‘Fortnite’ Season 8 Update Will Improve Gameplay Sounds

Epic Games has plans to improve Fortnite’s various gameplay sounds in Season 8, a recent AMA confirmed.

Answering questions from players who took to the game’s most active subreddit to inquire about Season 8 and Fortnite in general, Epic Games addressed the topic of gameplay sounds and how they’ll be changed in Season 8. Epic Games said it’d been reviewing areas where the sound could be improved in the next season and have decided to move forward with some of its plans.

“In the last few weeks we’ve started reviewing our gameplay audio and found there’s a lot of room for improvement,” Epic Games said.

Epic Games followed that comment with a list of sounds it plans on improving in Season 8. Among the plans are improvements to the sound players’ footsteps make when they’re traveling either up or down sets of stairs as well as a better, “less fatiguing” noise when players hit the weak point of structures while harvesting materials. Sounds will also be added for actions such as aiming down the sights and crouching to give players “a better sense of player ownership of actions,” Epic Games explained.

Among those changes were several that dealt with gunplay, an area of Fortnite that’s one of the most important ones when it comes to the sounds. Some of the ways gun sounds along with the noises made when players hit enemies can be found below:

Improved Weapon firing sounds:

• All player weapon fire sounds are now 2D stereo, giving them a much fuller and natural sound.
• All 3rd person weapon sounds from other players are now mono and run through the new reverb, which gives much better point spatialization while still sounding ‘in the world’.

Improved hit notification audio

• Improvements to sound and mix of 2D hit notifications when players land shots on enemies. This includes a new clearer “shield break” sound.

Other changes Epic Games plans to make in Season 8 include the vaulting of the Stormwing planes, a controversial vehicle which was added during Season 7. There’s also a new vehicle that’s in the works and is expected to release in Season 8, though no exact timeframe has been given.

These sound improvements are said to be included in Season 8’s update which isn’t too far away now that Epic Games has begun teasing the next season.