Fortnite is the most popular game in the world at the moment, a distinction it achieved thanks to not only superlative game design and excellent support from Epic, but also the fact that it was available on all platforms, and more importantly, it was available for free. And yet, in spite of that, Epic is rolling in the dough with the game, thanks to excellent implementation of in game transactions.
Take the Battle Pass, for instance- Wedbush Securities analyst Michael Pachter has revealed that the game’s Season 3 Battle Pass sold a staggering 5 million copies on day one- at $10 a pass, that’s $50 million in one day. Throw in the fact that you can even get the thing for free by simply earning V-Bucks by completing all of the tasks in a given season, and this has to be the best implementation of microtransactions a major game has seen yet.
“You can play Game Pass forever by spending $10 once. It’s super smart,” Pachter said in an interview with Games Beat. “People are going to see that somebody has that hard-to-get skin, and more people will sign up for the Game Pass. Epic told me 12 weeks ago that the one that started 12 weeks ago, they sold 5 million Game Passes the first day. $50 million in a day? That’s a good business model. I think a lot of publishers are going to copy that and move to cosmetics so nobody complains about pay-to-win.”
If you are playing Fortnite, have you purchased the Battle Pass? Have you actually spent any money on the game at all? Or do you continue to play it for free (which is totally fine, by the way!)?