Marshmello Holds First Ever Fortnite
Concert Live at Pleasant Park
While the Maroon 5 singer was stirring controversy over his Super Bowl half-time show on Sunday, video game fans relished the glow of a different live performance.
"Millions attended" a concert on Saturday starring masked DJ Marshmello, who played a set that includes 2018 hits Everyday and Happier.
The turn? The concert was totally virtual, briefly converting Fortnite from a third-person shooter into a music venue.
When players logged into Fortnite, which has more than 125 million players, according to the Epic developers, players only had a competitive game mode available to them.
By joining the Showtime mode at 19:00 GMT, players would see a large concert stage with a Marshmello avatar and brand name turntables.
While listening to the music, Marshmello himself was being broadcast to the players, urging them to make their avatars dance along with the music.
The show itself lasted about 10 minutes and was full of interactive moments, with players thrown into the air during Fly and bouncing beach balls during Happier.
The set, which has been seen more than 11 million times, can be seen on the Marshmello YouTube channel.
'First live performance'
Many applauded what they called the "first live performance in a videogame", but this claim has been refuted since then in social networks.
Minecraft organized the Coalchella festival in 2018, a play on words at the Coachella real life festival, although this happened five years after the EDM label Monstercat organized a live charity festival in the block building game.
Meanwhile, virtual concerts became almost synonymous with the Second Life simulation game in the 00s.
U2 gave a live performance in 2008, the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra was broadcast live in 2007, and BBC Radio 1 simultaneously broadcast its One Big Weekend event on a virtual stage in 2006.
And that is not even to mention the mash-up with Duran Duran, who saw the new wave perform live concerts in the Duran Duran Universe within the game.
Gaming musicians
There has always been a type of symbiotic relationship between music artists and video games.
A whole genre of games starred virtual avatars of bands like Green Day and The Beatles, and a pre-recorded virtual concert could be found in 2003's Tony Hawk's Underground.
The history of gaming is littered with examples of musicians showing up in games, with David Bowie appearing in 1999's The Nomad Soul, and Michael Jackson starring in his own game in 1993's eponymous Moonwalker.
Whether Marshmello's appearance in Fortnite will kick off a new craze of live concerts in video games is yet to be seen.