Fortnite’s Device Event Sank The Map

After several delays, Fortnite players finally got to see Midas’ doomsday clock hit zero. After a lot of fireworks and some dreamy trips to an alternate dimension, Fortnite’s island sank beneath the sea.

In today’s event, called “The Device,” NPC henchmen could be heard panicking before the event began. After the countdown ended, pillars lifted off from under the water. An explosion blew up The Agency building, and the doomsday device appeared from below it on a pedestal. Electronic waves coming off the device lifted players into the air (a Fortnite event favourite move). An explosion briefly transported players into an office, before transporting us back to a map that had been overtaken by the storm. There was a brief flicker of nice weather, before we were sent back to the office, where a character could be heard saying stuff like “It’s not just a storm” and talking about “the loop.” That character then came into their office, and was revealed to be Jonesy ” before we were sent back to a map that was completely sunk into the sea.

I currently can’t get back into a match to see what the lasting effects are, but I’ll let you know soon.

Update 4:34 a.m. “ I finally got into a solos match, to find the starting island surrounded by a wall of water and covered with underwater lighting effects. Once my match started, the map was surrounded by that same wall of water and The Agency was mostly a hole in the ground. Henchmen promptly murdered me, so I wasn’t able to see what else, if anything, has changed.

Today’s event is a return to the season-ending fireworks we haven’t seen since Chapter 2 of Fortnite began. (The event was so popular that it seems even Fortnite‘s own Donald Mustard couldn’t get in.) Over the course of the game’s second season, character Midas ” a member of The Agency, one of this season’s competing spy groups ” has been assembling a device that players and dataminers have speculated would harness the power of the game’s storm somehow.

The device could be seen in Midas’ office in the game’s menu screens. A game update in late May changed the way the storm closed in; to some players, it seemed like delayed again to today.

Fortnite‘s Chapter 2, Season 3 begins on Friday. It’s been a long season of Fortnite, and players are ready for a change. The biggest speculation has been that the next season will feature an underwater component. Looks like we have our answer, though we’ll have to wait until Friday to see how else this water theme plays out.