Epic has announced a new Fortnite limited time event that's quite a bit different from its previous limited time efforts. It's called the Support-A-Creator Event, and it enables players to throw a little money to their favorite content creators—streamers, video makers, cosplayers, artists, and so forth—when they spend V-bucks on in-game items.
Beginning with the Fortnite update coming next week and running until the end of the year, a "Support a Creator" tab will appear in the Battle Royale Item Shop or the Save the World Loot tab. From that, players can enter the Epic tag of whichever Creator they want to support. Creators will earn $5 (or the regional equivalent) for every 10,000 V-bucks spent in total by their supporters.
We are very excited to announce our new Support-A-Creator Event! ✔️ Creators can apply between now and December 31st✔️ Earn real-world money through fan support in-gameFind out more info in our blog: https://t.co/EU1lDWLilN pic.twitter.com/fU4TGAx2RBOctober 5, 2018
Creators who want to take part in the event can apply to do so now, but of course there are a few restrictions. You must have "regularly created and released Fortnite content over the last 30 days," have a minimum of 1000 followers on at least one "major social platform," and you have to be able to accept payments in a form that Epic supports—sorry, but I don't think they're just going to send you cash in the mail.
There's also an Affiliate Agreement form to fill out and a Creator Code of Conduct you'll need to follow, and if you live in China, Iran, North Korea, or any other nation disallowed by US law, you can't take part.
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10,000 V-bucks goes for $100 on the Microsoft Store (with 3500 bonus V-bucks, but that makes the math harder than I want to deal with right now), meaning that creators are taking a 5 percent cut. Nobody's going to get rich on this in other words, and Epic warned that participants should "expect modest results." Even so, it's a bone to throw to its established supporters: It's not nearly as lucrative as, say, Ark's "sponsored mod" program, but it's far more accessible, and unlike Bethesda's Creation Club it places no financial burden on the players.
It does encourage purchases, though. As basically an Epic-supported system of donations, players might feel more inclined to throw around some V-bucks if they know that their favorite video maker or cosplayer is going to get something out of it. And Epic gets something out of it too: Content creators who want to attract supporters may ramp up their efforts to create more, cooler stuff, which obviously benefits Fortnite as a whole.
Epic also warned that, rather like a few other limited-time events its attempted in the past, there could be unexpected outcomes, possibly including a delay in processing Creator applications, slow payments, or a need to put a limit on the number of Creators who can take part. "We’ve never run a program of this scale before, so we apologize in advance for challenges along the way," Epic wrote.
Fortnite Creators who want to sign up for the program can do so at epicgames.com. If you're interested and qualified, you should probably get your name in the hat quickly: Epic said that if "overwhelming demand" forces it to cap the number of participants, applicants will be look at on a first-come, first-served basis.
