Earlier this week, we brought the news to you that Fortnite Battle Royale was coming to iOS, and registration was open to try out the beta version before anyone else. Well that time has come, and two of us got entry into the test server! We know the mobile game is at beta stage, but here are our first impressions. Note we tested this on an iPad Air 2 & an iPhone 7.
- The game is free to download and will continue to be, Epic will generate their revenue from in game customisation purchases, just like the non mobile versions. The game currently requires 2gb storage.
- Interface is identical to the non mobile version, so if you play that, you’ll know your way round the menus.
- Straight out the box, you can add your friends to your contacts list and invite them into your squad. 4 man squad as standard.
- Character customisation and leveling seems to match the non mobile game.
- One map, 100 players, jump in the bus and drop straight into the fight.
- Matchmaking was quick, we didn’t have to wait for more than a minute.
- Graphics to your character is not bad, graphics to the rest of the game, including the bus, scenery, buildings, weapons on the ground is very poor/going on minecraft box’y poor.
- Controls are tricky and take a bit of getting used to. Bottom left of the screen (left thumb) is moving forward, backwards, left & right, and if you use your right thumb anywhere on the screen, it rotates the camera view. The rest of the buttons are highlighted on screen, simply tap and activate. You can switch from weapons to items, jump, crouch and when you have a weapon equipped, you can zoom in with or without a scope and shoot, by tapping anywhere on screen. No cross hair, so its hard to see where you’re shooting, unless you have a scope. It’s easy to run around but shooting is hard.
- The gameplay is relatively smooth, no real lag as such, which is quite something considering there are upto 100 other players in the game.
- My iPhone was running really hot…
Overall, our first impression of Fortnite Battle Royale was good. The game looks and plays very much like the console version, it runs fairly smooth, you can play with friends and the the matchmaking was impressive. That being said, the controls take a lot of getting used to and we get the feeling that most serious players, will play with a game controller, meaning everyone else will be at a huge disadvantage!
It’s unclear when the game will get an official released on iOS or when Android users will be able to get a sniff, but watch this space!
