You may have noticed over the weekend that Fortnite Battle Royale Chapter 4 went live across all current Xbox platforms, although the Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S were treated to an absolutely awesome feature that you won't find on Xbox One.
As of this update, Fortnite now makes use of various Unreal Engine 5.1 features including Nanite, Lumen, Virtual Shadow Maps, and Temporal Super Resolution, which now means it looks seriously stunning on Xbox Series X|S.
Here are some examples of what we're talking about:
Lots of Xbox owners have been taking to social media over the past 24 hours to show off how good the game looks now on the two consoles, and Digital Foundry's John Linneman has also expressed how impressed he's been with it:
If you want to check out these graphical improvements on your Xbox Series X or Xbox Series S, all you need to do is make sure you're not playing at 120FPS — just drop the frame rate to 60FPS to see all the Unreal Engine 5.1 benefits.
Don't forget that Fortnite Battle Royale is completely free to download, with the Chapter 4 update featuring a new island, the ability to ride a dirt bike, new boosts called Reality Augments, various new weapons and a whole lot more.
Let us know how you get on with it in the comments below. Have you been impressed so far? Tell us!
Comments 21
*Waits for those devs to explain to me why the series s is holding gaming back
Jumping into the new season yesterday I was blown away by the graphical improvement. It's a brand new map so you can't do side by side with the areas I'm familiar with, but it looks so much more vibrant and alive. It's helped by some really nice environmental designs too.
One thing that's a big improvement is the reflections. I think previously it was using screen space reflections, and when you were falling to the island the reflection of clouds or mountains in the water would disappear if you moved the camera a particular way, and always looked really fake. Now it's much more realistic.
"although the Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S were treated to an absolutely awesome feature in particular."
I'm confused, but what is this "absolutely awesome feature in particular" that is available for Xbox Series X/S but not other current-gen platforms? (PS5/PC) Sorry but this article sounds definitely kind of misleading.
The official announcement makes no distinction of feature availability between current-gen systems.
https://www.epicgames.com/fortnite/en-US/news/drop-into-the-next-generation-of-fortnite-battle-royale-powered-by-unreal-engine-5-1
@XxEvilAshxX don't you see that the Series S has this whatchamacallit that holds back everything those poor devs want to make in their super graphical but slideshow performance of a game?!?!?!
@Serge_G you are indeed confused. The article stated the differences between current gen consoles (xbox series, ps5) and last gen consoles (xbox one, ps4)
@grumpypotato Unreal and Epic devs are the same people. Epic is the owner of Unreal Engine. So not quiet sure what you are on about.
@Sunrah27 he meant other devs who will use UE5 on their games
Cool it looks nothing like Fortnite anymore. Just slap realistic lighting onto every game and make every game look the same.
Nothing says great graphics like blinding light shining onto surfaces so you can't actually make out the textures
@grumpypotato limiting games to a specific framerste has always been the decision of the game developers. Not game engine arbitrarily adds a frame limit. Especially engines for modern consoles where the console is expected to hit 120.FPS in some games.
@Serge_G Apologies for the confusion! As others have mentioned, we tend to only focus on Xbox consoles, so PlayStation 5 and PC don't typically get a mention.
The sentence was intended to reference that the update "went live across all current Xbox platforms" (meaning Xbox One as well), but the "awesome feature" was only on Series X and Series S rather than Xbox One.
Hope that clears things up - I've altered the text slightly
@FraserG Clear communication is always appreciated, now how do I communicate that to my girlfriend? 🤨
Looks great but I'll still be killed by an 8 year old boy in 30 seconds if I play it online.
@grumpypotato the only issues that might arise is the difference in graphics. Like anything.. if I had two graphics and one was cartoon and one was ultra realistic, what would render first? The cartoon version. Less pixels and detail. That's the same when it comes to FPS, how many pixels render on screen. So just because they have done this for Fortnite. It doesn't mean it would be achievable on a game that really works the system graphically.
Having played Fortnite last season, I can say the graphical updates aren’t that noticeable as the graphics before Unreal Engine 5.1 were very good on the Series X already.
Going from an Xbox One to the Series X was the ground-breaking improvement; the difference being absolute night and day. Goes without saying to anyone with a Series X.
I could never enjoy Fortnite when it was first released, I just couldn't handle the building element whilst trying to defend myself at the same time... not sure if things have changed much.
@grumpypotato Depends on how much raytracing effect and how much other effects you pack into the game. If one game managed to have A amount of RT effects at 60 fps doesn't mean all games should.
@Clyde_Radcliffe Not just boys. My 8 year old daughter would 360 no scope you as well 😜
@RetroMan71 There has been a Zero Build mode for quite some time now so you can hop in and play without anyone building
@RetroMan71
I was the same.
But... When they announced the Zero Build mode I tried it again. It's now probably the game I play the most... awesome fun. Give it another go... just be sure to select Zero Build mode.
@Vepra @antstephenson Ahhh OK cool, thanks
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