To celebrate the birthday of its survival/crafting/Battle Royale third-person shooter, Epic Games has announced a limited in-game event for Fortnite. It starts on July 24th and players can earn different cosmetics by completing challenges and quests.

The challenges in question are the following:

• Deal 1,000 damage to opponents to unlock the Fortnite Birthday Emoticon
• Dance at different birthday cakes to unlock the Happy Birthday Spray
• Play 14 matches to unlock 5,000 XP.
• Complete all 3 challenges to earn the Birthday Cake Back Bling

With each completed challenge, a different piece of the birthday set will be unlocked. If you finished the Fortnite Birthday questline in Save the World, then Birthday Brigade Ramirez will be unlocked as a hero.

It’s also possible to earn tickets for Birthday Llamas. Excluding quest rewards, they contain heroes and weapons from all events that have taken place this year. Whether the loot pool will be too crowded or not for getting specific items remains to be seen.

Aside from the launch of Season 5, which has significantly changed Fortnite: Battle Royale’s map, the developer has added Rifts for random teleportation across the map and a new Submachine Gun.

Epic Games’ Fortnite was down for maintenance today, but servers are now back up. The latest content update v5.0 is also available, and it adds two new weapons, one for Fortnite: Battle Royale and the other for Save the World.

Battle Royale players have the Submachine Gun to play around with. The Tactical SMG has been sent to the Vault, so the SMG is your best bet for close range fights. Available in Common, Uncommon and Rare varieties, it uses Light ammo and has a capacity of 30 rounds.

Save the World players have access to the Typewriter Assault Rifle in the weekly store. It will be available from now until July 25th, 8 PM EST and offers mid-range damage with a high capacity magazine. The recoil is tough to deal with but it should be good for killing groups of enemies at close range.

If that weren’t enough, Fortnite: Save the World is currently 50 percent off from July 17th to July 30th. Though it will go free to play at some point, it’s not a bad time to get in on the Minecraft-meets-zombie-horde-defense PvE mode.

Check out the full notes for the content update below, as provided by Epic.

BATTLE ROYALE

WEAPONS + ITEMS

• Submachine Gun added.
  – Available in Common, Uncommon, and Rare variants.
  – 19-21 base damage.
  – Uses Light Ammo.
  – 30 round capacity.
  – Can be found in floor loot and chests.
• Tactical SMG has been added to the Vault.
• Semi-Auto Sniper Rifle damage increased to 75/78 from 63/66.

SAVE THE WORLD

• 50% OFF SALE!Purchase the game for half off for a limited time.
• Starts July 17 and ends July 30.

WEAPONS + ITEMS

• Typewriter Assault Rifle added to the Weekly Store.
  – A mid-range assault weapon with a high capacity magazine and a lateral kick. Its shooting profile makes it ideal for clearing groups of nearby enemies in mobile engagements.
  – Available Wednesday, July 18 at 8 PM EST until Wednesday, July 25 at 8 PM EST.

With the release of update v3.5.2 of Fortnite on PC, consoles and mobile, there are a bunch of new things to do. The limited time 50v50 mode is finally live in Fortnite: Battle Royale as is the Light Machine Gun while the Save the World has a new questline “Into the Storm: Encore”.

This can be completed to earn one of the new cyberpunk heroes (four in total to unlock). To help both PvE and PvP players, Epic has different incentives available this weekend. Battle Royale players get double XP gains while Save the World players will receive free Into The Storm Llamas, one for each day they log in during the weekend.

That means four Llamas for the whole weekend. The double XP weekend will end on April 22nd so, as usual, get to grinding. In other news, Fortnite has been doing quite well, especially Fortnite Mobile which has grossed $25 million since arriving for iOS. Head here to learn more about the same.

In addition to Guided Missiles and the Heavy Shotgun, Epic Games is adding yet another crazy weapon to Fortnite: Battle Royale with Light Machine Guns. Though they currently exist in Save the World, these will enter the Last Man Standing mode for the first time.

The existence of Light Machine Guns for Battle Royale was discovered in the game’s news section by Fortnite Intel. Dataminers at Storm Shield One (with Rare and Epic variants existing). LMGs will have a reload time of 4.75 seconds but hold 100 bullets in the magazine and boast a high rate of fire.

As long as you’re spraying and praying, things should be fine. Just don’t get caught reloading. How this will work out with the Minigun also present remains to be seen. If Epic Games announces the Light Machine Gun, then we could very well see it in this week’s patch. Until then, stay tuned for more information on the same.