Epic Games is ensuring Fortnite creators get a substantial cut of revenue.
At its 2023 Game Developers Conference March 22, Epic laid out its vision for what it calls the “Creator Economy 2.0“–a system that involves the Unreal Editor, which Epic introduced this week to allow players to design, develop, and publish their own locations and games within Fortnite. Those locations and games, once published, can be accessed by other players who visit the designing player’s “island.”
Epic said it plans to share a whopping 40% of its total revenue with island creators.
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Per PC Gamer, that means 40% of total net revenues earned from the purchase of things like cosmetics from Fortnite‘s in-game item shop, plus purchases of Fortnite‘s in-game currency V-Bucks, will be set aside into an “engagement pool” that’ll be disseminated monthly to island creators over the age of 18.
According to Epic, how much a creator earns from the engagement pool is based on “engagement metrics that contribute to the health of the overall Fortnite ecosystem.” (We’re assuming that means something along the lines of how many people show up at that particular creator’s island.)
“The money in the economy comes from player spending in the item shop. Fortnite generates billions of dollars a year in revenues from players’ purchases,” Saxs Persson, Fortnite‘s executive vice president, said during the conference. “Fortnite players who have fun engaging in islands tend to spend more in the Item Shop. Creators who make popular islands are bringing real value to the Fortnite ecosystem, and we’re going to share the resulting revenue with them.”
Persson added that while this program aims to boost island creators, Epic thinks it’ll also be a good thing for players visiting their islands, since creators won’t feel pressure to build “cunning monetization loops or extractive gating items” into their island games.
“The benefit of this new approach is rooted in fun, and rewards everyone’s creative work, both yours and Epic’s,” Persson said. “You make an island the players love—that is all you need to be part of the new economy.”
You can read more about Fortnite‘s island creator requirements here.
