Epic Games
Epic Games provides details on Season 9 audio improvements
Fortnite has never had pristine audio and Epic Games has been working hard to remedy that problem. They’ve just released a new blog post detailing audio improvements that they are working on for Season 9.
Fortnite’s audio side has never truly been fixed since the launch of the game. Vertical audio and spatial sounds can be extremely dodgy especially in crowed end-game fights.
Epic Games wants to fix these issues by implementing broad-scale changes to the way audio is handled and received by the client. They released a short blog post about the current issues being looked at on Thursday evening.
Upcoming Season 9 Audio Improvements
Epic wants to ensure that game’s infrastructure gets updated along with its content. They’ve fallen behind on some keys areas of engine-based problems recently, but they look to be turning things around.
In a blog post on the FortniteBR subreddit, Epic listed some of the issues that were fixed for v8.50 and what new issues they’ve detected so far:
‘Release 8.5 Audio fixes and updates:
- “Random sounds” playing issue (‘ghost’ weapon switches, reloads, item use) fixed.
Release 8.5 open audio issues:
- Switch issues were more complex than anticipated, but we’ve dug in and have a speculative fix by v9.00′
Additionally, they gave an extensive list of new audio improvement that will be arriving in future updates. Season 9 is mentioned several times and seems to be Epic’s current target for all these audio updates.
This is extremely good news for all Fortnite players, but especially competitive players. The Fortnite World Cup rages on throughout the rest of Season 8 and all of Season 9. These audio changes will make the game much more consistent and fair, leading to the best players winning the World Cup.
From Epic Games:
‘What we’re working on for the upcoming season:
- Better tactical audio when inside player-built structures:
- Enemy Pickaxe impact within ~one building tile radius louder.
- Wallbreak by enemy close/behind player much clearer/louder.
- Hear the approach of enemy players outside player build structures.
- Better audio tells for jump/landing:
- Jump tell audio added (so bunny-hopping isn’t as noiseless).
- Clearer landing sound detection.
- Improvements to issues of sounds dropping outside of player FOV.
- Improvement of close versus distant player gliding sounds, to help clarify distance of gliding enemies.
- Bullet impact and explosive audio improvements- shorter, higher dynamic range sounds.
- Longer sounds properly playing during Replays.
- Fix for PC audio device swap issues.
- Improved differentiation of teammate versus enemy audio.
Last but not least, we are investigating ways to improve vertical and spatial audio in Fortnite. We are actively working on a binaural/HRTF solution that will be a great help to headphone players, as well as other spatialization improvements.’
Challenges
Lazy Lake Floating Ring locations for Fortnite Week 3 challenges
How to collect floating rings at Lazy Lake for the Season 3 Week 3 challenges.
The Fortnite Season 3 Week 3 challenges are here, which means we’re getting closer and closer to unlocking the second half of the Season 3 Battle Pass. Most of the challenges have been relatively easy this season, with only one weekly challenge requiring us to search in a particular area.
Last week we were looking around The Yacht. This week we’re venturing across the map over to Lazy Lake, where we’ll need to collect floating rings.
These four rings are scattered around Lazy Lake, making it difficult to complete this challenge in one shot – at least, if you’re doing it in a regular Battle Royale match.
As always, we recommend opting for Team Rumble. It makes things easier, and you may even be able to finish your eliminations challenge from last week if you haven’t already. Here’s a map of all of the Floating Ring locations at Lazy Lake:
The most obvious ring is located next to the gas station. You should be able to jump on an umbrella to grab it. After that, make your way to the intersection and look on top of the tree. The third ring is in the street at the entrance to Lazy, and the final ring is in between the towers of the No Sweat Insurance building.
Here’s a video from HarryNinetyFour that shows you exactly where you’ll need to visit.
You can take a look at the full list of challenges here, but the rest of them are easy enough to complete on your own. You may be sitting in the cornfield at Frenzy for a while, but that comes with the territory.
When the Fortnite v13.20 patch released, Epic revealed that they’d be bringing a special hero to the Item Shop for the 4th of July. That hero was later revealed to be none other than Captain America – one of the core Avengers who we never saw during the initial Marvel crossover events.
Captain America is, reportedly, set to hit the Item Shop within the next rotation. He should be available when the Item Shop resets at 8 PM EST on July 2. We’re only hours away from having Cap in our locker, and he’ll probably be one of the most popular skins for the next week.
As you can see, there have already been plenty of official teasers for Captain America, but one of them went under the radar. When the Week 3 Challenges went live, Epic added a daily challenge that requires you to light fireworks around Lazy Lake. These fireworks explode to show the Captain America shield.
There are six firework locations surrounding this POI, but you only need five to complete the challenge. You can easily finish this challenge in a single game of Team Rumble once you know where to look. Here are all of the firework locations.
This challenge rewards players with 14,000 XP as it’s one of the golden daily challenges rather than a weekly challenge. That isn’t a ton of experience, but it’s a healthy reward for a challenge that will only take a few minuted to complete. Now, all that’s left is to see how the new Fortnite Captain America skin looks!
Concepts
This concept brings grilling to Fortnite in time for summer
This thematic addition to Fortnite Season 3 is perfect for Summer Splash.
Fortnite Season 3 has put a new emphasis on food. Vegetable boxes spawn all across the map while players farm for cabbage and corn as a new way to heal. Most players are fans of this change. The more healing items in the game, the better.
Why stop there? Why not allow us to cook our food for additional HP? Well, one Fortnite player made a concept that allows us to do just that. Reddit user u/MapleSmoothie created a Hot Dog concept. You can find them in fridges and eat them raw, or grill them for greater healing power.
This concept, as its creator points out, would be a perfect addition to the Summer Splash event. Grilling and summertime go hand in hand, and Epic even have an existing emote to correspond with the mechanic.
We don’t need to stop with hot dogs, either. Epic could allow us to grill corn and add other meats like burgers and sausages. Some of them could even grant shields, allowing you to carry some food versions of Minis and Big Pots.
It’s probably too late for Epic to add this to Season 3. There’s a chance that we could see it next year, however. Epic have always welcomed community concepts with game mechanics and skins. This one would be a small, yet thematic addition that could bring a new element into the game.
Lazy Lake Floating Ring locations for Fortnite Week 3 challenges
How to collect floating rings at Lazy Lake for the Season 3 Week 3 challenges.
Lazy Lake fireworks location for Fortnite Captain America challenge
When the Fortnite v13.20 patch released, Epic revealed that they’d be bringing a special hero to the Item Shop for...
This concept brings grilling to Fortnite in time for summer
This thematic addition to Fortnite Season 3 is perfect for Summer Splash.