,” he continued, before moving on to how different the old map felt: “I’m so annoyed, I just miss the old POIs so much man. I do, I miss the old POIs so much. I miss Tilted, I miss Paradise, I miss OG Risky Reels.”
Subscribe to our newsletter for the latest updates on Esports, Gaming and more.
Timestamp – 0:18
“I miss Lazy Lagoon, I miss Lazy Lagoon dude” he finished, before pouring cold water on any hopes fans have of the old map returning. “The old map is not coming back, I just miss it dude.”
The introduction of Chapter One’s map does indeed feel very unlikely. The amount of time, planning, and design that will have gone into the creation of Chapter Two’s map means that a u-turn and reintroduction of the popular Chapter One setting is pretty much off the table.
Regardless, it looks like Ninja wants to see some changes made to mix up the new map and improve its lackluster pacing.