Science Explains How the 'Fortnite' Meteor Could Affect Tilted Towers 

Get ready Fortnite fans, because lots of players think one of the most popular named destinations on the island is about to get demolished by a meteor hurdling from space, and if it followed real-life space science, then it just might reshape the entire game as we know it. Or, based on the visual evidence, it might just gently bounce off a building.

On Tuesday, a new video from YouTube channel The Game Theorists outlined all the evidence presented about the Fortnite comet, taking it a step further to analyze the real science of meteor impacts. With Season 4 fast-approaching, there’s no better time for Epic Games to really shake things up, but based on all the visual evidence from the game, it probably won’t do much. Unless, of course, the evidence is incorrect.

Using a combination of data mined from the game and reported on Reddit, some startlingly astute science, and using various calculations to assess size and scale, The Game Theorists were able to determine the density, volume, mass, speed, and even chemical composition of the asteroid.

The results are totally underwhelming, mainly because the comet seems to be moving very slowly — too slowly to do any damage.

The video explains that this asteroid is as long as a bowling alley and as tall as a telephone pole, making its mass over 200,000 kilograms. It seems impressive until they calculate that over the past few weeks, it’s moved at a speed far slower than a sloth would, which should mean that if it ever does land, then it would do less damage to Tilted Towers than a single squad of Fortnite players with just their pickaxes.

However, there’s a sizable comet already in Fortnite’s code and located underneath Tilted Towers, which implies that an impact is imminent and a crater might soon replace Tilted Towers.

Check out the full video right here, which is pretty awesome if you like Fortnite and space science, but perhaps a little too meticulous in its attention to detail to take too seriously:

Something that’s made readily apparently but never expressly stated in this video is that Epic Games never aims for realism in a game where players can magically build a brick wall with the press of two buttons. It’s all but guaranteed that the game design team didn’t do this same caliber of super-meticulous scientific research.

For instance, The Game Theorists explained that comets get their colors because specific particles are ionized when exposed to solar wind; essentially, chemical composition dictates the color. As such, this comet should be made out of magnesium. We’re pretty sure some game designer at Epic Games just through the blue comet tail looked pretty sweet, so they programmed that in as opposed to something else.

Unlike the real world, in Fortnite the sky doesn’t change relative to your character’s position, which essentially nullifies the calculations done to assess the speed of this meteor. Based on visual evidence presented, the meteor seems like it’s moving very slowly, but the more likely explanation is that Epic Games simply put the meteor there as a teaser without actually trying to make any kind of realistic animation of its collision with the island. In actuality, it’ll do a lot more damage than The Game Theorists assert.

Remember that the theme of Season 3 has been “Space” from the very beginning, with Spacesuit skins and Space Shuttle gliders. This comet destroying Tilted Towers would be a great way to cap this Space-themed season when it ends in a few days.

If you’re wondering how or why there’s all this fuss about Tilted Towers, hidden vibrations spell out a message in Morse code that reads: “SOS D5 418.” In the Fortnite game map, D5 corresponds to the location for Tilted Towers and “418” presumably means April 18, which is today.

So are we lookin at an extinction-level event that’ll give us an entirely new map for Season 4 starting today? Or is the team at Epic Games just full of huge trolls? We should find out soon enough.