It's hard to imagine now, but there was a time before Fortnite's widespread, universal accessibility; a short-lived infancy period where Epic Games was still figuring out what this game truly was, prior to the behemoth that its Battle Royale mode would become. At that point, in 2017, Fortnite had a very limited physical release with discs made for PS4 and Xbox One consoles. This week, one of those has just sold for a whopping $42,500 — possibly the highest amount for a modern, online-only game.
Video game grading site Wata assigned its highest 10 A++ rating to this still-stealed copy of Fortnite for Xbox One, meaning it was essentially in flawless condition. Even though we do see mint copies of retro games from decades ago, preserving this particular disc for over eight years is certainly no easy feat either. Gearbox is the publisher behind the disc, which includes the "Storm Master Weapon Pack" cosmetics, to go along with the Save The World mode, but no Battle Royale since that was added in a later update.
Since this is an early copy of the game, you can earn Fortnite's digital currency V-Bucks for free just by grinding the STW mode and completing daily challenges. Epic Games removed this functionality in 2020, so every Save The World purchase made digitally after that point doesn't let you cash in on V-bucks that you can then spend in the game's popular Item Shop. Redeemable codes from back in the day for this mode alone go for over $1,000 on secondhand marketplaces.
After the grading, Heritage Auctions sold the copy to the highest bidder, who paid $42,500 to own this rare gem, if you could call it that. We're fairly confident that no other game released in the past decade has been valued so highly, partially because Fortnite became a cultural juggernaut, so its stocks are perpetually up. Just yesterday, the game launched its newest update, Chapter 7, which adds Marty McFly and Kill Bill to the mythos, following an Avengers Endgame-esque collab event that saw almost 10 million players attend it.
The current Guinness Book of World Records holder for the most expensive game ever sold is a sealed copy of Super Mario 64 that went for a casual $1.56 million, so this Fortnite disc is not even in the same conversation, and actually feels very reasonable in comparison. Previously, the most anyone paid for Fortnite was $13,750, but rare, unopened copies on eBay still sit around the $10,000 range. Maybe in a few decades, sealed Fortnite discs will be worth in the millions, too.
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