On January 15, it was announced that Tyler ‘Ninja’ Blevins would be the first major Fortnite personality to get his own skin in the game.
As part of the Icon Series, Epic Games are bringing a number of streamers to the battle royale title, making skins of their likeness available in-game, so fans can play as their favorite streamers.
Ninja is the first personality to be eternalized in Fortnite, and his popular streamer peers have reacted to and made their opinions known on the Ninja Fortnite skin. While many simply congratulated Ninja on his achievements, some offered a little more.
The Two-Time, back-to-back Blockbuster champion, Dr Disrespect, didn’t waste time letting his opinion be known.
The Doc, obviously, made a little joke at the expense of the Fortnite developers but offered “firm handshakes” to Ninja, who he says it took them way too long to create in-game cosmetics for.
Given the fact that he was always in favor of PUBG creating Dr Disrespect-themed skins, his support of Ninja here is no surprise.
I will say this, it took way too long for Epic to add an influencer skin, let alone a @Ninja skin.
These skinny developers from North Carolina finally woke up.
Firm handshakes Ninja.
— Dr Disrespect (@DrDisrespect) January 15, 2020
Meanwhile, good friend Tim ‘TimTheTatman’ Betar took the opportunity to roast his long-time streaming partner for his embarrassing incident that occurred on New Year’s Eve 2018.
It’s hard to forget the sheer awkwardness of Ninja standing in front of hundreds of fans in the middle of New York City’s Times Square, one of the most famous New Year celebrations in the world, and attempting to get the crowd to floss with him – to absolutely no response.
Of course, Tim made a joke of that situation as soon as the Ninja skin became available to him, doing the ‘Floss’ emote and telling his chat he “doesn’t see enough movement” while attempting the worst floss you will see.
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Ever the optimist, Turner ‘Tfue’ Tenney took a slightly different angle on the Ninja skin, claiming that he wasn’t actually the first personality to get one.
As well as the default Jonesy skin – which bears an uncanny resemblance to the former FaZe Clan member – he also noted that Marshmello had got one, and then Ninja.
This doesn’t do much to prevent the rumors of ongoing beef between the two Fortnite and livestreaming megastars, but it’s unlikely that bothers Tfue too much.
(Timestamp 5:27 for mobile users)
While much of the main reactions were from fellow top-tier Twitch streamers, Fortnite players or close friends of the star, one of CSGO’s best players, Oleksandr ‘s1mple’ Kostyliev also reached out to Blevins.
In a tweet posted shortly after the game, s1mple tagged Ninja and congratulated him on the “well-deserved award.”
Congratz with well deserved award in your game @Ninja
— Sasha (@s1mpleO) January 15, 2020
The Icon Series definitely seems like something that has been a long-time coming to Fortnite. The game became a pop-culture phenomenon and people such as Ninja have helped it grow massively, as well as vice versa.
As well as Ninja, Kathleen ‘Loserfruit’ Belsten and David ‘TheGrefg’ Martínez will be getting in-game skins at some point in the future as part of the Icon Series.