Fortnite Season 11 estimated release date, live event as it happened, and what to expect from Fortnite Chapter 2

Fortnite Season 11 is almost here - and it's playing out a little differently to previous seasons.

The new season is expected to offer some of the biggest changes to the game yet. For one, it's heavily rumoured to offer a brand new map - the first time in the game's two-year history.

The other is the way the Season 10 live event is set to play out - which should lead straight into the next Season.

If you're just getting started, our Fortnite Battle Royale tips and tricks can provide some helpful hints.

When is the estimated Fortnite Season 11 release date now the live event is over?

Update 4 (October 15th, 12:45 UK time): If you haven't noticed already - the new season is live with, as predicted, a new map. Despite the name as with any new season this is the same client - so update your download on your platform of choice, and then jump in when it's done.

Enjoy!

Update 3 (October 15th, 9:15am UK time): Things are finally happening. Just after 9am this morning, you could no longer log into Fortnite as because clients begin to download patches on various platforms - suggesting the release date is upon us.

Fortnite patch downloading on PS4 - 9.023GB: pic.twitter.com/OPXIYdV6de

On PS4 it's 9.023GB and on PC, we've seen a 14.9GB download take place - so whatever your platform of choice, make sure you start downloading now so it's ready for whenever Epic flips the servers back on.

Typically, it takes a couple of hours between when patches drop and the servers go back up, but since this isn't a normal season launch, this could be shorter - or, of course, much longer.

As to what to expect, we reported on the leaked trailer last night showing what's being added with Chapter Two. We won't spoil the surprise here!

Update 2 (October 14th, 9:00am UK time): Good morning! It's been 14 hours since the black hole took Fortnite 'offline', and for all intents and purposes, nothing has changed - the game is still unavailable.

There have been some possible clues as to what's happening next, however.

First, regarding those numbers that have been appearing around the black hole - Thooming on Twitter has matched the numbers with the words in the Visitor Recording audio and discovered they form a new message: "I was not alone. Others are outside the loop. This was not calculated. The zero point is inevitable."

Our guess is whoever is outside of the loop will help bring things back to normal:

Full Leaked Line : 11,146,15,62,87,14,106,2,150,69,146,15,36,2,176,8,160,65 MATCHED NUMBERS TO VISITOR AUDIO TRANSCRIPT: I WAS NOT ALONE. OTHERS ARE OUTSIDE THE LOOP THIS WAS NOT CALCULATED. THE ZERO POINT IS NOW INEVITABLE

Guess we will see if this is correct after the next one

If whatever this is will help brings back to normal, then when? The only sign of a possible Fortnite Season 11 release date is again from leaker Lucas7yoshi, who has found code on the official website revealing the finale of this The End event will be at Thursday at 4am EST - that's 9am UK time.

The https://t.co/0TDeMk7Bda code was updated so the the-end thing has its end_time as Thursday at 4am EST

i really doubt they really going to make people not play for 4 days or whatever straight but its epic lmao

take it as you will pic.twitter.com/P6gYB7lWHw

Though it's days away, Thursday at 9am UK is usually when most new seasons begin, so it's possible this could be accurate.

That said, the idea of Fortnite being offline for the best part of a week almost sounds farfetched. Will Epic Games wait that long to bring the game back online? It's, of course, possible the game could return in some form before then, and Thursday 9am is then when the new season officially kicks in.

Update 1 (October 13th, 10:05pm UK time): That was something, wasn't it? Following a black hole swallowing the map - and, if you log into the game as of right now, the lobby screen and your character with it - Fortnite as we know it doesn't exist.

Watch the Fortnite live event as it happened:

And here's what happens when you attempt to log into the game for the first time after the event:

This all goes beyond the game itself, too, with developer Epic Games deleting every tweet on the official Fortnite account - except a live glimpse at the black hole - with similar wipes across other accounts too.

What's next? Usually as one season ends the next begins two or three hours later, but right now we're in uncharted territory. The Fortnite Season 11 release date - also known as Fortnite Season Chapter Two - is currently unknown.

At the time of writing - around three hours after the live event - the Fortnite client simply shows a live feed of a black hole. There have been reports of numbers appearing from around it, and thanks to leakers such as Lucas7Yoshi, there's the tease of something happening in the coming hours.

survey_br_nick_001
kevin_says_hello

both end at the following times

kevin_says_hello - 5:07 PM EST
survey_br_nick_001 - 6:07 PM EST

It's hard to know how significant these are, as the reality is, no one knows when Fortnite will be back up, or what's coming next. It could be hours - or possibly days! - until Fortnite Season 11 releases, so it's simply case of waiting and seeing what happens.

It's worth nothing Destiny 2 recently went offline for 24 hours as it underwent a huge revamp, so lengthy waits between new seasons in games such as these aren't unheard of!

Original report: Fortnite seasons start every 10 or so weeks, giving you a variety of rewards to unlock by levelling up a Battle Pass. These include emotes, music tracks, loading screens, character and weapon skins, and sometimes even V-Bucks.

Towards the end of each season, there is a live event that concludes the current storyline, and often teases the next. Though there is usually a gap of a couple of weeks between this and the new season, this season looks to be different - with the live event suggested to be a full stop on Season X, with the new season starting straight after.

As such, the Fortnite Season 11 release date is Sunday, October 13th, and will begin after the Fortnite live event time, which is as follows:

• UK: 7pm (BST)
• Europe: 8pm (CEST)
• East Coast US: 2pm (EDT)
• West Coast US: 11am (PDT)

Though developer Epic Games has yet to confirm this explicitly, the countdowns for both the live event and the end of the Season X Battle Pass are one and the same.

As such, we don't know the exact Fortnite 'Chapter Two' start time - it could be an hour or two after the live event time, or several hours, depending on how long it takes to put things together.

As always, all previous challenges will vanish when Chapter Two begins, so make sure you've unlocked all the rewards you want to keep.

Fortnite Season 11 - or Fortnite Chapter 2 - theme explained

As a season ends in Fortnite, events start happening throughout the game that teases what's coming next.

In previous years, this has included a mysterious purple cube and rifts, and in Season 10 - which has been a 'best-of' previous seasons thanks to a time-travelling storyline - it looks like Season 11 is about starting things afresh. This means a thorough refresh of existing locations, or quite possibly, an entirely new map.

The most blatant clue comes from several iOS App Store leaks, which calls Season 11 'Fortnite Chapter Two', with images showing a map with brand new locations and attractions, including boats and a lighthouse (thanks Sombrahhh on reddit for spotting this).

This map will include a series of new locations, the names of which have been reportedly leaked via Lucas7yoshi on Twitter, and include Camp Cod, Frenzy Farm, Lazy Lakes and Weeping Woods:

Gonna go ahead and say a new map is likely, or atleast a massively changed one

Kinda proof is in the reply to this https://t.co/Gv8UzgEXKW

It's not only through leaks that we know Fortnite is about to tease a new map. In the final week of Season X, the game's traditional set of Overtime challenges - which run when a season goes past the usually allotted 10 weeks - are named 'Out of Time'. A play on the season's time travel theme, perhaps, but it's another thing to add to the above theory.

Not only that, but this season's final set of time-limited set of challenges is named 'Last Stop', with the loading screen reward seeing characters waving goodbye to the Battle Bus as it flies into the sunset.

Pretty blatant at this point, right?

So how is this all going to play out? The exact specifics are unknown, but Season 10 has seen the return of the Visitor, who kickstarted much of Fortnite's current plot by arriving in Season 3's meteor.

The Visitor has returned and is looking to close a time loop that has seemingly caused most of Season 10's time travel rifts, which has seen destinations from past and future appear on the same map.

The Visitor Recordings - which can be collected as part of the Out of Time set of challenges - talk about this in more detail, with the Visitor's preparations taking place at Dusty Depot.

And above the north-most warehouse in Dusty Depot, on the roof, is a rocket with a timer counting down to the live event.

Whatever happens, this looks like the end of the Visitor storyline - and possibly the start of a new whole new map.

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