Can anyone survive Fortnite as a job?

polygon.com:

“I feel like the majority of my life has been in front of a screen,” Turner “Tfue” Tenney reflected amid tears. A fateful kill against Tyler “Ninja” Blevins back in 2019 had catapulted Tenney to fame, and his audience went on to outgrow that of Twitch’s most mainstream star. Yet in 2022, Fortnite’s golden boy — whose name is synonymous with the battle royale game’s most recognizable character, Jonesy — called it quits. For many, Tenney’s retirement video was a sign of yet another Twitch star grappling with burnout: sad, yet familiar. In essence, though, Tenney walking away from it all cemented the end of an era for the games industry.

Tenney was the real deal, a perfect nexus of undeniable charisma and tenacious talent on display at least eight hours a day for years. But his ascent was a complicated one that reflected many of gaming’s biggest growing pains during the influencer era. Tenney came up as an early Fortnite esports champion; we now know that esports is a bubble that’s burned millions of dollars. Tenney rode a Fortnite wave that raised billions of dollars for Epic Games; a few years later, the publisher laid off 830 of its employees. When Tenney blew up, everyone was salivating over Drake and what his livestream appearance signaled for Twitch’s future; now both the rapper and many of the platform’s stars are better known for promoting gambling over hits. Tenney spurred headlines after joining FaZe Clan, a gaming lifestyle brand so lucrative it was endorsed by celebrities like Snoop Dogg; FaZe Clan is now an infamous penny stock that tried to rip him off, Tenney says.

Where all these disasters converge is Twitch, the livestreaming platform that’s home to over 30 million daily viewers. Many would say the writing