What is 'Fortnite' and why do NRL player's keep referencing it after scoring a try?

The Warriors celebrate a try. Photo / Facebook.

The Warriors have joined in on a try-celebration craze that is sweeping the NRL.

Josh Dugan was the first to make the news for his cheeky try celebration during his Cronulla debut last Friday night, with Blake Ferguson following his buddy's lead amid the Roosters shock loss to the Wests Tigers.

However, it wasn't just the poster boys for rugby league scandals getting involved in the fun, with two Warriors players also mimicking Dugan's post try celebration.

Fortnite... it’s really a thing 😬 #NRL

Posted by NRL on Saturday, March 10, 2018

The strange act seen across the NRL over the weekend is actually an homage to the highly popular video game Fortnite - the movement Dugan simulated is the act a character in the game will do when they are using a health pack to heal themselves.

Fans of the video game were quick to make the connection, although many more people were left puzzled by the reference.

#NRL Dally M Leaderboad (Round 1)

3pts Fortnite
2pts Cashing Out
1pt Rooster$ & Souffs Losing pic.twitter.com/zGZks97wig

— NRL Stats (@NRLstats) March 11, 2018

Can we please make sure none of our @RaidersCanberra players partake in this stupid fortnite post try celebration business that’s going on #IHaveNoIdeaWhatItIs #NRL

— Ryan Gillard (@gilby_gillard) March 10, 2018

WHAT EXACTLY IS FORNITE?

The game is heavily influenced by Playerunknown's Battlegrounds - a Battle-Royale game which places 100 players on a remote island for a winner-takes-all showdown.

Fornite has no single-player campaign and the online component ends as soon as you die — there are no second chances.

Players drop out of a flying purple bus and parachute down to an island below where they try to locate weapons and supplies in distinct regions that will be used to kill others in the game.

To ensure fast gameplay, Fortnite eventually forces players into a shrinking play zone - if you're outside of that area, your health begins to drain until you're dead.

Unlike Playerunknown's Battlegrounds, Fortnite puts a large focus on crafting, which is made possible from the game's destructible environments.

Once you've collected enough resources to build something, you can begin assembling walls and ramps for protection, with the game also allowing players to create traps.

Available on PS4, Xbox One, PC and Mac - and coming to iOS and Android - the free video game has attracted 45 million players worldwide since being released around six months ago.

In February, Fortnite achieved a record-breaking 3.4 million people playing at the same time, with the title also now the most-watched release on the world's largest video game-streaming platform, Twitch.

HOW DOES THE GAME MAKE MONEY?

As mentioned earlier, Fortnite is free to download on almost every video game platform.

And with 45 million players worldwide, it might seem like the developer missed its chance to make a fortune from selling the title.

Although, it appears Epic Games is trying to get money from microtransactions - players pay $A12.71 for $1000 of the virtual currency used by the game.

Using the virtual currency players can purchase items for their character which are "cosmetic only and grant no competitive advantage".

Surprisingly, the people playing the game also have a chance to make money from Fortnite, with a player making at least $A445,000 a month from his Twitch subscriptions.