Epic design lead says V-Bucks price increase is a necessary evil, but players aren’t impressed: ‘We need to fight this hard’

Well, folks, it happened: Fortnite is increasing the price of its premium currency, V-Bucks, much to the dismay of a good chunk of its player base. The game, featuring heavy microtransactions and battle passes, helped spread to live-service games as a whole, and had stable prices for most of its existence, but now they're getting beefed up. And, of course, Epic Games thinks this move is absolutely necessary. Fortnite has revolved around huge collaborations with other popular franchises and IPs, and though many of these collabs had actual in-game events and content, most of them were primarily driven by microtransactions, specifically skins and outfits folks can purchase either standalone or earn via the battle pass. It's gotten to the point where Fortnite has become an actual marketing venue, one used by publishers to advertise their games, movies, TV shows, or just about any other form of audiovisual media. Not having your IP in Fortnite nowadays is almost taboo. Screenshot by Destructoid And given this strong reliance on selling cosmetics, purchasable exclusively with V-Bucks, it only makes sense that Epic would want to buff their primary revenue stream. The fans, at least those vocal enough to speak out, are having none of it, though. "We need to fight this hard," one player said on Reddit. Epic thinks the game has grown to a point where it’s unkillable, but with how many bad decisions they have been making, Fortnite might actually be gone for good," they added. Others immediately started advocating and calling for a boycott of the game, at least its financial side, in an attempt to force Epic Games into rescinding its price increases. So far, there hasn't been much success, and Fortnite's lead designer Andre Balta actually came out to defend this move in response to the boycott campaign. "We put a ton of work and care into Fortnite’s gameplay, and this focus is only growing. Paying the bills frees up our teams to continue driving stories and building stuff you love," Balta wrote on X. The responses to his comments weren't so positive, though, as many believe Fortnite has long been focusing on microtransactions, cosmetics, and collabs, propping them up instead of actual gameplay and content, making this price increase feel that much more hurtful. "For me personally, just my own experience lately, it seems to me that the collabs and item shop cosmetics have been the most important factor in promoting the game and it just doesn’t feel right," Fortnite content creator MoonNite said in a reply to Balta. Selling skins is a huge revenue stream for Epic Games. Screenshot by Destructoid Others were of the opinion that the price increase would probably be fine if there were content to justify it. "Something tells me these price increases aren’t coming with more content in each pass," one player noted. It's been a few days since the initial announcement of the price increase. Epic Games plans to start implementing these changes as of March 19, i.e., next Thursday. You'll now be getting some 20 percent less V-Bucks per pack, with popular choices like the $8.99 pack now giving 800 instead of 1,000 V-Bucks. The exact amount packs, which let you decide how many V-Bucks you want to buy, are essentially doubling in price, going from $0.50 per 50 V-Bucks to $0.99 for the same amount. To compensate for some of these changes, Epic Games is lowering the price of certain store-bought items. As such, battle passes are going down from 1,000 to 800 V-Bucks to maintain the same real dollar price as they had before. Actual cosmetics and outfits are staying the same, however, making them quite pricier than they were prior to the changes. Whether or not the boycotts will achieve anything remains to be seen, as community action can affect publisher behavior, even if some would disagree. The post Epic design lead says V-Bucks price increase is a necessary evil, but players aren’t impressed: ‘We need to fight this hard’ appeared first on Destructoid.

Mar 14, 2026 - 04:57

Epic design lead says V-Bucks price increase is a necessary evil, but players aren’t impressed: ‘We need to fight this hard’

Well, folks, it happened: Fortnite is increasing the price of its premium currency, V-Bucks, much to the dismay of a good chunk of its player base. The game, featuring heavy microtransactions and battle passes, helped spread to live-service games as a whole, and had stable prices for most of its existence, but now they're getting beefed up.

And, of course, Epic Games thinks this move is absolutely necessary.

Fortnite has revolved around huge collaborations with other popular franchises and IPs, and though many of these collabs had actual in-game events and content, most of them were primarily driven by microtransactions, specifically skins and outfits folks can purchase either standalone or earn via the battle pass. It's gotten to the point where Fortnite has become an actual marketing venue, one used by publishers to advertise their games, movies, TV shows, or just about any other form of audiovisual media.

Not having your IP in Fortnite nowadays is almost taboo. Screenshot by Destructoid And given this strong reliance on selling cosmetics, purchasable exclusively with V-Bucks, it only makes sense that Epic would want to buff their primary revenue stream. The fans, at least those vocal enough to speak out, are having none of it, though.

"We need to fight this hard," one player said on Reddit. Epic thinks the game has grown to a point where it’s unkillable, but with how many bad decisions they have been making, Fortnite might actually be gone for good," they added.

Others immediately started advocating and calling for a boycott of the game, at least its financial side, in an attempt to force Epic Games into rescinding its price increases. So far, there hasn't been much success, and Fortnite's lead designer Andre Balta actually came out to defend this move in response to the boycott campaign.

"We put a ton of work and care into Fortnite’s gameplay, and this focus is only growing. Paying the bills frees up our teams to continue driving stories and building stuff you love," Balta wrote on X. The responses to his comments weren't so positive, though, as many believe Fortnite has long been focusing on microtransactions, cosmetics, and collabs, propping them up instead of actual gameplay and content, making this price increase feel that much more hurtful.

"For me personally, just my own experience lately, it seems to me that the collabs and item shop cosmetics have been the most important factor in promoting the game and it just doesn’t feel right," Fortnite content creator MoonNite said in a reply to Balta.

Selling skins is a huge revenue stream for Epic Games. Screenshot by Destructoid Others were of the opinion that the price increase would probably be fine if there were content to justify it. "Something tells me these price increases aren’t coming with more content in each pass," one player noted.

It's been a few days since the initial announcement of the price increase. Epic Games plans to start implementing these changes as of March 19, i.e., next Thursday. You'll now be getting some 20 percent less V-Bucks per pack, with popular choices like the $8.99 pack now giving 800 instead of 1,000 V-Bucks. The exact amount packs, which let you decide how many V-Bucks you want to buy, are essentially doubling in price, going from $0.50 per 50 V-Bucks to $0.99 for the same amount.

To compensate for some of these changes, Epic Games is lowering the price of certain store-bought items. As such, battle passes are going down from 1,000 to 800 V-Bucks to maintain the same real dollar price as they had before.

Actual cosmetics and outfits are staying the same, however, making them quite pricier than they were prior to the changes. Whether or not the boycotts will achieve anything remains to be seen, as community action can affect publisher behavior, even if some would disagree.

The post Epic design lead says V-Bucks price increase is a necessary evil, but players aren’t impressed: ‘We need to fight this hard’ appeared first on Destructoid.

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