With the New Year’s hype now behind us, everyone anticipated the Fortnite wave to slow down. However, this was not the case last weekend, as over 4.9 million players were online in the first weekend after New Year’s. Epic has effectively kept the Fortnite fanbase engaged with its diverse modes, ranging from racing to open-world survival.
With the company operating at full capacity after a well-deserved holiday break, we can expect them to go all out for Season 2. Let’s explore what we know about the upcoming game updates.
Fortnite will now drop NEW Jam Tracks every Thursday, and soon you will be able to use them as Lobby Music Packs ‼️
Which artists or songs do you wish to see in the game? 🔥👀 pic.twitter.com/uAX3vo05KY
— HYPEX (@HYPEX) January 9, 2024
The recent update only saw the unvaulting of the lock-on pistol and nothing more, apart from the regular in-game bug fixes. Multiple sources have now confirmed that Fortnite will feature a new jam track in the item shop every Thursday. Priced at 500 V-Bucks, the jam track can now be used as the main menu track, adding more value to the purchase. I still feel it is too expensive, but perhaps new menu-music might be worth collecting for hardcore fans.
Another patch update is set to be introduced around January 23rd, and leaks suggest more items will be added to the game. Multiple “Augments,” similar to previous seasons, have been added to the game files and are set to be introduced in the next season. Already, there were a ton of augment leaks, and the new ones seem to be creative as well. A few notable ones are:
- Adding a shockwave effect to every explosion created.
- 2x reload time while interacting in a vehicle or with wildlife. This confirms the return of animals as vehicles.
- Increase damage on the shield of opponents by 50%.
These are three among the 25 possible augments that could enter the game by Season 2.
Fortnite scrapped the "Spend 5 minutes touching grass" quest, which was supposed to come out today ‼️ pic.twitter.com/jYma99npfg
— HYPEX (@HYPEX) January 9, 2024
Epic Scraps ‘Touching Grass’ Quest Due to Early Leaks
Apart from rumored augments, there were leaks suggesting the introduction of a new in-game quest, “Spend Five Minutes Touching Grass.” Fortnite has confirmed that they scrapped any plans of adding this humorous mode to the game. I’m guessing they have something better planned because it certainly made many players talk about such a mode coming soon. There are strong suggestions that it was removed because information about it got leaked, and Epic wanted to introduce it to the community as a surprise. Now that the surprise factor no longer exists, Epic has scrapped the plan altogether.
Epic Games is developing a new ore "Rifle Ore" in LEGO Fortnite.
Rift Ore uses Galaxy materials and can be mined in Rift Cave. pic.twitter.com/K4mLx0LYdo
— Fortnite Leaks & News (@fortbrleakks) January 9, 2024
Update incoming on the 23rd of January for Lego mode.
It has been confirmed that there will be rift caves and a ton of quests surrounding the rift caves. A Japanese Twitter page has showcased the possible render of what seems to be a “rift ore.” The rift ore can be created using materials mined from the rift cave. Apart from this, other powerful weapon renders have also been leaked, including a rift blaster which has a faster attack time than the regular blaster.
A new crafting station will be needed to process items that are rift-related. A ton of galaxy-themed renders suggest the upcoming rift caves to have a similar texture to them. Fortnite has been silent on the upcoming Lego updates, but with the overall success of their game, Epic plans to focus on prioritizing the development of the new Lego mode and take that experience to another level. I hope there are more activity-related quests you could complete with your friends coming in soon. As of now, the rift leaks are the only prominent leaks; the rest of what could happen in the Lego world is still a surprise Epic might be holding out on.
