Fortnite teases Thor for Season 4, announces Free Fortnite Cup
Fortnite has teased that Marvel’s Thor is coming to the game in Season 4 while announcing a Free Fortnite Cup that signifies the end of the game’s updates on iOS devices. Sorry, that’s #FreeFortnite Cup.
The Thor tease is pretty straightforward. The game’s official Twitter account posted a teaser image of a comic book character with lightning coming out of their eyes and emojis of a hammer, a lightning bolt, and a rainbow.
The hammer and lightning bolt are obvious references to Thor, and the rainbow is a reference to the Bifrost Bridge, which might explain how Thor travels to the world of Fortnite. Does that mean that Fortnite‘s world is one of the Nine Realms? Sure. Why not.
As for the, ahem, #FreeFortnite Cup, that’s where things get a little more interesting.
You may be aware that Apple and Google recently pulled Fortnite from its app stores after publisher Epic Games gave a 20 percent discount on V-bucks and tried to set up a direct payment system that would bypass the percentages that Apple and Google take from any and all app sales. Apple did not like that Epic was trying to excuse itself from the rules that every other app developer has to follow and removed the game from the store. Google soon followed suit and removed Fortnite from the Google Play Store for Android. That being said, you can still download and play apps directly on Android, and players are still able to update the game.
This brings us to the #FreeFortnite Cup, which Epic is calling the “final days of the entire Fortnite community’s ability to play together.” The event’s announcement specifically calls out Apple preventing players from updating new versions of the game as the reason for the Cup. The event takes place on August 23rd, as August 27th marks the beginning of Season 4.
Prizes for the event include the Tart Tycoon Outfit, which is a black and white businessman with an apple for a head, and a “Free Fortnite” hat that features its trademark llama done in the style of the old Macintosh logo for the event’s top 20,000 players.
But Epic doesn’t stop there. In fact, the announcement actively prompts its fans to bombard the Apple App Store’s Twitter account with the #FreeFortnite hashtag, which is generally a very mature way for a billion-dollar company to deal with another billion-dollar company it’s currently suing.
Who’s the Tart Tycoon in this scenario? I guess that’s for the fans to decide. However, if you can’t play on your iOS device anymore, you can still play Fortnite on Xbox One, PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, PC, and even Mac, as well as Samsung Galaxy devices.
Michael Goroff has written and edited for EGM since 2017. You can follow him on Twitter @gogogoroff.
