Fortnite's Guided Missile is going away for a while

The Fortnite guided missile that promised pinpoint death-and-destruction but became far more famous for enabling Silver Surfer-style cruises across the battlefield has been removed from the game. Despite all the fun that people were having with it, Epic said on Reddit that there's concern about the "fairness and strength" of the weapon, and so it will go back to the drawing board until the developers can figure out what to do with it. 

Epic is also rolling back a change in the 3.5 update that resulted in players shooting their own structures when peeking over them. This was apparently caused by a fix for an "unidentified behavior in shooting that affected a small number of players" (Epic didn't specify exactly what, but a running list of "community issues" is maintained on Trello) and the rollback in 3.5.2, which is coming later this week, will restore that issue. But better a small bug than a big one, and Epic said that it will work on coming up with a proper fix for the original problem. 

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Changes to the new weapon equip timer are also coming in a hotfix slated for today. Equip time changes for sniper rifles and crossbows will be reverted since they don't benefit as much from quick switching, while delays for shotguns, the revolver, hand cannon, and rocket launcher will be retained. Changes to weapon equip animations are coming as well: It's currently possible to fire weapons before they appear to be ready with the current animations, "so they feel more sluggish than they really are." 

Epic said in follow-up comments that the delayed 50v50 mode is expected to be enabled later this week, but the issues with Builder Pro will have to wait until the next major patch.   

Andy Chalk

Andy has been gaming on PCs from the very beginning, starting as a youngster with text adventures and primitive action games on a cassette-based TRS80. From there he graduated to the glory days of Sierra Online adventures and Microprose sims, ran a local BBS, learned how to build PCs, and developed a longstanding love of RPGs, immersive sims, and shooters. He began writing videogame news in 2007 for The Escapist and somehow managed to avoid getting fired until 2014, when he joined the storied ranks of PC Gamer. He covers all aspects of the industry, from new game announcements and patch notes to legal disputes, Twitch beefs, esports, and Henry Cavill. Lots of Henry Cavill.