The Fortnite fandom has found a surprising ally in the war against power-ups, with Doja Cat joining the ongoing battle with an epic and super full-on blow-up where the “Paint the Town Red” singer dubbed anyone who uses the mechanics “losers.”
Major game developers rarely take action almost immediately after a celebrity rants about unbalanced features they’re facing, but the popstar’s explosive rant may be the exception; Doja Cat took to X (formerly Twitter) on Wednesday to declare it “f—king embarrassing” that Fortnite still allows waterbending and Chains of Hades in its lead playlists. She went on to add she just wanted to join “lobbies where people with actual aim skills and FPS experience didn’t have to deal with losers [who use the abilities].”
Ironically, Chains was vaulted mere hours later, though its unavailability is more likely due to a confirmed gamebreaking bug than Doja Cat’s epic X tirade.
Regardless, the removal brought near-instant celebration both from Doja’s camp and the wider Fortnite community, many of whom asked Epic to “get rid of waterbending” from ranked games next. If that’s not possible, many continued, they’d love to see separate lobbies where one is for those who enjoy the FPS side of Fortnite and “a separate mode for all the extra sh*t”—exactly what Doja Cat was demanding.
If Epic did implement a changed playlist offering like that, it would mean players who want to use what some Fortnite fans have dubbed “broken” no-skill weapons, tools, and abilities like Deku Smash, the now-vaulted Chains of Hades, or Waterbending can do so, whereas those who want to “enjoy playing a true FPS match” could do separately.
Not everyone seems to agree with Doja Cat though; some said they only play Fortnite because they enjoy the building but aren’t great at FPS games. They’d “rather just throw lightning bolts and pray,” which is fair. Having these items means more people can enjoy the battle royale, just in a different, non-FPS-focused way.
Whether it was indeed a bug or if Doja’s blow-up did light a fire, the Chains of Hades has now been vaulted in competitive for the rest of the season.
At the time of writing, Doja (who technically appears in the battle royale through the Say So emote) hasn’t added to her explosive rant again.
