Epic Games will put $100 Million towards Fortnite Competitions

This is going to make Fortnite one of the biggest eSports games ever, and potentially the #1 eSports game in a few years.

Epic Games, video game company who developed Fortnite, recently announced in their blog post that they will be providing $100,000,000 ($100 Million) towards eSports Tournaments being held for Fortnite in the 2018-2019 Competitive Season. This means that professional eSport players could earn more in Fortnite than any other game. They’ve explained in the blog post how they intend to have a different approach to eSport competitons compared to others, and become more inclusive – this could potentially mean that they would allow anyone to compete. They also want to focus more on ‘the joy of playing and watching the game’, as the blog post read, so they do want to put an emphasis on the enjoyability factor of watching Fortnite Competitions.

Comparision to other eSport Game Prize Pools

Let’s take a look at other eSports game prize pools. Dota 2 has had a total of $140 Million prize money awarded to players, from 918 Tournaments. The biggest tournament held was the International 2017 Dota 2 Championship, with a prize pool of $24.6 Million.

PLAYERUNKNOWN’S BATTLEGROUNDS, the more serious and realistic battle royale game, has had $2.2 million awarded to players from 41 Tournaments, with IEM XII – Oakland being the largest tournament with $200,000 Prize Money. This prize money mark will increase by $2 Million after the Official PUBG Global Invitational 2018 will be held, as it has a prize pool of $2 Million.

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, the classic tactical FPS shooter has had $54 Million being awarded to players over a span of 3236 Tournaments, and the largest tournament held was the World Electronic Sports Games 2017 with a prize pool of $1.5 Million. League Of Legends is on the next spot with $53 Million total prize money being awarded to players, and the LoL 2016 World Championship was the biggest tournament with a $5 Million prize pool.

Blizzard Entertainment’s Overwatch has had $6.9 Million awarded to winners from 571 Tournaments, with the largest tournament being the upcoming Overwatch League 2018 Tournament with a $3.5 Million prize pool. The Call Of Duty World League Championship 2017 held last year had a prize pool of $4 Million.

As you can see, the prize pools of other major eSport titles except Dota 2 are not at all close to the insane $100 Million prize money to be awareded to Fortnite Players.

It’s important to note that $100 Million Dollars in one year is a very big deal, and Dota 2’s $140 million prize money awarded was done in a span of over 6 years. In 2018, Dota 2 has had 41 events and $9.8 million being awared to players till yet – Fortnite’s $100 million is more than 10 times that. This $9.8 Million mark can go up to $40 million after the to be held World Championship 2018, so still not close to Fortnite’s $100 million mark. Imagine Fortnite’s total prize money being awarded after a few years!

The total prize money being awarded to players also includes tournaments held by third parties. Some events are sponsored while most are not, so $100 million being put for eSports Tournaments by Epic Games themselves is amazing.

Epic Games is said to be making more than $2 Million per day from Fortnite, after releasing the game on iOS as well and even having cross play between PS4, Xbox One, PC and iOS players. A report said that Fortnite made nearly $300 Million in April 2018 which translates to $10 million a day! Fornite has clearly won the Battle Royale Race against PLAYERUNKOWN’S BATTLEGROUNDS and has also become the biggest eSports game in history.