Fortnite Chapter 5 Season 4: Absolute Doom Overview | Daily Rant
Fortnite Chapter 5 Season 4 “Absolute Doom” was released on Saturday, November 2, 2024. I’ll be talking about the beginning of the season. It followed the almost universally hated season Fortnite Wrecked, in which the focus was heavily shifted from gunplay and battle royale to cars, nitro boosts, and vehicular weapons similar to the likes of Twisted Metal. Hated, yes. But I was one of the few that absolutely loved it! In the beginning, Fortnite Wrecked allowed you to deck out your car with armored tires, a gun turret, and a spiked bumper which made you almost unstoppable!
If you managed to defeat one of the island bosses, you could get your hands on an armored car with an almost unlimited boost. At the beginning of the season, you were all but assured a Victory Royale. Add to this the medallions that each boss dropped, which granted special powers and attributes, and it was almost impossible to fail!
About Fortnite
Okay, so this may sound like a lot of gibberish to those unfamiliar with Fortnite, so let me explain a bit about the game. Fortnite is a battle royal game where you queue into a giant world and fight 100 other players. The premise is simple: eliminate all the opposing 99 players and be the last one standing, gaining yourself what is called the coveted Victory Royale.
You play on a giant island. There is a storm circle that encompasses the entire island. It starts off wide and does minimal damage if you happen to wander into it. Not too bad. But as time goes on, every few minutes the storm will move, get smaller and smaller so there’s less room to hide, and do increasingly more damage as it shrinks.
Every player begins the same: no weapons, no items. The goal is to scour the island for chests, and weapons like machine guns and shotguns, to defend yourself. There are also items that give you shields and replenish your health.
Fortnite is broken into Chapters, with Chapter 5 being the most recent chapter as of the writing of this article. Each Chapter is split into smaller seasons, which usually span most of the year. This season is Chapter 5 Season 4. Every season brings new weapons, new NPCs, and new items to find that keep the game evolving and growing year after year.
Absolute Doom- Characters
This Season introduced a Marvel collab which added well-known Villain Doctor Doom to the island. Along with Doctor Doom, they added Wolverine, Deadpool, Gwenpool, Shuri, War Machine, and Mysterio, to name a few. They are part of the Battle Pass.
The Battle Pass is a paid feature in Fortnite, which is simply just a cosmetic that allows you to change the look of your characters. Every Chapter and Season has a different Battle Pass with new characters and items to unlock. So as far as looks and design go, it is very cool.
Absolute Doom- Locations
They also added some new locations to the island in the form of Doomstadt, The Raft, Castle Doom, and Doom Courtyard. There is a boss character guarding each of the locations, each with its own medallion and loot drops.
Doomstadt is where you’ll find Mysterio, the fish bowl-headed illusionist from the Spider-Man universe. He drops the Stealth Medallion that allows you to crouch and become invisible. This is kind of cool, but a bit useless, since you’re still sort of visible (because you have a watery outline and footsteps) and you cannot shoot. He also drops the Mysterio Sovereign Shotgun.
The Raft is a floating fortress where you’ll find the beautiful Emma Frost from X-Men fame. Her diamond form turns her into a shiny shield that blacks damage. If you manage to take her out, you get the Reveal Madallion, which sends out a ping of light that shows the location of nearby players. This is definitely my favorite medallion! She also drops Emma Frost’s Striker Burst AR.
At Castle Doom, you’ll find the Doombot, which I guess is like a robot version of Doom, or like a Doom henchman. I’m not knowledgeable about Doom lore, but this guy is here. He drops the Siphon Medallion. This medallion grants you health and replenishes your shield after every enemy kill. Pretty cool, but since I can’t aim that well, this medallion is always wasted on me. He also drops mythic Doctor Doom’s Monarch Pistol.
You can also find Gwenpool lurking around Reckless Railways, but she isn’t a boss. But she will sell you a pair of sweet mythic dual SMGs. Which are my favorite guns in the current season! Although come to think of it, at the beginning of the season, she was locked inside somewhere and didn;t escape till later.
Absolute Doom- Weapons
Aside from the boss weapons, you can also find new mythic weapons like Captain America’s Shield, War Machine’s arsenal, and Doctor Doom’s Arcane Gauntlets. They recently added Shuri’s Gloves, Iron Man’s Arsenal, and Doom’s transformation. I also heard Spider-Man’s gloves have been added to the game. But I will only be talking about the beginning of the season.
Doctor Doom’s Arcane Gauntlets fire off a large ball of green energy that does a decent amount of damage. It doesn’t follow or track players, like the next few weapons, so it makes it less dangerous in my opinion. The attack is cool, but I would rather have the Captain America shield or the War Machine gloves.
Captain America’s shield can knock back players with a rush attack, block bullets, and cars, and will follow enemy players when thrown and bounce off of them to do a significant amount of damage. It can also ricochet off and damage several players at the same time. It has been nerfed, but it was one of the cheapest and scariest weapons of the season! If I ever came across someone with a shield, I was running.
The War Machine arsenal consists of a shoulder turret, gloves, and a jet pack. The jet pack allows flight for a finite amount of time. The gloves shoot a barrage of heat-seeking missiles. While the targeting laser is simply an auto-aim weapon that locks onto a nearby target and shoots automatically. Yeah, it’s as cheap as it sounds!
Closing Thoughts
So far Fortnite Chapter 5 Season 4 Absolute Doom is pretty fun. Although, even with the nerfs and updates, I feel like there are a lot of balancing issues. I feel like there are way too many weapons this Season, and I think they should have focused on one or two weapons and then either added or changed out the other weapons during subsequent seasons.
As it stands, it’s fun, but chaotic. It is literally like you come across actual superheroes, and unless you have the right weapons, you are dead if you run into a player decked out in Marvel gear.
I miss the cars and nitro boost from Wrecked. I may be one of the only players that miss it. But whenever I play Absolute Doom I hop into a car, drive past a gas station, and think about what once was. Ah well, cest la vie! All in all, I’d give this season a 3 out of 5. It’s fun, I’ll still play, but the chances of getting absolutely wrecked by any number of weapons make it less fun. At least for me.
SCORE: 3 out of 5
Rating System:
1 point for Story
1 point for Characters
1 Point for Music
1 Point for Design
1 point for Fun
1/5- Unplayable
2/5- Not Worth it
3/5- Flawed but enjoyable and playable
4/5- Fun and Inspiring
5/5- Perfect
