There have been some controversial Fortnite seasons throughout the years, but perhaps none have caused as much controversy as Chapter 5, Season 3: Wrecked. After spending some time with this patch, I think it’s by far the worst that Epic has ever dropped, losing sight of what even made Fortnite enjoyable in the first place.
Think back to your favorite Fortnite memories. How many involve getting run over by a guy in a vehicle? I know that that number is zero for me, and I’d guess for many of you, it’s the same. Yet for some reason, Epic has decided that Season 3: Wrecked should be all about the cars.
In truth, that’s what every single match I’ve played has been so far. Sooner or later, I hear the roar of a vehicle speeding my way, and I spend my time jumping and running out of its way, trying to take potshots at the driver whenever I can. Inevitably, you have two options: Get flattened by your opponent, or get in a car yourself and fight fire with fire.
Why is this happening? Well, with Season 3’s Mad Max-esque Wrecked theme, there are more vehicles than ever before on the map. That’s not all though, as Epic has introduced even more vehicle mods to make them more dangerous than ever, from Machine Gun Turrets to Spiked Bumpers that send you flying and deal huge damage if you get hit by them.
Then, for a final added bonus, the new Nitro barrels can give your car an extra speed boost, explosive power when ramming opponents, and a buff to any mod you have attached. It’s no wonder then that players are skipping guns and going straight to vehicles—they’re the best weapon in the game right now.
That shouldn’t be what Fortnite is about though. At its best, Fortnite gives you multiple ways to play, with items that lend themselves to different playstyles. Yes, I would complain when I got sniped by a distant enemy, but at least I understood that not everybody is a “run-and-gunner” like me. For the past week, I’ve spent match after match being squished by cars over and over again, to the point that I don’t want to play the game for the rest of the season.
This season of Fortnite is reminiscent of the horrible days of the X-4 Stormwing plane or the B.R.U.T.E mech suit, which both bombed their way through anyone and everyone in their path. During those times, guns were essentially useless too, and anyone who didn’t find a plane early or get themselves locked into a mech suit were at such a disadvantage that you might as well have quit to the lobby yourself.
There is no enjoyable gunplay in Season 3 because you rarely face enemies on foot. The map changes are irrelevant because half the player base spends their time driving around, avoiding the buildings. I’m not saying there isn’t room for vehicles in Fortnite, but making them all-powerful killing machines is too far in the wrong direction.
This season doesn’t feel like Fortnite at all, it almost feels like a weird game of Grand Theft Auto when you would unlock a tank and just destroy everything and everyone in your path. And look, I get it, for some people that sounds like fun, but it’s different when the people you’re blowing up are actual players, not NPCs. Getting squashed, shot, and blown to smithereens by an opponent in an armored vehicle is not battle royale gameplay, and it actively makes the game unfair. Yes, your odds are often dictated by the guns you find, but if you land beside a vehicle and don’t get it first, you have no hope of survival at all, and when that happens game after game, it’s hard to keep playing.
It’s not just me who feels this way, either. Tyler “Ninja” Blevins has already quit Fortnite for this season, saying: “If I was a five-year-old that still loved cool cars I would be having the time of my life. I’m a 32-year-old grown man who likes to fucking shoot things in video games, and now I have to drive a vehicle around and pray that I run into people that have a worse vehicle than me.”
None of this feels like Fortnite, and if it was an entirely different game, I wouldn’t play it again. Epic should be praised for its creativity and the willingness to try new things, but it should always feel like Fortnite. When you get off that path, it’s time to look back and readjust, and I believe that’s where the developer finds itself right now.
With the season themed around this Mad Max-esque vehicular warfare, presumably due to the timely release of Furiosa, there’s little chance that Epic will decide to remove the cars entirely. I just hope that Epic goes back to basics when Chapter 5, Season 4 rolls around, because this is, by far, the least fun that Fortnite has ever been.
