Earlier this month, Epic Games unveiled an impressive new Fortnite Battle Royale cosmetic called the Galaxy skin. The new cosmetic gives characters a cosmic makeover, complete with glowing, galactic bodies, and a halo of orbiting space bits. Many were eager to get their hands on it, but there was just one catch: unlocking the Galaxy skin requires fans to play the game on the Samsung Galaxy Note 9 or Samsung Galaxy Tab S4.
The Samsung Galaxy Note 9 and the Samsung Galaxy Tab S4 are two brand new, high-end handsets, and so unless players are in the market for a new device specifically, that would be one pricey purchase just to unlock a Fortnite skin. As such, some players have come up with a sneaky way of unlocking it for their accounts.
On social media, players have explained that they have been going into electronics retailers such as Best Buy and have been downloading Fortnite on the company's demo units of the Note 9 and Tab S4. Unlocking the skin requires players to play three rounds of Fortnite on the device, and so players have to distract store employees, sometimes convincing them they're in the market for an upgrade, so they can be left alone to play the game.
Throwing a spanner in the works is the fact that the Fortnite Galaxy skin can only be unlocked once from each device. This means that players will have to find a Note 9 or Tab S4 that hasn't previously been used to unlock the Galaxy skin, which is something that takes a reasonable amount of difficulty to do given how popular the method is.
There's also the fact that some demo units are restricted to retail mode, which means that by default, no additional apps can be installed. As such, Fortnite players have detailed workarounds including disabling retail mode and connecting the unit to the data on their actual phone (as a hotspot).
Given how many people have been trying to complete this sneaky method, it hasn't taken retailers long to catch on. According to Reddit, some stores have now begun to display clear signs warning off Fortnite players from trying to take advantage of demo units. According to social media, this hasn't been a very effective solution though, as some fans are continuing to try and use demo units to unlock the Galaxy skin regardless.
The efforts of Fortnite fans will be bad news for Samsung, which will have paid Epic Games good money for this partnership. In fact, the exclusivity of the Galaxy skin was originally designed to get people to actually buy the devices, and not just play around on the demo units. However, some will argue that like other sneaky in-game strategies, this is just another case of Fortnite players outwitting their opponents.
Fortnite is available on PC, PS4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and iOS devices. An Android beta is also taking place.
Source: Waypoint