Epic Games‘ big move to challenge Roblox is officially rolling out.
Starting today, Fortnite developers (who have been able to make custom Islands/game modes on Fortnite‘s platform since 2018) will be able to make and sell their own in-game items to its tens of millions of players.
What sort of items? Epic said previously that this new rule covers both “consumable” and “durable” categories of user-generated items. Durables are things like skins and weapons, which players can keep and use over and over, while consumables are used once to give a player something specific, like a power-up, then disappear from inventory.
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When this news first came out back in September, we theorized that “consumable” could also refer to loot boxes–and we were right.
Under this new system, developers are allowed to sell loot boxes.
Concerns around loot boxes, which generate billions of dollars in revenue per year, have been around as long as loot boxes themselves. Some lawmakers have likened them to gambling for kids, while game developers like Electronic Arts have defended them by saying they are “surprise mechanics” that are similar to IRL products like Kinder Eggs and LOL Surprise dolls.
Fortnite itself has been in hot water over loot boxes, so it removed them from the game in 2019. Now, it’s putting them back, and will earn cash from them when the developer revenue split begins in 2028. But it’s putting all of the regulatory onus on creators.
A page on Epic’s developer forum is very careful to say that if Island owners want to sell loot boxes, they have to comply with all laws around random items sales and all laws about minors. (Possibly related, Epic was slapped with a $245 million FTC fine for using “dark patterns” to get people to unwittingly make one-click purchases, including “[making] it easy for children to make purchases while playing Fortnite without requiring any parental consent.”)
Laws mainly center around ensuring players know the odds of getting specific items when they buy a loot box, though there are some regions where selling loot boxes is banned entirely. Those include Singapore, Qatar, Australia, the Netherlands, and Belgium for all ages, and the U.K. and Brazil for under-18s.
Epic also explicitly says its guidance doesn’t make it responsible for what developers do. “Epic is providing the below for information purposes only. Epic is not providing legal advice and the information contained within is not legal advice,” it says. “As the developer, it is your responsibility to comply with all relevant laws and Epic policies. You should consult a legal advisor when determining how and when the law applies to the content you publish in Fortnite.”
Basically, Epic is a bakery owner who found a way to cut itself a slice of that fat loot box pie, while shunting safety regulation compliance onto individual bakers.
Loot boxes aren’t the only things developers can sell.
But what caught our eye is what they aren’t allowed to sell. Because it’s a restrictive list.
Turns out Fortnite is cool with devs selling items–as long as those items don’t compete with its own sales.
That means developers aren’t allowed to sell outfits, emotes, or cars/trucks/buses. The former two have always been Fortnite‘s biggest sellers, and the latter tends to be a core part of its battle royale game mode.
Developers are allowed to sell items adjacent to these categories. For example, hats and scarves are A-OK, house decor is okay, airplanes are okay, and jet packs and moonwalk shoes are okay.
Those items get clearance under these two rules:
- “You are allowed to offer items in categories similar to those sold in the Fortnite Item Shop […] as long as they affect gameplay and are not purely cosmetic.”
- “You are allowed to offer cosmetic items in categories that are not sold in the Fortnite Item Shop.”
This is likely to be Fortnite‘s biggest issue in keeping up with the Robloxes. Roblox also sells in-house-designed items, but doesn’t bother preventing independent developers from making items in the same category. Roblox sells neon hair? Developers can also sell neon hair. Roblox sells cool hats? Developers can also sell cool hats.
We’re guessing the difference is because Fortnite didn’t start off as a UGC platform; it’s always been a house-made battle royale game with house-made buyable cosmetics. Roblox, on the other hand, doesn’t have a central game; it relies entirely on user-generated content, and always has, so wouldn’t want to limit what devs can do.
All this being said, outside of cosmetics, there are some interesting things developers can do. They’re allowed to sell supporter badges that will be displayed in game, can sell progression systems like battle passes (which will reward players with more items the longer they play/gain XP), and can paywall areas of Islands.
Note: Developers are not actually allowed to use the very common gaming vernacular “XP” or “battle pass” to refer to their games or items, because Fortnite uses that for its game and items.
Eesh.
We’re curious to see how quickly developers embrace this new system. Roblox already pays out nearly $1 billion per year to devs for their game and item sales on its platform. How long will it take Fortnite to reach those kind of numbers?
