Epic Games has announced an Economy for Authors 2.0, which will increase the amount of money that Fortnite creators can earn by creating in-game islands.
Yesterday (March 22) at the game developers conference, Epic Games announced the launch of a beta version of Unreal Editor in Fortnite. Unreal Editor allows players to create new projects in Epic’s Unreal Engine and publish them directly to Fortnite, which, according to the studio, will offer “a whole world of new creative possibilities” for fans and developers.
For those who participate in the creation of user-created Fortnite islands, Epic has also introduced Creator Economy 2.0, which is already available in Fortnite and offers fans more ways to make money from their creations.
In the future, Epic announced that 40% of the revenue from the Fortnite item store and “most” real-money purchases, including B-bucks, subscriptions and Fortnite Crew kits, will be deferred and paid to eligible creators.
Payouts will be proportional to the popularity of each creator’s island among players and will be evaluated depending on how many new or returning players the island attracts.
The studio added that legal entities and authors over the age of 18 are eligible for payments, but added that it is “working on expanding” the program to include younger authors.
Creators can sign up for the Epic payout system here.
Describing the new system, Sax Persson, executive vice president of the Fortnite ecosystem, said that the new approach “rewards the creative work of everyone, both yours and Epic.”
“There is no need to develop tricky monetization loops or extraction controls,” Persson added. “You create an island that the players like — that’s all you need to be part of the new economy.”
Last week, the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) made a final decision to pay Epic Games a fine of 201 million pounds after accusations that the company tricked players into making unwanted purchases.
