Recently, rumors of a Fortnite TV show in the works for Disney have gained a lot of attention, but the hopes of Fortnite fans have been “knocked” as they find out the announcement made by a fake Twitter account isn’t real.
If you’ve never heard of Fortnite, it’s a co-op fantasy ‘Battle Royale’-style survival game that was first released in July 2017. Earlier this year, it became the most-viewed game in YouTube history and the free-to-play game has attracted more than 125 million players globally. The games massive success made it easy for some to believe that a TV show was a real possibility.
The rumors started after a Disney XD parody account tweeted the fake announcement of a Fortnite TV show leading many to believe a show was in the works as you can see in the post below.
Fortnite: The TV Show will premier on August the 12, 2019! pic.twitter.com/sR4M4VFffV
— Disney XD 🌐 (@DisnayXD) July 15, 2018
The fake announcement stated the show would premiere on August 12, 2019 and teased upcoming sneak peeks throughout the week and has been retweeted more than three thousand times.
The parody account goes by the Twitter handle @DisnayXD and even uses a globe icon at the end of the username to convince users that it’s a verified account.
The tweet gained enough attention to get addressed by an employee of Epic.
Are you actually reporting on a story based on a fake/parody account’s tweet as if it’s a fact? This can’t actually be a thing you’re doing, right? Because that would be irresponsible and NME would absolutely never do that.
Is *this* a parody account? *checks NME spelling*
— Nick Chester (@nickchester) July 17, 2018
Nick Chester tweeted condemned the tweet and anyone reporting it as fact, eliminating any question that a TV show is being made.