[GameSpot] - Fortnite Chapter 4 Start Date, Battle Pass, And Everything We Know So Far

[343iBot]

With less than a month remaining in Fortnite Chapter 3, Season 4, it's time to look ahead to what's next. We don't know a lot for sure about next season--for example, we don't know if it will be Chapter 3 Season 5, or Chapter 4 Season 1. But there are plenty of rumors in the air, along with some datamined info that may or may not mean anything. From battle pass rumors to start date inferrences, there's a lot to discuss. First, let's start off with what we know for sure about the next season of Fortnite.

Everything that's been officially announced about the next Fortnite season

Technically, the answer to this is "nothing," because Epic hasn't made any reveals or even teased anything yet. But we know that the current season will end the first weekend of December, and thus we also know that the next season will start within a day or so of the current season's conclusion.

When is Fortnite Chapter 4 Season 1--or is it Chapter 3 Season 5?

You should expect to be playing a new season of Fortnite on Sunday, December 4.

There is an odd wrinkle to this, however. Currently, The Herald's quest timer says her quests last two weeks past that date. That would be unusual, since The Herald is part of the current battle pass, and battle pass quests haven't extended past the length of the actual battle pass before.

Could next season be delayed? Or was this just a typo? It's almost certainly just a mistake, because the battle pass end date recently changed from December 3 to December 2 (more on why they did this in a moment). If The Herald quest timer was correct, then Epic probably would have changed the battle pass end date to two weeks later to match it. But they didn't.

The change in the battle pass end date is likely a signal that we'll have a live event to end the season on the afternoon of Saturday, December 3, after which the game will go offline for 12+ hours and likely return Sunday morning. That would make Friday, December 2 that last full day of the Season 4 battle pass, which is why they updated the date in-game--so make sure you grind out your levels on time.

Will Fortnite's next season be Chapter 3 Season 5, or Chapter 4 Season 1?

Fortnite Chapter 1 lasted 10 seasons, and Chapter 2 lasted eight. So why do folks think Chapter 3 will end after only four seasons? Well, just before the current season began, dataminers made note of a reference in files to a new "launch option" called Asteria. Past "launch options" have included Athena, Apollo and Artemis--but you know those three better as each chapter's battle royale map. Athena was Chapter 1, Apollo was Chapter 2, and Artemis is the current island.

Fortnite's Chapter 3 battle royale map, codenamed Artemis

So it follows that Asteria, another ancient Greek deity whose name starts with A, would usher in a new map and new Fortnite Chapter. And there's certainly some logic in doing yearly chapters, especially now that Fortnite has moved past its fifth birthday. But this is still datamined info that doesn't necessarily mean what it looks like it means. Or it could mean nothing.

Is Fortnite Creative 2.0 finally coming next season?

Currently, the signs point to yes, as dataminers are reporting that Creative 2.0, or the Unreal Editor for Fortnite (UEFN), is being tested by Epic right now for inclusion in Fortnite's 23.00 update--that's the patch that will kick off the new season in December.

The timing isn't terribly surprising, since Creative 2.0 has been rumored for December for a while now. But this is going to be a huge deal for Epic--with a far more robust set of tools, creators may be able to build whole games inside Fortnite, a la Sony's Dreams. And that could, in the long term, shift Fortnite into being more of a platform than just a game.

And attaching such a change to a brand new chapter so you can push the idea that a new era for Fortnite has arrived would be pretty standard stuff for the tech industry. But we'll see.

What do we know about next season's gameplay changes?

There have been several mechanics teased in the files for a long time now, like motorcycles and rideable skateboards. Skateboarding, for one, may have been intended for Fortnite's big summer event--remember the skatepark they put up in the big bay on the eastern end of the island?

Likewise, rideable flying animals have been rumored for a minute as well. Not to mention the first-person mode that folks have been chattering about for a while now. We don't know if any of that stuff is for battle royale or just for the Creative 2.0 toolset (or both/neither).

What will Fortnite's new season be about?

The current season has been surprisingly light on plot--this season hasn't had any new story quests since the ones we had on launch day. So that makes it difficult to guess what's in store for the last few weeks of this season, much less beyond that.

But here's where we are right now: A creepy plant lady called The Herald is causing chrome to spread across the island. The Herald works for some kind of being or entity called The Nothing, whose voice we got to hear in the Bytes quests. Both The Herald and The Nothing have some kind of connection to The Last Reality, aka the place all the nefarious cubes came from in the previous chapters.

As for the good guys: they seemingly all got chromed except for Brie Larson's new Paradigm, who went to some place called Reality-659 in the season trailer. And we haven't heard from her since then.

Brie Larson's Paradigm has been out of the picture all season.

Assuming this season does end with a live event, it'll likely involve The Herald's last push to fully chrome up the island, and presumably the Paradigm's attempt to resist with whatever she brings back from Reality-659. And if we are about to get a new Chapter with a new map, then maybe The Herald will succeed--with the new island being one scrambled by the chrome, like what happened with the black hole between Chapter 1 and Chapter 2.

With so little info even about the immediate future, guessing what next season has in store for us is a fool's errand, especially with so many dangling plot threads out there--chief among them being the fate of big bads like the Cube Queen--not seen since the end of Chapter 2 Season 8--and Geno, the cosmic dude behind the IO, who we've heard nothing about since we took back the island from them in Chapter 3 Season 2.

And then we have the Zero War comic, which told the story of Chapter 3 Season 2 as if it were another Marvel season, complete with a version of the Collision live event that was full of superheroes--a version that we most definitely did not see in the game.

And while the climax of the event (The Foundation and Jonesey going after Geno) was presented as a cliffhanger at the time, in the comic they find Geno five seconds later. And then The Imagined grabs him and jumps into the Zero Point, disintegrating them both, but crucially not killing them.

Are we going to catch up with Geno soon? Is the Cube Queen still around? Is The Nothing a separate faction or part of The Last Reality? Is there an in-universe explanation for why Zero War is completely incompatible with Fortnite's game story? Next season could deal with any of these topics.

What's coming with Fortnite's next battle pass?

There have been no rumors or leaks thus far about next season's battle pass. Fans have identified a player skin from a past survey that pretty much everybody agrees is Geno based on his look in the Zero War comic, and if that is indeed the case then he'll probably be in a battle pass eventually. And that "eventually" could certainly be next season if he's a part of the story, too.

Our confirmed look at GENO - Founder and Leader of The Imagined Order!
He will be officially revealed in #Fortnite X Marvel: Zero War comics. He also matches the new skin seen in yesterday's survey as well as the photograph with Slone from a while back!
(Img: @HYPEX) pic.twitter.com/a8p7fsKKJ0

— FNAssist  (@FN_Assist) August 26, 2022

Other than that, we have no leads about next season's battle pass. We'll be updating this story as weeks turn to days and eventually just hours before the new season--or is it chapter? Stay tuned for more information on the future of Fortnite.

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