Fortnite professionals, including many teenagers, have a chance to become multi-millionaires in one fell swoop. The World Championship of the popular shooting game in New York has a total of $30 million to distribute. The winner takes three million home with him.
It’s the biggest game on earth with about 250 million players. The ‘battle royal’ game, a genre in which one player has to compete against 99 others, is an integral part of the life of many, especially young, gamers. Chances are that at home at the dining table is talked about Victory Royale, drum guns and v-bucks. Of course, a world championship can’t be lacking.
This weekend, 200 players will be in action for that giant prize pool. The gamers first had to qualify for a spot in the New York stadium. This happened last year in ten weekends, in which, according to the developer, 40 million (!) people participated. The championship has two parts: duos and solo. In duos, the participants play with a teammate.
Pocket penny
Out of 40 million players, 200 have been invited to go to war in front of an audience of about 22,500 people. Hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of people are watching online.
The 200 gamers have already earned a nice penny with the qualification. They are guaranteed to get 50,000 dollars, but of course everyone wants to get that magical first prize of 3 million dollars.
Wimbledon
This is, by the way, – for now – the highest prize pool in e-sports ever. By way of comparison: it’s also much more than the winner of Wimbledon gets, for example. The contenders are mainly teenagers, including 14-year-old Kyle Jackson. He is tipped as the winner of the tournament. He himself plays about 8 to 10 hours a day, he says to the BBC. They are also mainly boys. Girls have not qualified for the tournament.
Fortnite can’t hold on to the title of the biggest prize pool in a tournament for long. The International, which will be about the game Dota 2, will have an estimated prize pool of around 33 million later this year. The winning team will then take at least $13 million home with them.
The tournament starts on the 27th and 28th of July and can be followed live via streaming site Twitch.
