Fortnite pro explains why McDonald's pays more than competitive Fortnite

During one of his live streams, Nicholas "NickEh30" Amyoony was seen talking to Complexity Gaming's Fortnite pro, Vincent "Punisher" Valtancoli, regarding the drop in Fortnite esports' prize pools.

The discussion started with the analytical viewpoints concerning Fortnite's competitive structure. The conversation then went on a tangent with comparisons drawn between a Fortnite professional's earnings and a McDonald's employee.

What are these prize pools? How did we go from millions to hundreds? Soon ima see every player in Virginia working the McDonalds drive thru

— Punisher (@coL_Punisher) January 10, 2021

NickEh30 made a valid point by questioning why Epic Games should provide a million-dollar prize pool and receive the same number of viewers they do on a $50,000 prize-pool tournament.

However, Punisher seems to be fixed on the point that Fortnite's multi-million dollar prize pool should have increased in future tournaments instead of decreasing like it did.

All the Fortnite competitive money went into the lawsuit vs apple... look at us now

— Punisher (@coL_Punisher) January 10, 2021

mobile games are so important. Everybody around the world just goes on their phone and can buy anything at anytime.

— Punisher (@coL_Punisher) January 10, 2021

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Downfall of earnings in Fortnite Competitive

Over the years, the gaming community has witnessed multiple professional streamers growing their own streaming or content creation channels. This occurrence has not been limited to any single esports title either.

From CS: GO professional like Michael "Shroud" Grzesiek to two-time TI champion John "n0tail" Sundstein; even the most successful esports athletes have taken up streaming as a backup plan.

With that in mind, NickEh30 rightly pointed out that the growth of an esports athlete is their individual responsibility. If a player thinks that they can make a living off the prize pools at each tournament, then they must secure a top-five finish at every event.

However, if a player focuses on growing themselves and their brand, they have a much better opportunity at sustaining themselves despite no notable success at esports tournaments. NickEh30 also went on to admit this:

"People feel entitled for some reason with Epic."

Punisher went on to explain the reason behind this. The fact that Epic Games invested millions of dollars for the esports scene of Fortnite has got the hopes of the community up. This, in return, has caused the community to be extremely disappointed at the lowering of the prize pools in Fortnite.

Understandable. Is there statistics on how much the company makes now and what they were making before?

— Punisher (@coL_Punisher) January 10, 2021

They got caught red handed

— OP LLama (@LLamma28) January 10, 2021

It feels safe to say that most major esports titles suffered a major hit on the prize pool for upcoming tournaments in 2020. The breakout of the global pandemic has caused multiple esports tournaments and events to be canceled.

This, in turn, has adversely affected the developers' earnings, which further helps organize esports tournaments.