"The Concept of a first-person Fortnite mode is excellent; however, based on everything we have seen so far, Fortnite Ballistic doesn’t have what it takes to compete with the market leaders."
PvP Multiplayer.
This review focuses on aspects unique to Fortnite Ballistic. For a comprehensive look at Fortnite as a whole, check out our full review here.
Fortnite is an evergreen success because it continually evolves to become something greater than its core components, and expanding that scope to include a first-person mode is not only the next logical step but also long overdue.
With many parents hesitant about letting children play more realistic titles such as Call of Duty, Fortnite is perfectly situated in the market to release a more family-friendly contender.
Unfortunately for Epic Games and players alike, the single mode they chose to launch Fortnite Ballistic is a variation of Search and Destroy, one of the more complicated and patience-testing FPS modes, and one which is just not a good idea for what could be many younger players first experience with first-person combat mechanics.
By all means, include Search and Destroy as an option, but many better-suited modes serve as a gateway to first-person shooter mechanics, such as Free-4-All, Team Deathmatch, and/or Domination (heck, even Capture the Flag would be great).
The main issue with Search and Destroy is that new players often die very quickly, and then they must sit and wait for the round to play out, watching their team win or lose without them.
A secondary issue is that without the ability to respawn, players have a single shot to succeed in each round.
This means that new players will have few opportunities to learn before more experienced players gun them down.
These issues result in frustrated players, who will likely quit the match. They may feel like they have better things to do than sit around and watch others play, especially when they will likely be the first to die in the next round.
I have yet to play a Fortnite Ballistic match in which multiple players have not dropped out before the end of the map.
This issue is especially troublesome, considering that Fortnite Ballistic does not currently allow bots or new players to fill these empty slots.
My most recently played match went like this.
In the above example, seven out of the ten players quit before the match’s conclusion.
I wish I could say it was the only time something similar had happened, but I would be lying if I did not admit that most games lose roughly half of the participants long before the end of the match.
The best way for Epic Games to salvage Fortnite Ballistic is to look at what third-party creators have done with the first-person mechanics in EUFN and learn from that; I have witnessed user-created first-person modes with over 50k players online and even less popular modes with concurrent user counts more than double that of Fortnite Ballistic Unranked.
While I would not advise Epic Games to remove the Search and Destroy mode or current map, I would add at least two more maps and both Free-4-All and Team Deathmatch modes.
Doing this would give players an avenue to grow accustomed to Fortnite Ballistic in a more new player-friendly manner while ensuring it is given every chance possible to succeed.
I very much want it to succeed, considering that Fortnite has one of the most user-friendly cosmetic systems on the market.
Due to how Fortnite handles cosmetic items, players can use any skin or weapon wrap from their account-wide locker in Fortnite Ballistic, making it one of the most affordable and consumer-friendly free-2-play first-person shooters on the market.
One good thing about Fortnite Ballistic is that even if it fails to take off and Epic Games is forced to stop working on the mode or at least put it on the back burner, the addition of first-person mechanics has improved Fortnite and UEFN as a whole.
I am already having a lot of fun playing games by third-party creators using models and mechanics first introduced with Fortnite Ballistic.
Fortnite Ballistic is a first person shooter video game developed and published by Epic Games, it was released on 11 December 2024 and it is Free-2-Play.
Fortnite Ballistic is available on the following platforms: Nintendo Switch, PC, Playstation 4, Playstation 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X|S.
As of February 2025, around 175,000 people play Fortnite Ballistic on a fairly regular basis.
Fortnite Ballistic is fairly active, meaning that matchmaking is stable for much of the day in populated regions and viable in less populated regions, even though wait times are considerably longer.
Fortnite Ballistic supports:
Fortnite Ballistic offers the following matchmaking options:
The Fortnite Ballistic in-game store sells:
The following peripherals are officially supported:
Fortnite Ballistic is rated PEGI 12+ and contains:
Ultimately, Epic Games creating Fortnite Ballistic is a good thing for Fortnite as a whole. The additional mechanics are a great boon to third-party creators, and already, some pretty amazing first-person modes/games have begun to show up in Fortnite, with a near-perfect recreation of Nuketown from Call of Duty being my personal favourite.
However, Fortnite Ballistic itself is rather lacklustre at this point.
Unless Epic finds a way to win over the Fortnite community by making the mode more enjoyable, I cannot see it lasting even as long as Fortnite: Rocket Racing, let alone being a major part of Epic Games’ plan for Fortnite past the end of 2025, even if it survives in some form in 2026 and beyond.
We found Fortnite Ballistic to be a good game, meaning it is likely to be enjoyable for most players, despite having a few areas that could be improved upon.
