Fortnite’s servers have stopped working ahead of a major update.
The multiplayer game went offline this morning to allow developers Epic Games to roll out a major new update, numbered version 42.
The game will be back online at midday in the UK, or 7am eastern time, it said.
“Scheduled maintenance is currently in progress,” it said in an update on its server status page. “We will provide updates as necessary.”
When Fortnite comes back online, it will have been updated to v42. That brings a host of changes – including alterations other the map, a variety of new weapons and items, new loot to be found and changes to gameplay including a new “cheat code” feature.
The update also fixes various bugs and other problems, as well as speeding up some parts of the game, such as better performance on the Nintendo Switch.
The full list of new features can be found in a post by Epic Games on the Fortnite Reddit page. It also separately laid out the various bug fixes and improvements in a post on its official forum.
But the changes led to some frustration among players.
Some pointed to a new update that will allow players to gain exclusive content only if they gift a battle pass to a friend – and complained that it punished players who do not have friends who play the game to gift it to, and as a sign of “how desperate for money this company has become”, for instance.
Others argued that a continuing focus on the collectible “sprites” that were introduced in a recent version of the game was disappointing. Players argued that it was an unfair way of encouraging them to stay engaged with the game, as well as criticising a new addition that only levels up from winning matches and so would make playing the game for recreation less fun.
And yet more complained about other problems that they said had not gone addressed. One user on Reddit criticised the fact that the game’s matchmaking system was only putting them against strong players that meant they were consistently losing – though another replied telling them that the solution was to “get better”.
