Fortnitemares starts early this year, and Hollow Knight's Knight is coming as a sidekick
Fortnite's v42.30 update turned Halloween on from October 1, with a Five Nights at Freddy's crossover, a renamed Battlewoods and Freddy Krueger. The Knight arrives as a companion rather than a playable outfit.
Fortnite's Halloween event is running, and it started on October 1 - unusually early for Fortnitemares, which normally waits until the middle of the month. Update v42.30 brought it in alongside the season's biggest crossover yet.
Five Nights at Freddy's, finally
The headline collaboration is Five Nights at Freddy's. Freddy, Bonnie, Chica and Foxy are all in it, and Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria has been added to the island as a place you can actually walk into. Elsewhere on the map, Battlewoods has been reworked into a darker version of itself called Gravegate, part of a broader Halloween pass over the island.
The event trailer also features Freddy Krueger from A Nightmare on Elm Street and what appears to be a maskless Predator. On the systems side, the update adds new Sprites, Loot Hacks and match Overrides - modifiers that change how an individual match plays rather than permanent additions.
The Knight is a sidekick, not a skin
Hollow Knight's protagonist is making its first Fortnite appearance, and it is not an outfit. According to TheGamer, the Knight is arriving as a sidekick - a companion character that follows you around - which is the mechanism Epic now uses for characters whose creators would rather not see them holding a gun. A Shade version is included as a style, and Fortnite leakers have found matching back bling and a pickaxe in the files.
One thing left as it went
The same October 1 date that switched Halloween on also switched Rocket Racing off for good, and UEFN islands built from its templates have been unpublished. Creators keep the racing tools for other projects. It is an odd pairing: the biggest Fortnitemares lineup in years arriving on the day a whole mode leaves.
Why it matters
Hollow Knight has spent years as the obvious Fortnite crossover that never happened, and the sidekick route is how Epic has started handling characters that do not fit a shooter. For everyone else, this is the earliest Fortnitemares has started in years, which means a longer run at the event's rewards than usual.
Why it matters
Fortnitemares starting on October 1 gives players the longest run at the event in years, and the Knight's arrival as a sidekick shows how Epic is now handling crossovers whose characters do not carry guns.