Fortnite’s new season adds Optimus Prime and lets you ride the raptors

theverge.com:

By Andrew Webster, an entertainment editor covering streaming, virtual worlds, and every single Pokémon video game. Andrew joined The Verge in 2012, writing over 4,000 stories.

Things are getting pretty wild on the Fortnite island. Epic just launched the latest season of the battle royale game, bringing it up to Chapter 4: Season 3, and it’s called, appropriately, “Wilds.” Epic has been teasing it over the last week — including with a trailer at yesterday’s Summer Game Fest.

The big change is that the center of the map has essentially been destroyed, revealing a new jungle area to explore, complete with ruins. Here’s how the island looks now:

To go along with this theme, there are some notable gameplay changes. Some of these include: the return of raptors, which you can now ride; the ability to grind on vines; mud that you can slide through for stealthy camouflage; new plant life to contend with (including explosive flowers); and weapons like a boomerang and jars full of hostile wasps.

There are also some Transformers elements this season — no surprise, given the premiere of Rise of the Beasts — like a weapon called a Cybertron Cannon that looks quite hefty. Elsewhere, Optimus Prime will be available if you purchase this season’s battle pass, and his animal counterpart, Optimus Primal, is coming to the item shop.

Speaking of the battle pass, here’s the full lineup of new skins — including a very laid-back version of Meowscles — as well as a look at Primal’s Fortnite makeover:

Elsewhere, there’s a big change when it comes to the language of Fortnite. As Epic explains, “pickaxes are now officially called pickaxes instead of harvesting tools.” Okay, maybe it’s not that big of a change, but it does make a lot of sense now