Fortnite leaving Early Access: No free-to-play content

Three years after launch, Epic Games has announced that Fortnite is finally coming out of Early Access, along with the news that the Save the World PvE campaign will remain as a premium paid experience rather than going free-to-play. 

In an update posted on Epic’s website, the Fortnite team revealed, “Today we’re bringing Save the World out of Early Access and have decided that it will remain a premium experience rather than going free-to-play. Development of new content will slow down after this official release, but the adventure doesn’t end here for Save the World.” 

Those changes also mean that “the legacy Early Access label will also be removed from Battle Royale and Creative game modes.” Epic suggests that that label was “a holdover from our initial Save the World launch,” although it’s long been suggested that the decision has been at least partly fuelled by the game’s extremely fast update schedule. However, any existing purchases of cosmetics will continue to function in both modes. A future update is expected to be announced when this change will occur.

And finally, all paid for Founders packs will also be upgraded to the next level and will unlock rewards included in the upgraded back for free “courtesy of the Homebase.” Anyone who owns a copy of the Ultimate Edition will receive the new Metal Team Leader Pack and 8,000 V-Bucks. The Free days are over, but the game goes on!