My housemates and I have become obsessed with the video game Fortnite in the last month or so. Tonight, they all played, while I attempted to document the events that followed.
Game One:
The team floats in a blue bus above a battle torn island.
“Where are we going?”
“That purple waypoint”
“The blue one or the purple one?”
“Uh the blue, erm the purple one.”
Hanna finds a glowing golden chest and opens it. She finds a rare machine gun.
“Come to this house and revive me, we can start a family together”
“Where did the people go?”
The team regroups under some stairs.
Hanna walks outside the building at the Lazy Lake. She looks at balloons.
“Ooh ooh ooh!”
“I just got hit by a car!”
“Did we kill that person?”
Hanna walks up a ramp to find a shield potion. She drinks it. The team has established control of the Lazy Lake.
Hanna strafes across a low residential firing steadily with her assault rifle. She knocks down an opposing player. The team follows up with enough damage to finish the enemy team.
“Sarah, Sarah! There’s someone on you”
“Are they on top of this building?”
Hanna starts climbing stairs to try to reach the roof. She gives up and jumps out a window.
“Is there still someone ‘Fortniting’* over there?”
“Atty, there’s someone running towards you”
“Oh, shizznickle”
Hanna runs through a field. She jumps over a fence. The team has relocated to Retail Row.
“Oh they’re Fortniting. I don’t know if I can handle this. Oh I’m shooting. Oh I’m down. They just killed me at once”
Hanna is killed. We begin spectating Atticus.
“How does this charge shotgun work?”
“You just hold the trigger down”
“Oh wow. Cool”
Atticus and Sarah attempt to avenge their teammate’s deaths. Atticus is slain in a firefight. Sarah dies soon thereafter. The team places sixth.
Game Two:
The team jumps from the flying bus and dives towards Retail Row.
“Guys there’s a shitload of people in this town. Ping where you go and we can try to..Yellow house? Yellow house?”
“Sure”
“Oh I’m dead. There’s a person on the roof. You guys! Oh no”
“Where on the roof?”
“I mean, he’s not on the roof now, he’s in the garage somewhere”
Hanna dies.
“There’s someone downstairs Sarah! They’re really bad. They’re stuck in a crouch. Except they killed me”
“Ok Basil you’re on your own”
Basil is at less than half health. She forages for wood, then runs around collecting the fallen teammates’ ‘reboot cards’**
Basil heads for the nearest reboot station. She drives into a metal guardrail. The guardrail does not budge. She goes around the guardrail. She finds a reboot station and revives the team.
The team climbs aboard a pickup truck and drives across the map, heading for the safe area where they will not be damaged by the impending storm.
Basil drives the truck off of a dam. The truck falls into the water and all team members are tossed out.
Hanna scavenges an abandoned sewer station for guns and supplies. She finds a submachine gun, but not much else.
“Is that slurp juice?”
“Oh thank God!”
The team breaks open a tanker truck full of ‘slurp juice’ that heals them all replenishes their shields. They run through the forest, and come upon a gas station.
“Sarah, that car is really fast. Watch out.”
“Ok”
“Enemies, enemies”
“Wait, are we ditching Basil? Basil’s fighting!”
The team regroups and comes to Basil’s aid.
“Wait there’s someone over there. We got a bogey!”
“Low on fuel”
Hanna is being attacked by a dinosaur. She kills the dinosaur, but the storm is fast approaching. A fast-paced firefight breaks out. Hanna lays down suppressing fire as the team flanks. Hanna heals and replenishes her shield.
“Hanna, come jump off this thing”
“What thing?”
“Wait, grab that big shield and eat it first”
“Ok where’s the launch pad”
“It’s right here”
“Dope”
The team goes flying through the area, towards the zone of safety.
“Woohoo!”
Hanna follows Basil up a series of ramps until the team is perched atop a purple crystal spire. They survey the landscape for enemies. The team takes fire from below. Another team assails them. Structures are hastily built. Hanna knocks them down. The team loses vision of the enemies. The storm approaches. Two teams remain.
The storm closes in and a the other team emerges. A pitched battle.
“I’m down”
“I’m down too.”
“They shook me down”
“Basil?”
Basil continues the fight offscreen. She succeeds. Victory Royale!
*Fortniting: using the game’s building mechanic during a fight, a difficult but essential method in higher skill level matches.
**Reboot Card: an item that allows teammates to revive fallen members.
Second and Slightly Worse 