Fortnite season 11 event ends with a cosmic explosion and now the game is gone – CNET

It’s gone. 

Epic

After a week’s delay, Fortnite season 10 ended Sunday with The End event that would have introduced season 11. It was literally the end as the game was no longer playable after the event started. 

An explosive season-ending event caused the destruction of the island and apparently the game itself, as it’s not playable as of this writing. 

Fortnite has ended… for now.

What happened?

Like in season 4, the event started off with a rocket launching into the sky and exploding to create rifts. Like in the earlier event, the rocket went out of one rift into another except that there were several more rockets this time around. The spacecrafts then flew into one rift again and again right where the meteor was frozen in the sky. Then, once more, rockets went into the rifts near the meteor and the meteor itself went into the rip, making the rockets disappear. Players were then sent into the air, floating uncontrollably, when all of a sudden, the rockets and the meteor reappeared high above the island just to crash into it. The singularity-like event sucked in everything and everyone and then, in a blink, there was nothingness. 

What was left was a singularity. 

The official Fortnite Twitter account and website only show the black hole. The game’s Instagram account shows the same. 

Since then, developer Epic deleted all of the more than 12,000 tweets on the Fortnite Twitter account, aside from the link to the stream of the black hole. 

The Fortnite YouTube channel has a livestream of the event that shows the explosions and is currently streaming just the singularity. More than 1 million people tuned in to watch the event unfold on Twitch. 

During the stream, keen-eyed viewers saw a set of numbers appear around the black hole: 146, 11, 15, and 62. 

Some have since tried to decipher these mystical digits. One person entered the numbers in Google maps and it appears to be a location of some sort of “crab rave.”

Even Twitch got into the fun with a tweet offering some theories. 

Some Fortnite data miners speculated something might happen at 5:07 p.m. ET/ 2:07 p.m. PT. Since then, more numbers appeared near the black hole. So far, the numbers are: 11, 146, 15, 62, 87, 14, 106, 2 and 150.

Epic also pulled the plug over at Twitch. A visit to the Fortnite page comes up blank, as the entire category of Fortnite no longer exists. 

Fortnite is no longer on Twitch. 

Twitch

Players who try to play the game are greeted with a technical difficulties screen and then nothing. However, one player did discover that Epic added a little secret. During the screen showing the singularity, players can enter a Konami code (up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, B, A, start). A minigame similar to the classic Galaga will begin where players can shoot Durrr Burger heads for a high score. 

A minigame if players can enter the Konami code.

Epic

It appears some concerned gamers reached out to Sony about their game. The Ask PlayStation Twitter account tweeted Sunday about the “Fortnite Blackout” and that players’ inventory and V-Bucks, Fortnite’s in-game currency, are still available. 

It also appears that Fortnite: Save the World — the non-battle-royale mode where players survive against waves of enemies — is no longer available for purchase on various platforms. There’s speculation that Epic will make this mode available for free instead of the $39.99. 

How long the game will stay down is unclear, but this is an unprecedented move for a game this popular. 

What about season 11?

The next season of Fortnite will still happen. Epic released multiple updates about the next season including adding bots for players to use for training. Since this is a holiday weekend in the US, Columbus Day, Epic may have something for those staying home Monday.

The most likely scenario is that Fortnite season 11 will start on Thursday, Oct. 17. Thursdays are the standard starting days for the seasons. 

One of the Fortnite data miners tweeted there was an update sent to iOS devices that was larger than 5GB. This is a significant update considering it size hinting that the Fortnite Blackout may actually come to a close. 

On Friday, the Italian App Store leaked the supposed next iteration of the game, Fortnite Chapter 2. It appears there will be a new map, default skins and boats. 

Originally published Oct. 7 and updated as new information is revealed.