Within just one month, Fortnite swept across the entire gaming industry.
Almost overnight, battle royale games became the hottest topic in gaming.
All other genres had to step aside.
No one could really explain why so many people loved battle royale games so much.
Maybe it was an instinctive drive for competition. Or maybe the gameplay itself was genuinely fun.
The first thing Brown Entertainment did was dig deep from the ground up to analyze why Fortnite exploded in popularity.
First of all, it was a shooter, and Brown Entertainment already had similar game types they could directly reference.
They could even add battle royale mechanics to their existing online shooter titles.
But that required time for analysis—understanding why Fortnite succeeded, and why other battle royale games failed to catch on.
After a month of research, Brown Entertainment arrived at a rough conclusion: Fortnite aggressively stripped away the complicated mechanics found in other battle royale games.
Systems like hunger, weapon durability, physical condition, and similar stats were all discarded.
What remained were only:
Player health
Armor
Weapon combat strength
Other battle royale games tried to showcase "professionalism" by obsessing over gun details—claiming ultra-realistic recoil, authentic handling, and faithful weapon assembly.
But that was likely missing the point.
Most players didn't want to study tiny differences between firearms.
And no one was interested in worrying about eating or drinking while fighting to survive.
Just fight.
Simple.
Pure.
At the same time, many other battle royale games featured matches that lasted several hours.
For players with lots of free time, that level of immersion was appealing.
But most players didn't have that kind of time.
Even carving out half an hour to play was rare.
And even when time allowed, matches lasting several hours quickly became exhausting.
These insights were what Brown Entertainment gradually pieced together over the course of a month.
Their next step was obvious: stop analyzing and start developing—immediately.
Brown Entertainment moved extremely fast.
Just two months after Fortnite launched, its peak concurrent player count reached two million.
On top of that, Nintendo voluntarily released its revenue data, practically showing off that their very first game had already become a blockbuster—an unmistakable nouveau-riche attitude that left many competitors envious, jealous, and bitter.
Some companies had spent years carefully building their brands, yet couldn't match the appeal of a game Nintendo made in just three months.
That stung.
But video games often come down to creativity.
If you have a strong idea—and it hits players' excitement threshold—a game can explode overnight.
Gamestar Electronic Entertainment's Candy Frenzy was a perfect example.
In just two months, it pulled in $200 million in revenue.
Of that, $130 million was pure operating profit, with the rest going to labor, marketing, and server costs.
It was practically money printing.
No wonder so many game companies were green with envy.
More importantly, Fortnite was clearly a long-term online multiplayer game.
At first glance, players didn't need to spend a single cent.
But when you saw cosmetic items priced at just one dollar—or even less—after getting bored of the default look, wouldn't you want to spend a little to customize?
In reality, very few people could resist.
The game also introduced a battle pass system.
This model was already common in other games and was extremely effective at keeping players engaged while encouraging spending.
By combining free-to-play with low-cost cosmetics and battle passes, Fortnite made a fortune.
And this was only the first two months.
After that, revenue began growing at a geometric rate.
Inside Nintendo, employees were so excited they could barely contain themselves.
It felt like winning the lottery.
Most of them had joined this startup with little expectation—attracted mainly by decent starting salaries and just wanting to try their luck.
None of them had planned to stay long-term.
Now, every employee received bonuses worth several times their monthly pay as a reward for their hard work.
Yet instead of splurging, they held back—because Takayuki had already assigned them new tasks: preparing crossover collaborations for the game.
Takayuki used his behind-the-scenes connections to negotiate with major animation and film IP holders.
The deal was simple: as long as they allowed their characters to appear in Fortnite, they would receive a percentage of revenue based on the sales of IP-themed skins.
With Takayuki's hidden network and Lorenzo's public influence, most companies didn't think much of it at first—but still licensed their IPs to Nintendo.
Then, in the game's third month, a wave of IP crossover events launched.
After years in this world, Takayuki had developed a deep understanding of its IP landscape.
He knew many franchises rivaled top-tier works from his original world.
This world had superhero comics, classic Japanese hot-blooded manga—old and new alike.
Any IP that could be secured was brought in wholesale and released season by season.
Fans of those franchises were thrilled and more than willing to pay for skins tied to characters they loved.
As a result, Fortnite's third-month revenue hit yet another record.
$200 million in a single month.
That same month, Nintendo announced that Fortnite would be launching on mobile platforms.
PC.
Consoles.
Mobile devices.
Fortnite would be everywhere.
That included—even more provocatively—Mikufu's smartphones.
Although Fortnite was confirmed for Mikufu phones, all other platforms had clear release timelines.
Only Mikufu's smartphones did not.
That made Maylon Case restless.
A game that generated $400 million in revenue in just three months would be a massive profit driver on Mikufu smartphones.
And with Mikufu having just announced plans to split off its game division, they were desperately lacking a flagship title like Fortnite.
Before Takayuki even finished preparing to acquire Mikufu's game department, Maylon Case contacted him first.