Lego Fortnite is simply two months previous, however Epic Video games is already out with a good greater collaboration.

Epic and Disney introduced immediately that the businesses will associate on an “all-new video games and leisure universe” that can deliver characters from Disney’s deep catalogue to life via Fortnite. Disney will take a $1.5 billion fairness stake in Epic Video games as a part of the deal.

The scope of the mission sounds large, to say the least. In a press launch, the businesses described the forthcoming mission as “an all-new video games and leisure universe” providing gamers a approach to “play, watch, store and interact with” characters and storylines from Disney, Marvel, Star Wars and Pixar. The collaboration will use Epic’s Unreal Engine and will likely be “interoperable” with Fortnite, tying into Epic’s current on-line social gaming infrastructure.

“This marks Disney’s largest entry ever into the world of video games and affords vital alternatives for progress and growth,” Disney CEO Bob Iger mentioned of the partnership.

The Disney collaboration comes as a shock, however suits proper into Epic’s present roadmap. Epic has been increasing the previous’s scope lately. What started as a well-liked battle royale recreation (technically a player-versus-environment recreation earlier than that) has exploded right into a hub of user-generated recreation modes and model collaborations.

In December, Epic additional signaled its dedication to develop Fortnite past its roots as a multiplayer shooter with the addition of Lego Fortnite, Rocket Racing and Fortnite Competition — three full standalone video games in utterly totally different genres than the unique Fortnite. On the Disney aspect of issues, a deep partnership and enormous funding will open up Epic’s refined toolkit for creating on-line social worlds the place many individuals can construct and play collectively without delay. Epic’s profitable Fortnite retailer, the place gamers should buy in-game outfits generally known as skins together with dance strikes and emotes, additionally affords priceless infrastructure for what might be a limitless digital shopping center stocked with items impressed by Disney’s beloved characters.

The mission doesn’t but have a launch date past “quickly(ish),” which means gamers received’t be in for a multiyear wait on the bold collaboration, which apparently grew out of Epic’s time in a Disney Accelerator program again in 2017. Disney and Epic additionally already work carefully on model collaborations inside Fortnite, and lots of in style characters from Star Wars and the Marvel Cinematic Universe can be found as collectible skins inside the recreation.