Everything is different, yet at the same time very similar.
Chapter 3 has arrived in Fortnite, and you know what that means. It’s time for forting and niting and getting those chicken dinners. I could be wrong about one of those three things, or all of them. Thankfully it only took three matches for me to get my first victory royale of the season.
First off, big thanks to the entity that leaked Fortnite Chapter 3 and got the end of last season moved up as well as the start of this season. Of course I’m talking about Epic who, after begging their testers and data miners not to leak chapter 3 details, leaked chapter 3 details themselves. Is it technically a leak if they do it, or is it just premature e-promotion?
Chapter 3 of Fortnite appears to be where Epic goes heavy on the story. Previous seasons have always been lore-heavy with a slowly progressing story that hit big strides at the start and end of each season and mostly existed in the background. But this seems to be the first point where the game is really pushing the story in the player’s face and giving them more direct investment from the start. The goal, as we learn at the first entry point on logging in, is we’re eventually going to help Dwayne “The Foundation” Johnson break the loop and help everyone escape. Good luck with that, that’s kinda Epic’s money you’re dealing with.
Biggest shift of Fortnite Chapter 3 of course is the sexy piñata guys. I mean, the new island. Artemis is literally just the cool side of the pillow, as the island flipped over at the end of Chapter 2. That and the fact that the game is now on Unreal Engine 5. As with Chapter 2, everything is different. Almost everything. There’s a couple landmarks that made the leap from Chapter 1 and 2. Mostly different.
It’s always fun playing a big update like this day one and seeing people very clumsy with new features. Chapter 3 introduced sliding to Fortnite, a bane of my existence from Destiny 2 pvp. Thankfully people are still getting used to the feature, and it hopefully won’t lead to the obnoxious sight of everyone sliding around everywhere. I imagine nobody as of yet has figured out its full potential, but it is week one.
Another potential game changer is the tent, another one of those “let’s throw crappy players a bone” feature. The tent is a new item that you can find and throw on the ground, and it builds a tent. Go figure. You can actually store gear in the tent and have it transfer between matches, you just have to find another tent and you can pull weapons you stored in prior rounds. You can also hide in the tent and it recovers health, and also steal another player’s tent if they deploy it and get eliminated. You don’t get their stuff, you just claim the tent.
There are two interesting healing items this season in the form of the Guzzle Juice (seen above) and the med-spray. The med-spray is literally an aerosol spray can of medicine that heals you pretty quickly, has a finite amount, and heals live. So no waiting on med-kit counters. Damn useful in an active fight because you heal gradually. The Guzzle Juice heals a ton, but in small increments over time and it appears to cancel out if you take any damage whatsoever.
My new favorite gun is the MK-Seven Assault Rifle, the first gun of its kind that has an actual ADS function. It makes the gun very accurate but also limits your field of view and it has a big kick in recoil. Very good on the ass kicking. Since Epic transitioned into Chapter 3 in December, the map is covered mostly in snow in preparation of the upcoming Christmas event. As a result some of the map has still not been uncovered, including what appears to be a Tilted Towers reinsertion.
Happy Fortniting.
MMO Fallout 