Fortnite creator Epic Games becomes world's most popular gaming company

New data based on the most popular searches by country has revealed that Epic Games, the creators of Fortnite, has recently passed Nintendo for the number one spot of the world’s most popular gaming company.

Anyone curious to read more can find this study here, conducted by the excellent team at BusinessFinancing.co.uk. They come highly recommended for curious readers.

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— Epic Games Store (@EpicGames) January 27, 2021

This measure of popularity is different from other measurements, such as by revenue or quantity of sales, in part because it has much more to do with brand recognition than actual measurable success. As a result, while this data is useful for presenting a general expectation of each brand’s expected success, further work would be required to turn mere recognition into quantifiable value.

What companies make up the most popular gaming brands?

Companies like Epic Games and Nintendo have an ongoing brand centered around new content, such as how Fortnite releases updates every few weeks and Nintendo is always working on either a new generation of games or consoles.

However, beyond that, these two companies couldn’t be more different. Epic is a relatively new brand, and has gained its significant recognition in part due to Fortnite and partly due to the Unreal Engine which many games run on.

Epic also operates their own digital marketplace. Nintendo, meanwhile, has been producing games for 132 years, but won most of its international recognition on the back of its early work in making video games respectable. They also developed in players, an expectation of high quality works, with Mario, Zelda, and many more now long-lived and beloved brands.

The next three companies, Gameloft, Atari, and Activision, are each varied in their own ways as well. Gameloft focuses mostly on mobile games, Atari was once one of the biggest brands in gaming but had to shrink due to competition with Nintendo, and Activision is mostly known for the Call of Duty franchise, though it publishes much more.

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— Epic Games Store (@EpicGames) January 19, 2021

Together, these five companies represent the past, present, and future of gaming.

How Fortnite helped Epic Games take the top spot

It’s fair to say that Fortnite played a massive role in helping Epic earn its brand recognition. Although an argument could be made that the Unreal Engine is more impactful to the world of gaming, Unreal doesn’t have quite the same mass market presence that Fortnite was able to generate.

Fortnite released as a free to play game with a colorful aesthetic that helped it easily catch on with school-aged gamers. Fortnite became an instant cultural phenomenon, and Epic was able to turn that into advertising and merchandising. It made headlines both due to its popularity and the various teenaged pros who were able to make millions in the game’s competitive scene.

It’s uncertain whether or not Fortnite alone could have propelled Epic to such heights, but it certainly did the lion’s share of the work. Epic’s brand is further supported by one of the most successful game engines and a reasonable digital marketplace as well. All things considered, it’s easy to see how Epic earned its number one spot.