{"id":15000,"date":"2018-03-14T08:58:00","date_gmt":"2018-03-14T08:58:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gamasutra.com\/view\/news\/315485"},"modified":"2018-03-14T08:58:00","modified_gmt":"2018-03-14T08:58:00","slug":"q-a-how-epic-pared-down-fortnite-battle-royale-to-be-fast-and-approachable","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/2018\/03\/14\/q-a-how-epic-pared-down-fortnite-battle-royale-to-be-fast-and-approachable\/","title":{"rendered":"Q& A: How Epic pared down Fortnite Battle Royale to be fast and approachable"},"content":{"rendered":"

Epic Games’\u00a0Fortnite<\/em> has had one hell of a year.<\/p>\n

2017 saw Fortnite<\/em> rise from hidden gem to household name, as popular among celebrities<\/a> and sports stars<\/a> as it is in playerbase numbers. This February it reached a staggering 3.4 million concurrent users<\/a>, beating out genre trendsetter\u00a0PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds<\/em> for the first time in series history.<\/p>\n

After a lukewarm reception to the game’s original, cooperative survival mode, last March saw the first playable release of Fortnite: Battle Royale<\/em>, a player-vs-player\u00a0deathmatch survival game. One hundred players drop from the Battle Bus onto a lush, vibrant island of rolling hills, sandy beaches, and tight clusters of buildings dotted throughout the map to battle it out for last person standing.<\/p>\n

Inextricable from Fortnite<\/em>\u2019s popularity is its unique building mechanics. Everything destructible in Fortnite: Battle Royale<\/em> drops materials, which can be crafted on-the-fly into walls, floors, and staircases. In pitched gunfights, players can throw up hasty constructions to act as impromptu cover, or elaborate towers and fortresses to wait out the tense endgame.<\/p>\n

Both Battle Royale<\/em> and the earlier, cooperative Save The World<\/em> mode have not yet reached release, but are both available to play in early access using Epic\u2019s launcher as development continues. Recently, Gamasutra\u00a0sat down with Eric Williamson (Design Lead) and Zack Estep (Producer)\u00a0to discuss how Fortnite: Battle Royale<\/em> came to be what it is, and how the team brought it to life.<\/p>\n

How did you arrive at the building blocks that went into Fortnite Battle Royale<\/em>? Were there any assets or designs that you wanted to implement but didn\u2019t, or couldn\u2019t?<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Eric Williamson:<\/strong> So there\u2019s a couple parts of my answer for this. First and foremost, when we started Battle Royale<\/em>, we had this tremendous starting place from the Save The World<\/em> campaign that we could use as our sandbox to build on top of.<\/p>\n

\n
“We didn’t want it to feel like it was going to be a huge commitment when you hit the play button. We had to evaluate a lot of gameplay systems and other things under that lens to determine ‘does this make sense?'”<\/span><\/h6>\n<\/blockquote>\n

We wanted to create Battle Royale<\/em> in a relatively quick timeframe. One of the things that we intentionally said upfront was that no one\u2019s on the team\u2019s allowed to say \u201cwhat if\u201d.<\/p>\n

What we meant by that was that because our timeline was so short, and we wanted to create a playable version immediately, it wasn\u2019t \u201chey we could do all these crazy things\u201d it was \u201cwhat can we do, and how can we get it done as quickly as possible.\u201d It wasn\u2019t pie-in-the-sky land. Naturally, that meant that lots of ideas we had didn\u2019t really get fully explored.<\/p>\n

As we continue to update and iterate on the game, we\u2019re adding new items, new systems, new consumables, etc. Those are some of those ideas that we had way back of like, \u201chey what if we wanted to do something like that?\u201d<\/p>\n

You mentioned how you were building off of the base of the STW<\/em> mode, and obviously you had something of a crunched timeline. What was the process of converting that\u00a0into a battle royale\u00a0mode,\u00a0in a design sense?<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Eric Williamson:<\/strong> Where Battle Royale<\/em> is at now, there are a lot of decisions that appear deliberate or may seem obvious, but during the initial development period were still sort of questions. For example, the decision to go with a more natural flowing terrain is a little bit different than Save The World<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Our weapons and weapon tuning as well as the details of our weapons systems\u2014some of that progression isn\u2019t present in Battle Royale<\/em>. There are a lot of traps that are available in Save The World<\/em>, and we have a very small subsection of that. It was a deliberate but also time-constrained decision-making process of what we should do and what made the most sense.<\/p>\n

Were there any things you were specifically looking for or avoiding when taking design assets into Battle Royale<\/em>?<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Eric Williamson:<\/strong> One of the targets that we had very early on was that matches needed to be a reasonable duration: 18-25 minutes or somewhere in that ballpark. We didn\u2019t want it to feel like it was going to be a huge commitment when you hit the play button. We had to evaluate a lot of gameplay systems and other things under that lens to determine \u201cdoes this make sense?\u201d<\/p>\n

For example, Save The World<\/em> has a crafting system that allows you to create things. We considered some parts of that early on, but we felt like if the matches were going to be relatively short, how much time did you want to spend crafting something, rather than scavenging and finding things and engaging in combat?<\/p>\n

We had to be very selective about what types of gameplay that fit in a longer experience that Save The World<\/em> provides, but doesn\u2019t fit in a shorter and more digestible match that Battle Royale<\/em> provides.<\/p>\n

Zack Estep:<\/strong> One of the tenets we had were to make sure stuff was very relatable, across the board. Everything should make sense when you pick it up, or when you utilize it, or through exploring the world. We didn\u2019t want anything that required several sessions of you experiencing that thing before you could mentally grasp it.<\/p>\n

It was a lot of easily mentally-mappable content like that\u2014easy to pick up, harder to master.<\/p>\n

Fortnite<\/em> is a huge game on Twitch, and people are talking about competitive Battle Royale. Was that a part of your design process or were you more focused on casual players?<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Eric Williamson:<\/strong> It\u2019s a silly thing to say, but we were so focused on fun and making the experience enjoyable above all else that those are kind of happy accidents along the way. It\u2019s great we have that exposure on Twitch and that people are picking up the game as they are, but the core for us was focusing on the fun, and making sure it puts a smile on your face.<\/p>\n

In comparison to other BR games, Fortnite<\/em> is the most prominent with a building element. In your design process, did you think that building would change a player\u2019s approach to the game?<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Eric Williamson:<\/strong> Very early on in our prototypes it was really a little unclear how players would use building. In our internal playtests, players felt initially like \u201cwhy would I build a base if the storm\u2019s going to close in and I can\u2019t use it?\u201d<\/p>\n

Over time that\u2019s evolved into \u201cI can build cover very quickly,\u201d or \u201cI can build a base very quickly\u201d and it\u2019s considered a throwaway base\u2014when you\u2019re done with it you move on, you go to the next place.<\/p>\n

\n
“Being able to build as a player means that combat isn’t just a couple shots…it’s this conversation that occurs over sometimes even a couple minutes.”<\/span><\/h6>\n<\/blockquote>\n

We certainly hoped that building would be a core component of the mode, but until we were in the first month or two of being in early access, we weren\u2019t quite sure how that would evolve and if the top tier players would use it as much as we had hoped they would.<\/p>\n

You watch some of these amazing videos of the best builders out there, and you see the dialogue or conversation that they have when they\u2019re fighting somebody else. The strategy they use in how to approach that engagement is really incredible.<\/p>\n

Being able to build as a player means that combat isn\u2019t just a couple shots and someone\u2019s dead, it\u2019s this conversation that occurs over sometimes even a couple minutes<\/em>, and in some ways it\u2019s like watching an artist try to paint with a building paintbrush. It\u2019s really quite incredible to watch.<\/p>\n

In a recent update you introduced an alternative style of building, the turbo building mode.<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Eric Williamson:<\/strong> Yes, it allows players to build much faster by not requiring a separate click for each building piece.<\/p>\n

Zack Estep:<\/strong> Yes, we enabled turbo building, auto material switch, and allowing you to build with less restrictions all with Season 3, that was all done recently.<\/p>\n

Less restrictions?<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Zack Estep:<\/strong> Previously you were put into a position where if there were obstructions in your way you first had to destroy them. Now with the same logic that you can build through hills and mountains, you can build through trees, rocks, and some other obstructions.<\/p>\n

You cannot build through pre-existing structures, but we\u2019ve rolled back some of the logic there for the building system.<\/p>\n

Another thing announced recently was the 20-player team mode. After the fifty-on-fifty mode, what made you want to look into a smaller team?<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Eric Williamson:<\/strong> We think that limited time modes are a really good way to keep things fresh. We\u2019ve done a couple different limited-time modes so far\u2014Fifty-vs-fifty was our first one, we\u2019ve done a rocket launcher and grenade only mode, we did a sniper rifle mode, we did a stealth mode\u2026 it\u2019s a real fun way to do something that isn\u2019t permanent but it\u2019s fun, and it keeps things fresh.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

We saw this as a natural evolution from the fifty-vs-fifty to something you can organize a little bit more with other players. It doesn\u2019t mean fifty-vs-fifty is gone (we\u2019re still thinking on how we can iterate on fifty-vs-fifty and make it as good as possible) but there\u2019s no reason not to have fifty-vs-fifty, teams of twenty, and potentially other things like that.<\/p>\n

Do you think that\u2019ll effectively change the meta of playing? Do you see a shift in meta when they\u2019re playing in twenty-person teams rather than four-man squads?<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Eric Williamson:<\/strong> Certainly, when you have a larger team there are more things that you can do. One of my favorite experiences in fifty-vs-fifty was hearing about someone who decided to be the medic, and all they did was carry around bandages and revive people and not engage in combat\u2014that\u2019s something that\u2019s really cool and doesn\u2019t occur (or is much less likely to occur) in squads. It\u2019s really fun to see that sort of emergent behavior happen.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Epic Games’\u00a0Fortnite has had one hell of a year. 2017 saw Fortnite rise from hidden gem to household name, as popular among celebrities and sports stars as it is in playerbase numbers. This February it reached a staggering 3.4 million concurrent users, beating out genre trendsetter\u00a0PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds for the first time in series history. After […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":15001,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15000","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15000","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15000"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15000\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15001"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15000"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15000"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15000"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}