With speculation ramping up for months over who would edge out a win at the first World Cup championship for Fortnite, Sentinels player Bugha shocked everyone by absolutely dominating all other players in the world. By the end of the sixth game in the solo-mod finals, he had almost double the points of the second-place winner.
To say the result was unexpected is hardly sufficient. The ethereal mood set in the stadium as Kyle "Bugha" Giersdorf progressed through each match was unique, and not a situation we are likely to see replicated in the near future. In a game where forty million players qualified for the initial round of finals, and then the top 100 went head-to-head over six games, no one expected Bugha to dominate in such an unstoppable way.
Normally when a tournament ends, there is a brief break where the officials ensure that the totals are correct before awarding a prize, but Bugha was so far ahead in cumulative points that had he literally quit the last match, effectively coming in last for the round, he still would have been the champion. This resulted in a shift in how the last game was shown. Normally the cameras are divided among many players, but since Bugha was unofficially the champion before the match even ended, all eyes were on his character in the game.
When the formal announcement came on of his victory, Bugha simply stood and shook his head, incredulous at the result of his performance. The camera panned to his family in attendance among the crowd, where his father busted out an absolutely terrible, and wonderful, short dance move that must be added to the Fortnite shop right away. Call it “A Father’s Pride”, price it at 500 V-Bucks, and watch the money roll in.
Perhaps Bugha was playing it cool in the lead up to the finals, not wanting to reveal too much of his skill to avoid being a target to other players. This is certainly a possibility when we consider that he was the very first individual to qualify in the World Cup Qualifiers online in Week 1, easily taking in first place.
With the tournament now over, Bugha has won $3 million in prize money, with the other contestants taking home their share of the $30 million prize pool. We are still waiting to know from Twitch how many viewers the event had, but there is likely even more room for the esports division of Fortnite to continue growing. This might push prize pools further up in size, which would not be a surprise given the general increase in popularity and revenue of esports over the years.
Bugha’s future will likely continue with Fortnite and related events, including lucrative deals for sponsorship and streaming. It will be interesting to see how other streamers like the wildly popular Ninja fares in the coming year. Despite his skill in tournaments year-round, he failed to qualify for the top 100 of the World Cup, which shocked many fans and experts.
For now, it’s all about Bugha, who destroyed all semblance of competition today and left no doubt in anyone’s mind who the champion is in 2019.