Battle Breakers
Co-op sandbox survival game developed by Epic Games
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Battle Breakers was a role-playing and strategy video game developed and published by Epic Games and Chair Entertainment. The game was released for Windows, Android, and iOS on November 14, 2019. Featuring an anime-inspired art style, Battle Breakers combined elements of hero collector games, turn-based strategy, and idle gameplay, with players assembling teams of fantasy and science-fiction heroes to battle monsters and rescue allies trapped in crystal prisons. The game was distributed through the Epic Games Store on PC and through mobile app stores on handheld devices.[1]
| Battle Breakers | |
|---|---|
| |
| Developers | Epic Games, Chair Entertainment |
| Publisher | Epic Games |
| Engine | Unreal Engine 4 |
| Platforms | Windows, IOS, Android |
| Release | November 14, 2019 |
| Genres | role-playing, strategy video game, |
| Modes | Single-player, Multi-player |
Battle Breakers is set in a fantasy world invaded by hostile monsters that descended from space in crystalized meteors. Humanity's greatest heroes became trapped within magical crystals, and players take the role of a young warrior tasked with rescuing and recruiting these heroes to fight back against the invasion. Gameplay centers around collecting heroes of different rarities and classes, upgrading their abilities and equipment, and battling enemies across grid-based missions. The game includes single-player progression, player-versus-player elements, timed events, and crossover promotions with other Epic Games titles such as Fortnite.[2]
The game utilized a free-to-play model supported through optional microtransactions, allowing players to purchase premium currency and randomized rewards to accelerate progression and unlock additional heroes. Despite receiving moderate attention following launch, Battle Breakers maintained a relatively small player base compared to Epic's larger titles. Epic announced the game's shutdown in late 2022, and online services for Battle Breakers officially ended on December 30, 2022.
Synopsis
In the world of Battle Breakers, mysterious crystal meteors known as "Breakers" suddenly descended from space and devastated the planet. These crystals trapped many of the world's greatest warriors, guardians, monsters, and champions within magical prisons while unleashing hostile creatures across the land. Civilizations collapsed as armies of monsters spread throughout the world and humanity was pushed to the brink of destruction.
The player takes the role of a young hero who discovers the ability to free the trapped champions sealed inside the crystals. After assembling a growing team of rescued heroes from different factions, species, and time periods, the player travels across the world to battle the invading monsters and recover additional allies. Throughout the journey, the player encounters increasingly powerful enemies, ancient ruins, magical technology, and rival forces also seeking control over the crystals' power.[3]
As more heroes are rescued and recruited, the player's team becomes strong enough to challenge the leaders behind the invasion and uncover the origins of the Breakers themselves.
Gameplay
Battle Breakers was a role-playing and turn-based strategy game that combined elements of hero collector games, idle mechanics, and squad-based combat. The game was played from a top-down perspective and featured anime-inspired visuals, colorful environments, and a large roster of collectible heroes. Players assembled teams of heroes with different classes, elemental affinities, rarities, and abilities to battle enemy forces across grid-based missions.[4]
Combat primarily revolved around selecting and activating heroes positioned on a battlefield grid. Players matched heroes together to unleash stronger attacks, chain abilities, and special team combinations against waves of monsters and bosses. Each hero possessed unique skills and statistics that could be upgraded through leveling systems, equipment enhancements, and evolution mechanics. Missions rewarded players with experience points, crafting materials, currency, and additional heroes used to strengthen their teams and progress through increasingly difficult stages.[5]
The game featured a campaign mode alongside timed events, dungeons, and player-versus-player content. Battle Breakers utilized a free-to-play progression system supported through optional microtransactions, allowing players to purchase premium currency, summon heroes, and accelerate progression. Cross-promotional content with other Epic Games titles, including Fortnite, introduced exclusive characters and rewards into the game.
Quests and events
Players could review their current story progression and quests, which included daily, weekly, event, and challenge quests that rewarded players with experience points, heroes, upgrade materials, premium currency, and other in-game resources upon completion.
Battle Breakers featured limited-time themed events with unique progression paths, missions, enemies, and rewards based on those themes. Many events introduced exclusive heroes, weapons, and items that could be obtained by completing special objectives and participating in timed activities. The game also featured crossover events with other Epic Games titles, including Fortnite, which added themed characters and rewards for players who completed event-related challenges.
Map and missions
Battle Breakers divided its progression across a world map consisting of multiple regions and chapters that unlocked as players advanced through the main story. Each region contained numerous individual stages with increasing difficulty levels, enemy varieties, and boss encounters. Missions displayed recommended power levels and reward information, allowing players to select stages appropriate for their current team strength. Some missions also featured special modifiers, limited-time objectives, or increased rewards during events.[6]
Most missions took place on linear battle maps divided into multiple combat encounters. During missions, players selected heroes positioned on a grid-based battlefield and activated attacks by tapping connected groups of matching heroes. Different enemy formations, elemental weaknesses, and boss mechanics encouraged players to assemble teams with varying abilities and hero classes. Completing missions rewarded players with experience points, hero shards, equipment materials, currency, and additional collectible heroes used to strengthen their roster.
The game featured a campaign mode alongside special dungeons, event missions, and challenge stages that rotated periodically. Some missions were designed around survival objectives, boss encounters, or timed battles with increased difficulty. Daily and weekly activities provided additional rewards and encouraged repeated play across previously completed regions. As players progressed further into the game, missions introduced stronger enemies, more complex mechanics, and higher rarity rewards.
Command and armory
The player maintained a roster of collectible hero characters that could be assembled into teams for missions and events. Heroes belonged to different classes, elemental types, and rarity tiers, each possessing unique abilities, passive bonuses, and combat roles. Players could organize teams strategically to take advantage of elemental weaknesses, skill combinations, and synergy bonuses during battles.
Heroes could be upgraded through leveling, evolution, awakening, and equipment enhancement systems using resources earned from missions and events. Increasing a hero's level improved their statistics and unlocked stronger abilities, while higher rarity heroes generally possessed greater upgrade potential and more powerful skills. Duplicate heroes and hero shards could also be used to strengthen existing characters and improve their combat effectiveness.
The game featured an inventory system containing heroes, equipment, crafting materials, consumable items, and premium currencies. Players obtained new heroes primarily through summoning systems that used earned or purchased currency to randomly acquire characters of varying rarities. Additional heroes, upgrade materials, and rewards could also be earned through story progression, limited-time events, login bonuses, and special challenges. Managing hero rosters and upgrading stronger characters formed a central part of the game's long-term progression system.
Hero roster and store
Players had access to a roster containing hundreds of collectible heroes obtained through gameplay progression, events, login rewards, and the game's summoning system. Heroes varied in rarity, elemental affinity, class, and abilities, with higher rarity heroes generally possessing stronger statistics and more powerful skills. Players could organize and customize teams using heroes suited for different combat roles and mission types.
Heroes could be upgraded using experience points, evolution materials, duplicate hero shards, and other resources earned through missions and events. Upgrading heroes increased their power levels, improved their abilities, and unlocked additional enhancements. Certain progression systems and upgrade tiers became available only after players reached specific story milestones or completed higher difficulty content.
Battle Breakers featured an in-game store that allowed players to spend earned or purchased premium currency on hero summons, upgrade materials, consumable items, and special event bundles. The game's summoning system randomly awarded heroes of varying rarities through themed banners and limited-time promotions.
Development
History
Battle Breakers was developed by Epic Games and its subsidiary studio Chair Entertainment, the developer previously known for Shadow Complex and the Infinity Blade series.[7] Development of the game began during Epic Games' expansion into the mobile and free-to-play gaming market during the mid-2010s. The project was designed as a cross-platform role-playing game intended to operate across mobile devices and PC through the Epic Games Store.
Unlike Epic's larger internally developed projects, Battle Breakers was primarily overseen by Chair Entertainment, which had gradually shifted from console-focused development toward mobile titles following the success of the Infinity Blade franchise. After the commercial success of Fortnite Battle Royale, Epic continued supporting several smaller projects simultaneously, including Battle Breakers, which remained in development for several years before its worldwide release.
Conception
The game originated as part of Epic Games' efforts to expand its presence in the mobile gaming market after the success of Chair Entertainment's Infinity Blade series. Chair co-founder and creative director Donald Mustard had previously helped guide Epic's transition into mobile development during the early 2010s, particularly after work on a planned Shadow Complex sequel was halted in favor of mobile projects.[8][9]
Epic and Chair aimed to create a game inspired by mobile hero-collection RPGs that had become commercially successful throughout Asia and North America during the 2010s. The developers combined elements of turn-based strategy games, collectible character systems, and idle progression mechanics with a stylized anime-inspired visual direction. The project was designed around long-term progression systems, cross-platform functionality, and live-service content updates intended to keep players engaged over extended periods.
The game's fantasy and science-fiction setting was developed around the concept of magical crystals imprisoning heroes from different worlds and time periods, allowing the developers to introduce a wide variety of character designs, enemy types, and crossover content. This structure also supported the game's large collectible roster and event-based progression systems.
Early prototypes and Fortnite: World Explorers
Before Battle Breakers was developed, Epic Games experimented with several mobile RPG concepts connected to their Fortnite franchise during the mid-2010s. One of these projects was a cancelled mobile spinoff known internally as Fortnite: World Explorers, which began development around 2014. Archived footage, screenshots, and development assets from the unreleased title later surfaced publicly in 2023 through video game preservation communities and online archivists.[10]
According to recovered prototype material, Fortnite: World Explorers was designed as a mobile hero-collection role-playing game in which players would build a roster of heroes, battle enemies, and gradually expand their control across a large world map. The game featured tile-based tactical combat, an expansive overworld map containing numerous missions, collectible heroes and monsters, and a persistent homebase mechanic.[11]
Audio files discovered within the released files of Battle Breakers contained references to "Fortnite: World Explorers", suggesting that portions of the cancelled project were repurposed during the development of Battle Breakers.[12] According to archivists and preservation researchers, "World Explorers" was eventually re-themed away from Fortnite into a standalone fantasy role-playing game internally referred to as Endless World, before later evolving into Battle Breakers. Although Epic Games never publicly confirmed the full development lineage, similarities between the projects and surviving internal references strongly link them together.[13]
Design and gameplay
Battle Breakers was designed as a turn-based hero collector RPG featuring simplified touchscreen controls and cross-platform play between mobile devices and PC. The development team focused heavily on accessibility and short gameplay sessions suitable for mobile platforms while still supporting deeper long-term progression systems for dedicated players.
The combat system centered around grid-based battles in which players activated attacks and abilities by connecting matching heroes. The game incorporated class systems, elemental affinities, rarity tiers, and upgrade mechanics common among free-to-play mobile RPGs of the period. Developers also emphasized collection systems and frequent content updates as major components of the game's structure.
The title utilized Unreal Engine 4, continuing Chair Entertainment's long association with Epic's Unreal Engine technology. The art direction featured cel-shaded anime-inspired character designs and highly stylized visual effects intended to distinguish the game from Epic's more realistic projects.
Release
Battle Breakers entered soft launch testing in selected territories, including the Philippines, during 2016 and 2017 before expanding to additional regions such as Australia and New Zealand. Epic Games used the soft launch period to balance gameplay systems, monetization mechanics, progression pacing, and server infrastructure before the game's global launch.[14]
The game officially launched worldwide on November 14, 2019 for Windows, Android, and iOS. The PC version was distributed through the Epic Games Store, while mobile versions were released through platform storefronts. Epic promoted the title through crossover rewards connected to Fortnite, allowing players of both games to unlock cosmetic items and heroes through linked progression systems. [15]
Post-release support and shutdown
Following launch, Epic Games supported Battle Breakers through regular updates, seasonal events, limited-time heroes, and crossover promotions. Many updates introduced new characters, dungeons, challenge missions, and balancing adjustments. The game maintained a smaller but active player community throughout its lifespan, though it never approached the popularity of Epic's larger live-service titles such as Fortnite.[16]
In December 2022, Epic Games announced that online services for Battle Breakers would be discontinued as part of a broader shutdown of several older online titles and services. The game's servers officially shut down on December 30, 2022, rendering the title unplayable due to its online-only infrastructure.[17]
Reception
Sales and revenue
Epic Games did not publicly release detailed sales or player spending figures for Battle Breakers during the game's lifetime. However, financial documents made public during the 2021 legal case between Epic Games and Apple provided information about Epic's internal revenue breakdowns and the commercial performance of the company's games. [18]
According to financial presentations revealed during the trial, Epic Games generated approximately US$9.17 billion in revenue from Fortnite Battle Royale during 2018 and 2019 combined, while Epic's other games, like Battle Breakers and Rocket League, collectively generated approximately US$108 million over the same period.[19]
Internal Epic Games financial documents released during the trial also showed that the company's mobile and live-service strategy during the late 2010s relied heavily on the continued success of Fortnite, while smaller projects such as Battle Breakers operated as secondary live-service titles within Epic's broader publishing portfolio.