Fortnite brought the current Marvel season storyline to a climax tonight with a climactic battle against Doctor Doom that drew a peak of 5.6 million concurrent players.
For an hour, players teamed up to take on a giant, rampaging version of the classic Marvel villain, but eventually his armor cracked, his health bar dwindled, and he was sent to the Marvel Multiverse. I was sucked in everywhere. It came out from.
Fortnite’s own statistics show that there were 5.6 million in-game players overall as of just after 7pm UK time tonight, when tonight’s live event began. This is the highest number of concurrent connections for the game since last December, when 11.6 million players flocked to the Big Bang Live event, which featured a performance by Eminem and teased the arrival of LEGO Fortnite, racing and music modes. is.
Tonight’s big battle with Doctor Doom played out a little differently than other in-game events in the past, and while mechanically quite simple, it made the Fortnite live experience memorable.
Tonight at 7pm UK time, players gathered to watch Fortnite’s heroes thwart Doctor Doom’s arrival, only to see the masked villain show up anyway. As Doom forces his way onto the island, the event cuts to a rare in-game cutscene that shows fan-favorite characters being targeted and even mascot Jonesy in danger. This lasts until Hope, the heroine of this chapter, stands up and breaks Doom’s mask with the Captain. American shield.
Then the event moved to the main phase. It’s a long boss fight against the towering Doctor Doom, who has a sizable health bar that doesn’t seem to be going down anytime soon. Instead, players found it took multiple matches to defeat Doom, as the game’s global community worked together to whittle down Doom’s health rather than fighting each other.
Whether due to live adjustments by Epic Games or a sudden uptick in damage dealt, Doom’s health bar seemed to drain faster as the hour-long battle continued. After three or four matches – Doom was still rampaging, his health bar slowly dropping – damage was visible to the armor he had forged from this chapter’s MacGuffin – Pandora’s Box – and Hope’s The voice was heard again, signaling that the battle was over.
The heroes’ plan succeeds, as Doom’s health is finally exhausted. Torn from existence, Doctor Doom dropped his cracked mask as he left the island – now a permanent reminder of the battle. (I had to laugh as I watched every player in the game get run over and start hitting the mask with a pickaxe as soon as the battle ended.)
Of all the Fortnite events, this was one of the most memorable in a while. Admittedly, this one didn’t have the detailed gameplay of Galactus Events or the storytelling impact of The Device. However, the return to live action was slow this year, and while the short cutscenes provided a nice moment of victory for Hope, whose storyline this season has centered around, the long nature of the fights meant that this was a fight. For something really powerful that brought real sensations. In the end, just under an hour felt like the right length. It needed to be long enough for players to share news of the event with friends and invite other players to join, but not so long that it would wander around and other players would drain Doom’s health. . for you.
Fortnite is already teasing what’s next for the game – the annual Halloween extravaganza, Fortnitemares – and beyond… with Doom already defeated and this season ending on November 2nd? Before the month, exactly what happens next will make the player think about what to think. Fortnite has been switching up its in-game map every year for the past three years, and similar changes are expected to begin again. But after the huge success of last year’s OG season, now is definitely a good time for Epic to focus on a new season as well.
