Fortnite Battle Royale has undoubtedly been one of the most popular games in the world since its 2017 release, but there have been some absolutely terrible moments that players may want to forget ever happened as well.
The game’s esports scene was once touted as the next big thing, with prize pools like no other. The Fortnite World Cup of 2019 saw Kyle ‘Bugha’ Giersdorf go home with a whopping $3 million, and with so much money up for grabs, the contempt from the competitive community spread like wildfire.
Every decision from developers was being scrutinized. The time’s patches were released, the guns vaulted, trying to keep up with the meta, and young children thrown into the spotlight for being good at what is – let’s face it – a game always angled for the younger generation.
Since then, a lot of the YouTubers and pro players who used Fortnite in their rise to prominence have since given up on it.
While a lot of players took some of the worst moments to heart in Fortnite’s history, let’s take a moment to reflect on them with a bit of comedy. Because some of this, you just couldn’t make up. Oh, we’ve ranked them as well.
7 – Ballers
Just when you thought Fortnite essentially turning into Sea of Thieves for a few weeks was bad enough, some Jurassic Park style balls entered the mix and made things a whole lot worse.
At one stage, people would be using these annoying vehicles right up to the final circle they were so fast and difficult to destroy. There was even one bug, involving the volcano, that shot the vehicle up so high you could see a full birds-eye view of the map. We finally saw them removed in Season 10, thankfully.
6 – Vaulting the Pump Shotgun
One of the biggest outcries from the Fortnite community came back in Season 9, Chapter 1. The Pump Shotgun – which was by far the most popular in its class – was kicked to the curb, and replaced by the Combat Shotty.
Did you seriously just vault the most important gun in your game? Theres no way you guys are this out of touch
— Chap (@ChapFN) May 9, 2019
After being called everything from out of touch to clueless, Epic eventually u-turned on their decision and brought it back. It’s fair to say at this point, some had totally lost it with the amount of strange weapon changes in-game. Such a strange, but memorable, gaffe.
5 – Patch notes were vaulted
When Chapter 2 came around and we were all sucked into that big black hole, the game was unplayable for some time. Millions of posts were made on social media, and from an advertising standpoint, it was a tremendous success. Everybody was talking about what was happening in the game and had no idea where they were going next.
Problem is, we still didn’t have a clue what had changed when we dropped into Chapter 2. In fact, we’ve been none the wiser about what’s changing from patch to patch ever since, leaving players to run around and find things themselves.
The patch notes were an opportunity for the dev team to show off new features and for players to get excited by changes, which were a weekly tradition. Since then, hype has dwindled and patches generally feel like they land without the same heavy punch. It was a terrible decision – and one we still can’t get our heads around.
4 – The content drought
There was a lot to be excited about when Chapter 2 dropped. It felt fresh, mixed things up. Though, coupled with the absence of patch notes, there wasn’t actually a lot going on for a long period of time.
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The developers delayed the release of Season 2, Chapter 2 until way after Christmas which meant the game reached its longest-ever period without a major update. This content drought, as many would call it, killed off any hopes of big streamers sticking around and by the time Season 2 came around a lot of YouTubers and Twitch streamers – who were driving FN hype – had turned their back on the game. It hasn’t quite recovered since.
3 – Planes
The X-4 Stormwing plans were just horrible from the word go. They were so overpowered and needed to be nerfed many times over before being able to stay in the game, but even then we had professional players teaming in them during tournaments. It was just a big mess from start to finish.
In Season 7 when they were first added, they could knock down entire structures and not suffer damage themselves. They could tear through teams with the gun function at the front, and generally, it was very difficult to hit those opponents high in the sky. They scrapped the vehicle in Season 8, with the consensus being: good riddance.
It was hilarious to see tournaments ruined by the things, though, you have to admit that.
2 – BRUTE Mechs
The BRUTE Mech suits were like something from another world, walking giants that didn’t quite belong in Fortnite – but rather Fallout.
They were super difficult to take down at first, and while in short supply, you would still see these dominant machines ruining gunfights right to the final circle in almost every game. They had rocket launchers, two people could safely operate them, and get around the map with these insane jumps in seconds. What a wild time to play the game.
Fantastic when you’re a terrible player laying waste to players who have been sweating for wins all night, yet in real terms, just not something anybody ever wanted to see in the game. They were changed, tweaked, and all that good stuff for a period of time – but eventually Epic Games realized they needed to put the old dog down.
1 – Infinity Blade
This one tops all of the rest. It’s really the outrageous nature and certain doom factor that came with the Infinity Blade that makes it the worst thing to ever happen to the game.
The idea sounded great as well. The entire lobby dives into one location trying to get it, the one who does wield it gets a huge armor boost and can slay the entire lobby for being the fastest there. Actually, on second thoughts, no. That’s a terrible idea!
What we really ended up with was games where players were killed off in insane numbers in the first few minutes. The rest being a long-drawn-out process. When you did reach the closing stages – shock horror – the Infinity Blade would be waiting to destroy you.
Imagine winning tournament prize money with this thing! The most ludicrous thing we’ve ever seen in the Fortnite world.