Fortnite: Battle Royale's Season 9 has officially begun and developer Epic Games has released lengthy patch notes detailing everything that is being added, tweaked, and changed to the wildly popular battle royale title. Naturally, there's a new Battle Pass complete with a whole load of fresh rewards to unlock, but there's also some big difference to the way you play Fortnite in Season 9.

　　Newly-added Slipstream tunnels will zip you around the island at high speed, letting you hop between locations quickly. Vehicles and projectiles can enter the Slipstreams too, just in case it wasn't chaotic enough. These Slipstreams can be found in the two new named map areas: Neo Tilted and Mega Mall. (Another new area--John Wick's house--has also been added to the map and lines up with datamined details suggesting a John Wick event and LTM are coming soon.)

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　　Now Playing: Fortnite Season 9 Battle Pass, Map Changes, And More - GS News Update

　　There are also new Air Vents around the map, and these fire gusts of air that players can use to launch themselves short distances. Despite how high you're sent into the air, players will not receive fall damage. Finally, there's Fortbytes, a new collectible that is exclusive to Battle Pass owners. There are 100 in Season 9 and, once all of them are found by a player, they will decrypt the secrets of Season 9.

　　On the weapon side, the Combat Shotgun has been added. It's semi-automatic and holds 10 shells at a time, and it reloads two shells at once. There are Rare, Epic, and Legendary versions, and you'll find them as floor loot as well as in chests, supply drops, and vending machines. A variety of other weapons have had their damage or availability adjusted, and a bunch of items have been added to the Vault (meaning you won't find them in the game for now). Those include buried treasure, the pump shotgun, balloons, clingers, and the poison dart trap.

　　Check out the full patch notes for Fortnite Season 9's Battle Royale mode below. You can head over to the official Fortnite website to see what's new with the Creative and Save The World modes.

　　

Weapons + Items

Added Combat Shotgun Semi-Automatic Holds 10 Shells.Fires 9 pellets per shot for 73 / 77 / 81 base damage.Tight spread and fast fire rate.Headshot multiplier of 1.70x.Reloads 2 shells at a time.Available in Rare, Epic, and Legendary variants.Available from Floor, Chests, Supply Drops, and Vending MachinesAdjusted Tactical Shotgun damage Base damage increased from 66/70/74 to 71/75/79Reduced Drum Gun availability from 16.732% to 7.155%Reduced Boom Bow availability from 1.292% to .755%Unvaulted GrenadesVaulted ClingersVaulted Buried TreasureVaulted Pump ShotgunVaulted Poison Dart TrapVaulted Scoped RevolverVaulted Suppressed Assault RifleVaulted Thermal Assault RifleVaulted Balloons

Bug Fixes & Improvements

Turbo building after gliding now works correctly.The stink bomb damage audio and effects were not playing if you damaged yourself.Fixed the Shadow bomb occasionally not making the player invisible on the Xbox One the first time it's used.Misplacement of Launch Pads in mid-air has been resolved.Pirate Cannon camera issues due to network latency have been resolved.The Reboot Card deposit sound effects no longer play in replay mode while the Van is on Cooldown.The Reboot Van card sound effects will no longer be heard when a squadmate disconnects.

Gameplay

Slipstreams These tunnels of wind passively carry players down the stream. Players can move faster and change direction when actively trying to move down the Stream.Use directional input to gain extra velocity. Experiment with bobbing up and down for higher speeds.Players are launched when exiting the tube based on their movement speed and exit angle.Projectiles and Vehicles can also enter the Slipstream.Air Vents The powerful gusts of air from these environmental items can launch players short distances and grant immunity to fall damage.Fortbytes Fortbytes are a series of 100 collectible computer chips available to Battle Pass owners. As you collect Fortbytes, you’ll decrypt a mysterious image. Collect them all to unlock rewards and uncover the secrets of Season 9.On the first day of Season 9, there are 18 Fortbytes available to find. At least 1 new Fortbyte will be unlocked each day. Check the Challenges Tab for detailed information on which Fortbytes are currently available and when the others unlock.Fortbytes cannot be collected after Season 9 ends.Disconnected players will stay in the world for 60 seconds. They still take damage and count for elimination points.

Bug Fixes & Improvements

Resolved an issue with the UI showing health gains incorrectly if the player canceled the consumable close to completion time.PS4 controller lighting not always matching your pin color when in Squads.Players not able to use Hold to Swap if they previously picked an item up normallyAdjusted turbo building to be more forgiving under poor network conditionsFixed cases of jittery movement under certain conditions.

Limited Time Mode Rotation:

Trios: Classic Battle Royale with Three-Person Squads.Solid Gold: Fight to the finish using Legendary weapons!One Shot: Low Gravity. Every player has 50 health. Sniper weapons are the only weapon, Bandages are the only healing item. Jump high and aim well!

Events

Players who have already qualified to be in the World Cup will be marked with a World Cup badge on the event leaderboardsLeaderboards now have a button to sort games by the number of top leaderboard players in them. This will help identify the most critical active games from a leaderboard standing view.The in-game HUD now has different icons for points for Arena matches and weekend tournament matches.

Performance

Improved frame rate on Nintendo Switch, particularly when large numbers of characters are onscreen.Addressed some cases of invisible characters after skydiving.

Audio

Better tactical audio when inside player-built structures: Enemy Pickaxe impact within ~one building tile radius has new, louder sound.Wallbreak by enemy close/behind player much clearer/louder.Explosion audio improvements- shorter, higher dynamic range sounds that will make explosion audio clearer and punchier.

UI

Bug Fixes & Improvements

　　“Swap" text appearing in the pickup UI will no longer appear when picking up more resources than the player can carry.The initial storm warning timer was incorrectly showing as 0.Spectators and replay watchers can now report users.Fixed party invites not showing up in the UI if the user logged out and back in again.

Spectating

Spectating a player’s match will now automatically follow that player.

Mobile

Auto fire will now trigger on vehicles.Added option for increasing elimination feed line count in the HUD Layout Tool.Dragging/Dropping from the quickbar is now allowed while jumping.The location of the boost button on Android for the X-Stormwing has been moved to avoid triggering the Home button.Squad formation is now accessible.Bug Fixes & Improvements

　　The delay with interacting when using the quickbar slots has been resolved.Weapon icons now correctly display icons on the quickbar.Fixed sliders that were broken in the Dead Zone tab of the Controller Options.Auto fire adjustments: Semi-automatic weapons now fire correctly.Increased acquisition delay for shotguns.Dynamite trajectory indicator is now correctly displayed during use.Ziplines can no longer be ridden past their endpoints.Autorun no longer takes more than two taps to initiate after jumping from Battle Bus.Cooldown Timer visual for boost buttons on vehicles is now displayed correctly.The camera no longer shakes when entering the X-Stormwing.Left virtual thumbstick no longer becomes invisible when holding left or right and pressing the fire button.The Harvest Tool UI button in HUD layout is no longer invisible.The stair railing in Pleasant Park no longer clips through the door.Variant numbers partially hidden in the preview screen by the "X" button.The Dream cosmetic is now correctly displaying: The butterflyEye glow effectWidow's Bite pickaxe visual effect issue has been resolved.The Cooldown ring timer showing briefly when switching seats in Cannon.Interact Icon is no longer missing with certain consumables.Input Blocked text will no longer appear when opening the inventory.The Item Shop arrows now display correctly on iPhone XS Max.