In mid-November, the popular Spanish streamer Rubius held a show tournament called Fortnite Mad Cup with a prize pool of $50K. This event gathered over 638K Peak Viewers and became one of the most popular tournaments in the entire history of Epic Games' battle royale. How did he manage to do that?
The popularity of Rubius' tournament can largely be explained by the hype surrounding the game. At the start of the season, Fortnite OG was launched, with developers bringing back the original map. This sparked a sense of nostalgia among top streamers, many of whom decided to briefly return to Fortnite to reminisce about the old feeling of the game. Furthermore, for many streamers, Fortnite literally served as a stepping stone in their career development. Following the streamers, their viewers also flocked to Fortnite OG. As a result, the game set a new record for the number of players in a 24-hour period, 44.7 million users. Currently, Fortnite is experiencing a second wind, making it the perfect moment for Rubius' show tournament.
The composition of participants played a significant role in the popularity of the Fortnite Mad Cup too. Rubius invited many friends and colleagues to the tournament, including popular content creators such as TheGrefg, Auronplay, ElMariana, ElSpreen, Roier, rivers_gg, Juans Guarnizo, DjMaRiiO, and others. Rubius even invited YouTuber WindyGirk, with whom he had a conflict in the past. All participants had a great time, engaging in a series of matches in three modes: Solo, Duos, and Squads. Of course, the majority of them broadcast the tournament matches on their personal channels — amounting to over 120 unique channels.
In total, the broadcasts of the Fortnite Mad Cup accumulated 2.3 million Hours Watched. The event reached 486.8K Average Viewers and 638.1K Peak Viewers. TheGrefg gathered the largest audience on his channel, attracting 183K Peak Viewers to his tournament broadcast. Meanwhile, Rubius became the leader among participants in terms of total Hours Watched.
The Fortnite Mad Cup achieved excellent results, reaching 638.1K Peak Viewers. It ranks as the second most popular tournament in the discipline in 2023 and has the seventh best result in the history of the discipline.
One should remember, that Rubius already held a Mad Cup for Fortnite back in March. That tournament had a similar format and lineup of participants, but it only attracted 327K Peak Viewers. As one can judge, the tournament's audience has nearly doubled with the new edition.
MadCup editions comparison
In November, German streamers Amar and eliasn97 organized a similar show tournament for Fortnite OG. They held a LAN tournament, which involved 33 professional players and 66 popular content creators from Germany. More details about Amar x Eli Hybrid Lan and its viewership statistics can be found here.
