Epic Games is gearing up for its biggest shake-up to Fortnite Creative since the introduction of the Unreal Editor for Fortnite. Soon, Epic will allow developers who use UEFN to make Fortnite Creative modes, or "islands," to sell in-game items using V-Bucks, the game's real-money currency.
The news, which Epic announced during the Veteran's Day holiday in the US, was not met with much excitement from fans. The way the Fortnite Creative ecosystem is currently crammed with clones of tycoon, boxfight, and platforming islands, it's easy to see how adding microtransactions to any of the typical island types could be a bad thing. And it becomes much more difficult to see any possible upside when Epic's example idea is to sell people a better shovel for 300 V-Bucks.
Fortnite will allow UEFN developers to sell gameplay items for money soon.
But the reality is actually pretty murky, because V-Buck transactions are a wildcard that could completely shake up the Fortnite Creative ecosystem and encourage creators to try new things. We've got a digital Wild West here, in a sense. Let's try to understand the situation a little better, and get a better sense of where it may lead us, by taking a deep dive into the details.
Right now, creators can use UEFN to make islands that use the V-Buck mechanic, but they cannot publish these islands yet. The most important detail to understand here is that UEFN developers will not be able to sell any of the same types of things Epic sells--meaning purely cosmetic items are not allowed. That means no skins, no pickaxes, no kicks, and no original cosmetic types. Likewise, you can't sell XP gains, since Epic sells account levels in the shop. Random loot crates are allowed but will automatically be disabled in the many countries where that predatory practice is banned.
These restrictions mean, essentially, that anything sold in a Creative island must have a gameplay purpose. So in the current Creative ecosystem, the most obvious options are pay-to-win mechanics, like selling better-quality guns in a boxfight map, or some kind of bonus to your gains in a tycoon. Most of the available options are the kinds of things players generally dislike.
But since the current Creative ecosystem is currently geared entirely toward earning payouts from Epic through engagement and playtime, these V-Buck transactions probably aren't being added for the sake of most existing islands. Most current islands would drive people away if they started charging for things that used to be free, and those island creators will be able to keep earning those same playtime payouts in the same way they have been anyway. In other words, those maps can keep making money the same way they have been, so they may not want to bother with V-Buck shenanigans that could mess up their current streams of revenue.
Instead, adding V-Buck transactions to Creative is at least partially about encouraging UEFN developers to try new things. And it's also about capitalizing on Steal the Brainrot, specifically.
Steal the Brainrot is the most popular Fortnite Creative island ever, with tens of thousands of players at any given moment and hundreds of thousands at peak times on the weekend. Steal the Brainrot is unique in that it's actually a licensed port of a popular Roblox game. It has no direct competition in Fortnite, because unlicensed copycat islands have faced legal action, and the Roblox version has a number of real-money transactions that are, thus far, absent from the Fortnite version.
Kids can use Robux to buy money, items, or Lucky Blocks that contain a random Brainrot--with the best Lucky Block going for $30. The mode also sells access to an "admin panel" that offers the ability to mess with your opponents for $50 or more, depending on the day's prices. We should expect these sort of predatory mobile-style, pay-to-win mechanics to be added to the Fortnite version once Epic allows creators to update their islands with the new microtransaction types.
It's not hard to figure, then, that Steal the Brainrot will be the first major beneficiary of these V-Buck transactions. But that doesn't mean you should expect to see that sort of thing everywhere in Fortnite.
While Steal the Brainrot is a prime candidate for V-Buck transactions, that's not the case for most of the rest of the current Fortnite Creative ecosystem, which is largely built on folks ripping each other off. If one of 500 identical boxfight Pit maps tried selling better guns for V-Bucks, people would just switch to one that didn't do that. And it would be the same story with any of the other common Creative archetypes we currently have. You might see V-Buck donation boxes pop up, but you won't see many paywalls added to existing islands.
As it is now, there's a decent chance that Epic is adding V-Buck transactions to Fortnite Creative specifically to capitalize further on Steal the Brainrot, and there may not be much of an audience for them in the current ecosystem. But the ecosystem will change as a result of Epic offering this new way to monetize maps. You can expect a lot of creators to try the same old exploitative mobile game-style monetization tricks that we're all too familiar with by now, but there actually is some (hypothetical) good news in all this.
There certainly could be some decent outcomes from this. Right now, creators can only monetize based on their engagement stats, and that's led to a lot of trend-chasing as creators keep trying to make "better" versions of things that simply exist to waste your time rather than be particularly enjoyable. While plenty of predatory monetization could come with this, the upside is that it should encourage creators to try new types of games.
For example, this scheme would allow a developer to create an experience within a "paid area" and charge V-Bucks for permanent access--selling a video game within Fortnite, essentially. When devs have more ways to monetize, they're more likely to make more unique things.
But for now, all this is speculative. Aside from those Brainrots, we don't really know what kind of stuff will sell in this ecosystem. This is one of those situations where nobody, including Epic, really knows how it'll shake out, because it's going to be up to UEFN developers, and their players, to decide what works.
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The news, which Epic announced during the Veteran's Day holiday in the US, was not met with much excitement from fans. The way the Fortnite Creative ecosystem is currently crammed with clones of tycoon, boxfight, and platforming islands, it's easy to see how adding microtransactions to any of the typical island types could be a bad thing. And it becomes much more difficult to see any possible upside when Epic's example idea is to sell people a better shovel for 300 V-Bucks.
Fortnite will allow UEFN developers to sell gameplay items for money soon.
But the reality is actually pretty murky, because V-Buck transactions are a wildcard that could completely shake up the Fortnite Creative ecosystem and encourage creators to try new things. We've got a digital Wild West here, in a sense. Let's try to understand the situation a little better, and get a better sense of where it may lead us, by taking a deep dive into the details.
What's actually happening with V-Bucks and Fortnite Creative
Right now, creators can use UEFN to make islands that use the V-Buck mechanic, but they cannot publish these islands yet. The most important detail to understand here is that UEFN developers will not be able to sell any of the same types of things Epic sells--meaning purely cosmetic items are not allowed. That means no skins, no pickaxes, no kicks, and no original cosmetic types. Likewise, you can't sell XP gains, since Epic sells account levels in the shop. Random loot crates are allowed but will automatically be disabled in the many countries where that predatory practice is banned.
These restrictions mean, essentially, that anything sold in a Creative island must have a gameplay purpose. So in the current Creative ecosystem, the most obvious options are pay-to-win mechanics, like selling better-quality guns in a boxfight map, or some kind of bonus to your gains in a tycoon. Most of the available options are the kinds of things players generally dislike.
But since the current Creative ecosystem is currently geared entirely toward earning payouts from Epic through engagement and playtime, these V-Buck transactions probably aren't being added for the sake of most existing islands. Most current islands would drive people away if they started charging for things that used to be free, and those island creators will be able to keep earning those same playtime payouts in the same way they have been anyway. In other words, those maps can keep making money the same way they have been, so they may not want to bother with V-Buck shenanigans that could mess up their current streams of revenue.
Instead, adding V-Buck transactions to Creative is at least partially about encouraging UEFN developers to try new things. And it's also about capitalizing on Steal the Brainrot, specifically.
Steal the Brainrot and your V-Bucks
Steal the Brainrot is the most popular Fortnite Creative island ever, with tens of thousands of players at any given moment and hundreds of thousands at peak times on the weekend. Steal the Brainrot is unique in that it's actually a licensed port of a popular Roblox game. It has no direct competition in Fortnite, because unlicensed copycat islands have faced legal action, and the Roblox version has a number of real-money transactions that are, thus far, absent from the Fortnite version.
Kids can use Robux to buy money, items, or Lucky Blocks that contain a random Brainrot--with the best Lucky Block going for $30. The mode also sells access to an "admin panel" that offers the ability to mess with your opponents for $50 or more, depending on the day's prices. We should expect these sort of predatory mobile-style, pay-to-win mechanics to be added to the Fortnite version once Epic allows creators to update their islands with the new microtransaction types.
It's not hard to figure, then, that Steal the Brainrot will be the first major beneficiary of these V-Buck transactions. But that doesn't mean you should expect to see that sort of thing everywhere in Fortnite.
Are Fortnite Creative and UEFN islands about to be filled with microtransactions?
While Steal the Brainrot is a prime candidate for V-Buck transactions, that's not the case for most of the rest of the current Fortnite Creative ecosystem, which is largely built on folks ripping each other off. If one of 500 identical boxfight Pit maps tried selling better guns for V-Bucks, people would just switch to one that didn't do that. And it would be the same story with any of the other common Creative archetypes we currently have. You might see V-Buck donation boxes pop up, but you won't see many paywalls added to existing islands.
As it is now, there's a decent chance that Epic is adding V-Buck transactions to Fortnite Creative specifically to capitalize further on Steal the Brainrot, and there may not be much of an audience for them in the current ecosystem. But the ecosystem will change as a result of Epic offering this new way to monetize maps. You can expect a lot of creators to try the same old exploitative mobile game-style monetization tricks that we're all too familiar with by now, but there actually is some (hypothetical) good news in all this.
The possible upside to Fortnite Creative V-Buck transactions
There certainly could be some decent outcomes from this. Right now, creators can only monetize based on their engagement stats, and that's led to a lot of trend-chasing as creators keep trying to make "better" versions of things that simply exist to waste your time rather than be particularly enjoyable. While plenty of predatory monetization could come with this, the upside is that it should encourage creators to try new types of games.
For example, this scheme would allow a developer to create an experience within a "paid area" and charge V-Bucks for permanent access--selling a video game within Fortnite, essentially. When devs have more ways to monetize, they're more likely to make more unique things.
But for now, all this is speculative. Aside from those Brainrots, we don't really know what kind of stuff will sell in this ecosystem. This is one of those situations where nobody, including Epic, really knows how it'll shake out, because it's going to be up to UEFN developers, and their players, to decide what works.
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