It was recently revealed that Epic Games' free-to-play, sandbox survival game
Fortnite reached 3.4 million concurrent players earlier this week. This eclipses the 3.2 million record previously held by
PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds (however, Fortnite's figure is multiplatform while PUBG is PC and Xbox One only).
However, the number of players placed an extreme load on the game's servers last weekend, rendering it unplayable for many. Had Epic's servers had the extra capacity, the 3.4 million figure might have been even higher. "The extreme load caused 6 different incidents between Saturday and Sunday, with a mix of partial and total service disruptions to Fortnite," revealed Epic in an official statement.
Following Fortnite's initial release in July 2017, Epic released a standalone multiplayer arena mode
Fortnite Battle Royale in September 2017 and that's when things turned around for the developer. Prior to the release of the arena mode, the game's peak number of concurrent players was a paltry 60k.
The success of Fortnite has led
Epic to shut down its prior battle arena multiplayer,
Paragon in April. Once that game shutters, that should free up more resources for Fortnite.