'Fortnite' Rocket Launch Theories - Cracked Sky & Lonely Lodge Portal Ideas

Fortnite's historic Rocket launch just happened, and it made a few significant changes to the Battle Royale map. Most notably, the sky is totally busted, a weird portal has spawned outside Lonely Lodge and there's a huge chunk of Rocket parts strewn across Anarchy Acres. What does that mean for Fortnite Season 5 and beyond? It's time to pull out those tin foil hats and drum up some theories!

1) Is This Real?: Given that the Rocket cracked the sky and landed in Anarchy Acres, the prevailing theory coming out of Blast Off is that the world of Fortnite Battle Royale might not be real at all. Are players taking part in some sort of Truman Show-esque simulation? Is this a live game show like The Hunger Games that takes place in a giant dome? Whatever the case may be, that sky we've been looking at since last September doesn't appear to be natural.

The Snobby Shores Villain launched this Rocket presumably unaware the sky was fake. That means either the characters are also fake or they're real and grew up in this arena.

2) Are We Breaking Into a New Map?: As the crack in the Battle Royale sky starts to widen and pulse, players are also starting to think about what happens if this supposed Battle Royale space were to break open entirely. With the old battleground essentially broken, does that mean players will get a totally new one for Season 5?

Will the sky be repaired, or will the players in this wild world be taken somewhere else? Since Season 4 emphasized the gradual repair of Tilted Towers and Dusty Depot, maybe Season 5 will focus on a total overhaul. We could theoretically leave the current Battle Royale map for a while and come back in a season or two once it's "fixed" with a bunch of new and updated locations. Especially given the recently discovered warp portal outside Lonely Lodge, a new location or time period seems possible.

3) Aliens: This wouldn't be a proper theory list if we didn't mention aliens at least once. If the current Battle Royale sky breaks apart and opens up to the "real-world" Fortnite space, does that mean we'll encounter the same monstrous threats we see in Save the World? Could they enter through the Lonely Lodge portal?

Prior to the start of Season 4, Fortnite fans hypothesized that Battle Royale may be a prequel to Save the World since it doesn't feature alien threats. On the other hand, what if the Battle Royale arena was actually designed to keep the population safe from the enemies lurking outside? If those bad guys can get in through openings in the map, does that mean Battle Royale will get some PvE elements for Season 5?

4) Can We Launch It Again?: When data mines for Fortnite's Rocket first appeared a few weeks back, the code suggested players might be able to launch the craft themselves by pushing a button. With that in mind, could there be subsequent player-induced launches after this one? For example, what if the Rocket scrap sitting on Anarchy Acres could be repurposed and reactivated over time? That might mean it could be launched again for the purposes of something like a limited-time mode.

As we saw with Thanos in the Infinity Gauntlet mode, Epic has no problem introducing totally OP gameplay mechanics for the sake of fun. The player to launch the Rocket could kill everyone in its crash radius. Maybe the first player to launch the Rocket claims Victory Royale. Either way, the Rocket sounds like a unique gameplay mechanic that could be leveraged in interesting ways. The alternative is that maybe Epic originally wanted players to launch the Rocket themselves and then scrapped the idea. The button might also be there for developer testing purposes too.

Fortnite is in early access across PS4, Xbox One, Switch, PC and iOS. Fortnite Season 5 begins July 12 at 4 a.m. EDT.

What's your take on Fortnite's Blast Off event? What does it mean for Season 5? Tell us in the comments section!