Something beautiful happened on Wednesday night. The worlds of video games and hip hop collided on Twitter, and hilarity ensued.
Here's a TL;DR: Super popular rapper and singer Drake nonchalantly tweeted that he was playing Fortnite on Twitch. The internet briefly exploded.
playing fort nite with @ninja https://t.co/OSFbgcfzaZ
— Drizzy (@Drake) March 15, 2018
For the uninitiated, Fortnite is a battle royale-style video game. It sees you being parachuted onto a weapon-laden map with 99 other players -- last one standing wins. Twitch, meanwhile, is a streaming service for video games and esports. It has over 100 million monthly users. Drake, his tweet announced, was playing with Ninja, a popular Twitch streamer.
Man, it was good. The internet followed by either watching the stream itself or manically refreshing their Twitter feed (guilty).
At the time of writing, the tweet is 5 hours old and has amassed over 107,000 retweets. "Drake" is the top worldwide trend, with over 500,000 tweets. Remember, the tweet was made just after 10 p.m. PT, so most of those tweets and retweets happened while the US was asleep. Most of those tweets and retweets were glorious.
This one, parodying Drake's "Views" album cover, was particularly popular.
Drake’s next album cover... pic.twitter.com/gKOvRxwkFD
— Miguel Lozada (@Miguel_Gator) March 15, 2018
The whole thing broke Twitch's record for most concurrent streamers, with 600,000 watching at once. Chrissy Teigen, model and famously good tweeter, wanted in.
Would anyone like to watch me shake trees on animal crossing
— christine teigen (@chrissyteigen) March 15, 2018
Oh, and by the way, rapper Travis Scott and NFL player JuJu Smith-Schuster joined Drake and Ninja's team.
In the same week I met and recruited LeBron to the Steelers and played Fortnite with Drake, Ninja, and Travis Scott.
— JuJu Smith-Schuster (@TeamJuJu) March 15, 2018
What a time to be alive
"Yo, how does JuJu have time to be in the NFL, and be part of a gaming Clan?" - @Drake
— FaZe Clan (@FaZeClan) March 15, 2018
Watching Drake run around as a bush is the greatest thing that's happened so far in 2018 pic.twitter.com/43qe8fbhYd
— luisa (@luisagibsonxo) March 15, 2018
Ninja: Are you a bush Drake?
— TriHard (@Blaztingz) March 15, 2018
Drake: pic.twitter.com/cfACtCDJ2H
Yes, despite Fortnite and Drake seemingly having very different fanbases, all of twitter was about it.
— Luke Lancaster (@LGLancaster) March 15, 2018
every 12 year old going to school tomorrow and telling people that they killed drake in game
— jack wagner (@jackdwagner) March 15, 2018
PUBG better get Beyonce on the horn or all hope is lost
— David Rayfield (@RaygunBrown) March 15, 2018
It’s 4am and I’m watching Drake, Travis, and JuJu play fortnite with Ninja. What a time to be alive.
— heather (@hnb6458) March 15, 2018
Ninja whenever somebody kills drake pic.twitter.com/YwBbjcnmmg
— Black Beatle (@Drob0G) March 15, 2018
Retweet if you would like to see me play Fortnite with @Drake & @Ninja
— Donald J. Trump (@reaIDonaIdTrxmp) March 15, 2018
dota community watching all the good stuff happening on fortnite and other trendy games pic.twitter.com/x6PLwnLedB
— midormeepo (@midormeepo) March 15, 2018
It could be a huge win for Fortnite, which is in something of an arms race with PUBG, the game that inspired it. It's a good time for a boost in interest, as it was last week announced the game would be ported in full from PC, PS4 and Xbox One to iOS and Android.
