Tim Sweeney, head of Epic Games, discussed the future of Fortnite and the constant desire for a programmer to develop a game of something known primarily as the Battle of Royale in a platform, which offers experience with many different species.
A few years after the highly promoted Fortnite Big Bang event, which was introduced by Lego Fortnite, a developer of the Harmonix rock band and a rocket league manufacturer, Psyonix Rocket Racing, Sweeney told Ign on the Unreal Fest 2025 that the key issue of Epic Games remained the fact that people are still thinking about Fortnite as the leading part of the Bit of Royale.
“This is our main challenge so that everyone recognizes that Fortnite is a game of everything and you can experience everything,” said Sweeney, “And it will take some time. We will have to provide many other really amazing species.”
So far, progress towards this goal has been constant. The festival still attracts great musical activities so that it is at the forefront of its season thanks to the modern skins of the player and the musical drop. Lego Fortnite Odyssey, craft experience, has a solid player’s core. But the rocket races were largely withdrawn, and newer modes focused on shooters, such as Reload, were more successful.
During his state Unreal this week Epic Games noticed that external experience in Fortnite was first overtook their own basic Epic modes, something that would seem impossible just a few years ago. But their own Epic Games modes are currently not showing any signs of replication of this success, with the numbers of players well below the main numbers of the Battles of Royale and Zero Build Playlists, not to mention the reloading or the offer of Fortnite og Fortnite Og.
Asked by Ign if the involvement in modes such as the Fortnite Music Festival and various experiences of LEGO Fortnite were where Epic Games, Epic Games Executive Sax Persson vice president replied: “I don’t think we would ever be happy.”
“They also introduced all kinds of musical elements to Fortnite with jams, which have not only a song, but all related rhythms and the ability to play them on your instruments.”
Although, despite the extremely popular live musical events in Fortnite, they generate huge interest and the number of players in millions, Epic has not yet found a formula that generates regular commitment of the same kind.
“Music coped extremely well in Fortnite, but ironically, not so much in music games,” Sweeney noted, “more in Battle Royale and elsewhere. Our next step is to find gigantic -scale music.
“I think that as a rock band and Guitar Hero they themselves achieved in their time, which was a decade or two decades ago, there is a chance to play a musical play with tens of millions of active users, that people simply love and come every evening or weekend to the coolest concert and a competitive play of all kinds.”
How about Lego, a brand that is perhaps the deepest rooted in the Fortnite ecosystem, and the offer that is most popular of all EPIC modes not shooters.
Again, it is that Epic is still struggling with the fact that Fortnite is currently a brand related to being a Royale battle more than anything else.
“What is our main challenge? Our main challenge is Fortnite, it is Fortnite, and historically Fortnite was a game of a shooter,” Persson continued. “This is no longer a shooter game. This is the game everything and we have to tell this story better than what we have done.”
One of the solutions will be the upcoming implementation of improved opportunities for external teams working as part of the unreal editor of Fortnite, UEFN, Sweeney said. Epic currently has a better set of tools than other creators, but over time it will change – to the extent that their own Battle Royale seasons finally (currently in 2026) will be made with the same tools to which every creator can have access to.
“Our great task is now that two of these programming frames to the intersection, that we, Epic and the creators would work in exactly the same tools with exactly the same possibilities, and the creators will have a lot more power, and this was the thing we have worked on so hard over the last two years.”
But why not just be a great success of Battle Royale? In the case of epic games, the future of Fortnite as a constant experience-and a source of huge income for the company-it is on its further evolution and continuous cultural importance, among the constantly changing landscape of popular tastes and genres of video games.
“I would say that we are successful only with Fortnite as an ecosystem,” Sweeney summed up. “If someone else actually defeats us in our game and builds something that is larger and cooler and better than Battle Royale … I think there is a high probability that this will happen.
It was a busy week for Epic Games, who spoke about the future of artificial intelligence in his unreal engine and in Fortnite after the recent release of a very talkative Darth Vader with AI drive. We also heard from Epic and the Witcher 4 Developer CD Projekt RED on this eye-catching demo Witcher 4-I or the last game will look like something similar.
Tom Phillips is the editor of Ign. You can reach Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on BlueSky @tomphillipseg.bsky.Social
