With Disney’s magic, Fortnite is poised to win the metaverse

techcrunch.com:

We may not be using the M word much these days, but the race to build an interconnected avatar-driven virtual world didn’t take the last year off.

The metaverse, a tech buzzword sandwiched in between the hype eras of NFTs and AI, is still being built, regardless of what we’re calling it. And in light of news this week, one company is increasingly positioned to dominate the near future.

Epic Games and Disney revealed Wednesday that they are designing an “entertainment universe” together full of Disney-flavored games to play and things to buy. The multiyear project will deploy Epic’s under-the-hood technology andFortnite’s social gaming ecosystem to bring characters from Disney’s vast intellectual property vault to life. Disney invested $1.5 billion for a chunk of Epic in the deal.

In an image promoting the project, Disney and Epic portray their work together as a series of futuristic colorful islands floating in space with highways running between them and a Magic Castle glowing in the center, a beacon of cash-printing possibility. Those highways, whether literally or symbolically, will connect with Epic’s Fortnite — a hit game that’s now evolved into a massive online social ecosystem.

Fortnite is best-known as a third-person shooter where 100 players swarm a shrinking virtual island and fight to be the last man standing. The game is famous for its goofy maximalism and it encourages players to dress in custom “skins” which can be obtained by playing or be bought through Epic’s lucrative virtual swag shop. In Fortnite, you can, as Darth Vader, roll over your enemy in a giant hamster wheel, slingshotted through the attic of a suburban foursquare home. Your foe might be dressed as Goku from Dragon Ball Z, Ariana Grande or Meowscles, a buff shirtless cat (an Epic original).

Goku Black appears on the Island – powered up to Super Saiyan Rosé and ready to fight! pic.twitter.com/Lo00LmJMmm

— Fortnite