Epic Adds Skill-Based Matchmaking and Bots to Fortnite

Fortnite, the biggest Battle Royale game in the world, thrives on a constant stream of updates that are largely supported by a huge team of people in a state of near-constant crunch and abuse. And while that’s horrifying from a humanitarian standpoint, it does mean it can release some dope new features quickly – although some are certainly bigger than others. That said, the upcoming 10.40 update is looking to be one of the biggest updates in a while: not because it adds any new skins or guns or changes any areas, but rather, because it fundamentally changes how the game is played.

Specifically: they’re adding skill-based matchmaking.

Up until this point, when you cued up for a game of Fortnite, it was more or less gambling if you’d wind up with people on your level, or if you’d be surrounded by pros who would destroy you the moment you escaped the battle bus. Now, you’ll be paired up with players who are roughly your skill level, and the better you get, the better your foes will get too.

Of course, this could be a problem on the lower end of things, since any overlap between bad and good players could keep the bad players from experiencing the thrill of victory… or getting any better. Epic’s response is the second big change coming to the game: bots. In non-competitive modes, there’s a chance some of the people running around are actually AI controlled. The worse you are, you’re more likely to wind up with lots of bots to demolish, while skilled players – or anyone playing ranked – likely won’t run into any at all.

Epic says they’ll continue to update and improve bots, as well as refine their matchmaking, well past Season 11, which is expected to start sometime early this October.

A good time to suck at Fortnite, I guess.