If you haven’t played Fortnite, you haven’t played one of the best video games of 2017. It’s a battle royale game where the goal is to be the last one standing, though it does have other game modes, including Lego Fortnite and Rocket Racing. Now, the game is returning to how it felt and played in 2017, but with new mechanics from the present-day game in the new OG Fortnite mode.
In 2023, Epic Games released OG Fortnite as a custom game mode, but it was removed a month after it began. However, on December 6, 2024, Epic Games returned the OG Fortnite game mode. This time, the OG game mode, starting in the first season, “will be here to stay,” according to Epic Games. Not only does this revived game mode bring back old weapons, mechanics, and icons, it also has new mechanics, new movement, and updated user interfaces.
Though it has these benefits, some drawbacks make the OG game mode not worth playing yet.
One drawback is the lack of movement options. In the very early seasons of Fortnite, there were very few ways to get across the map besides walking. To combat this issue, Fortnite added the ability to sprint or slide to the OG game mode, so you have the option to walk, sprint, or slide, if you have enough stamina. There are some options for ease of movement, like bounce pads, giving you temporary air-time, but they are hard to come by. If you cannot find these, you are stuck running and sliding around the map, and when your stamina is low, you are left walking around the map. When I’m playing the OG mode, it feels like just a constant running, walking, running, walking, cycle; in the newer versions of the game, I can enjoy driving and flying, allowing faster travel covering more distance. Then, if needed, I can travel to a different area, which makes the gameplay feel a lot faster-paced.
In later seasons, golf carts, shopping carts, ballers, grapplers, planes, rifts, and more were added to the game for ease of movement and/or rotation around the map. However, little to no transportation will not always be the case in OG Fortnite. For the most part, every update with each season brings back old transportation or brings new ones, which I love. For example, the cars and helicopters were very fun to use when revamped/brought back during Chapter 5. You could jump, boost, go fast, hit people with cars, and fly across the map, very easily. Epic Games plans to change the season of the OG game mode every few weeks, with season two beginning on January 31, 2025. This means movement will get easier, and the map will change, adding different landscapes, locations, and items.
Another drawback is the weapons and loot pool in the early game. I dislike how slow some of the weapons are, how common some of the weapons are, and how rare it is to find the select few weapons that are actually good. For example, while playing, right after landing I grabbed a common weapon, which did not help when someone landed on me with a better, legendary weapon, and eliminated me.
However, there are some more benefits of this game mode. It is here to stay, permanently, according to Epic Games. Also, it is free to play and through every update, it will shape into something better. Eventually, this game will have gone through some of the best seasons in Fortnite history.
If you want to experience the modest and original Fortnite, I would try the OG game mode during the early seasons. If you want to play the best and more action-packed seasons of Fortnite, I strongly recommend playing this game mode in a few months, when the faster paced, later seasons of Chapter One are released.
