Watch the crazy ‘Fortnite’ rocket launch into space and crack the sky

Over the weekend, Epic Games held a special real-time event that may have been the biggest yet for its smash-hit Fortnite. A rocket long-rumored to launch finally soared into the sky, eventually creating an enormous crack that points to further consequences for battle royale players over the coming weeks and months.

In June, a countdown timer started to appear on television screens located throughout the Nintendo Switch version of Fortnite: Battle Royale before eventually making its way to other consoles and PC. The timer ended on Tuesday, June 19, but players were still convinced that something involving a rocket at Snobby Shores was on the way.

That moment finally arrived on Saturday, and it was a sight to behold. As you can see in the video above, Digital Trends’ Nate Barrett was on hand to witness the enormous rocket soar into the heavens.

Players set aside their differences and gathered around the rocket’s departure point, and warning horns sounded to alert unaware players of the imminent launch.

After soaring off into the sky in a haze of flame and smoke, the rocket produced a large red targeting laser in the sky and appeared to instantly transport between several different positions. Eventually, it burst back up into the air, disappeared, and left a huge crack in the sky — almost like a piece of glass had been smashed with a hammer.

Almost immediately after the event had concluded, the Fortnite players returned to blasting each other into oblivion as if nothing has occurred at all, but we’re almost positive we haven’t seen the last of this phenomenon. Whether the rocket’s behavior has anything to do with interdimensional travel, or possibly a darker understanding of the reality of battle royale play, remains to be seen, but these sorts of events have certainly kept players more engaged than standard last-man-standing matches would have. It appears the cracks have also begun to expand, as well, and appear to be consuming objects on the original map.

Fortnite: Battle Royale is now available for free on Xbox One, PlayStation 4, PC, Mac, Nintendo Switch, and iOS, with an Android release coming this summer. Most versions of the game support cross-platform play, though the PlayStation 4 is still unable to connect to either the Xbox One or the Nintendo Switch.