Fortnite is the most popular game in the world,
and one big reason is that the developers
at Epic Games do everything they can to keep
the game as fun and funny as possible.
That includes hiding a number of easter eggs
inside the game - inside jokes and references
that only a handful of fans might notice,
much less fully appreciate.
So grab your pickaxe and get ready to board
the battle bus, because we're about to take
a look at some of the Easter eggs you might
have missed in Fortnite.
All that Unreal jazz
Players in Fortnite spend an inordinate amount
of time rampaging through the homes of random
strangers.
But while most of these houses are filled
with boring, cookie cutter decorations, a
couple of them actually have unique easter
eggs hidden in plain sight.
Just look at the walls for a second before
you smash them down for resources, and you'll
notice a couple of posters hanging in different
bedrooms.
One shows a gun-wielding rabbit with the name
"Jazz Jackrabbit" - an actual video game character
featured in two games Epic released back in
the 90s.
And the other poster features an aerial view
of the Unreal Tournament map "Facing Worlds"
- a testament to Epic's Unreal series of games
and the Unreal game engine, which powers both
Fortnite and its biggest competitor, PlayerUnknown's
Battlegrounds.
It's a Jurassic world
The Fortnite team has been quite adept at
dropping environmental Easter eggs into the
game.
And, as players have found out, those seemingly
innocent Easter eggs can actually impact the
game later on.
Which is what makes this giant footprint,
found between Snobby Shores and Greasy Grove,
so intriguing.
It looks like it could belong to a large dinosaur,
suggesting the game may someday add dinosaurs
to the mix.
And it's not the only dinosaur-themed element
to the game's design.
There's also a dinosaur skeleton, which appeared
out of a rift in the days leading to the start
of Season 5.
And of course, there are the wildly popular
dinosaur themed skins players can purchase
- which are featured in a loading screen homage
to Jurassic Park.
Nice!
The hatch
Epic does a great job of keeping the game
fresh with constant tweaks and updates to
the map.
One of the strangest, though, was the addition
of a random, mysterious hatch in the middle
of Wailing Woods.
Players eventually discovered there's nothing
actually inside the hatch, meaning it's simply
a visual gag.
But what exactly is it an Easter Egg for?
Most fans believe it's a reference to the
similarly mysterious hatch that drove most
of the action in the second season of the
hit TV series Lost, which was also about a
group of random strangers who land on an island
and get picked off one by one.
But there's actually an Easter Egg within
an Easter Egg here, as the graffiti on the
hatch is straight out of the hit game Half-Life
2.
Neat!
The Truckasaurus
There are two schools of thought when it comes
to the inspiration for this truck monster,
located between Retail Row and Lonely Lodge.
Some believe this Easter egg is a tribute
to Optimus Prime from Transformers.
Others have noted the similarity it shares
with The Truckasaurus, a machine that debuted
in The Simpsons and went on to cameo in several
Simpsons video games.
Both sides have valid points, but most Fortnite
fans have taken to calling it The Truckasaurus,
so at the moment, the Simpsons are beating
the Transformers in the battle for Fortnite
pop culture supremacy.
Battle Bus down
Since the game debuted, players have been
trying to figure out how to shoot down the
Battle Bus, the flying school bus which drops
gamers onto the island at the beginning of
each match.
Unfortunately, it seems to be impossible - unless
you're Epic Games, which placed a crashed
Battle Bus on top of a mountain near Shifty
Shafts, complete with a deflated hot air balloon.
"So you're tellin me there's a chance."
#JusticeForOrangeShirtKid
In early 2018, Epic ran the #Boogiedown contest,
which asked players to submit videos of themselves
dancing; whichever player had the best dance
would see their moves immortalized with an
in-game emote.
When the finalists were announced, one clear
favorite emerged, so fans were shocked when
the Orange Shirt Kid didn't actually win the
prize.
Fortnite players rallied behind Orange Shirt
Kid, demanding justice through a Change.org
petition which implored Epic Games to change
their mind.
It worked.
When Season 4 debuted in May 2018, the new
Orange Justice dance was among the battle
pass rewards.
Rock on, kid.
Rock on.
The great rescue mission
Popular YouTube gamer Muselk launched a new
Fortnite meme when his attempt to rescue a
player stuck at the bottom of a cliff using
a golf cart went spectacularly wrong in the
funniest way possible.
The developers at Epic were so amused by the
video that just a week later, they added a
tombstone to the spot commemorating the unfortunate
death - as well as a stack of tires to help
rescue attempts for anyone else stuck down
there in the future.
It was a great gesture, but we're glad they've
only done it once.
We can only imagine what the game would look
like if they placed a tombstone to commemorate
every time we've died.
