Fortnite Ballistic (PS5) Late 2025 Update Review

 

In early 2025 I published a Review for Fortnite Ballistic (https://gamereviewnation.blogspot.com/2025/02/fortnite-ballistic-ps5-review.html), the FPS gamemode in Fortnite Battle Royale, which is supposed to be Fortnite’s take on Tactical Shooters, like Counter Strike or Valorant. Since than Ballistic has got a lot of different updates and today we are going to talk about the status of the mode, which improvements they made and where it is still lacking.

The previously often broken unranked version of Fortnite Ballistic had been replaced by Fortnite Ballistic Test Ground, which was a new unranked playlist to play all the additional new shell maps. The ranked version on the other hand only featured complete maps, which meant, it still only featured a single map. This split might have been good idea on paper, but it unfortunately failed in practice.

While the original unranked playlist failed due to massive technical issues, which prevented most players from even queuing on it, Ballistic Test Ground on the other hand failed from the lack of players. While it initially gathered some interest, Ballistic Test Ground lost 97% of players within the first 3 weeks. There were often only 200-300 players in Test Grounds and this version of Ballistic suffered from even worse disconnects issues than the Ranked version. It was a real plague and unfortunately not even due to technical issues. A lot of Fortnite players just don’t understand the concept of a tactical shooter and disconnect at the slightest inconvenience. I had multiple matches finishing as 1v2 or 1v3. Test Grounds also had much longer queue times due to the very low player count. In combination, it made Test Grounds practically unplayable.

It’s honestly a bit sad, that they had to remove the unranked playlist in late February 2025 due to technical issues and Test Grounds in early June 2025, only 2 months after its launch, due to lack of players and player behaviour. The focus after this point completely shifted to the Ranked Mode, which also inherited the additional maps from the Test Grounds playlist. Allegedly Epic Games wants to bring bank the unranked playlist at some point in the future, but it’s certainly a bad look, that it already failed twice.

But let’s now talk a bit more about the additional maps. As I already mentioned, Ballistic originally only launched with a single map in December 2024. Skyline 10 was admittedly a good map, not amazing, but a fun map nonetheless. Just having a single map to play for 5 months however was completely unacceptable.

During 2025 4 additional maps have been released. Unfortunately they all released as ‘Shell Maps’, which is a truly bizarre concept. Those are unfinished maps, which instead of actual textures consist completely of these incredibly hideous grey squares. It just looks awful and destroys any kind of atmosphere those maps could have had. The Maps also often had to be redesigned based on community feedback, since they usually had some fundamental design flaws in certain places. On the one hand, it’s nice that developers apparently also listen to their players. On the other hand, a pretty pathetic display, that professional developers seemingly require player feedback to competently design maps. Epic Games obviously tried to frame this under the “Testing” and “Early Access” labels, but those honestly just sounded like poor excuses to me.

It is obvious to me, that Ballistic only got a tiny budget and probably just a skeleton crew of developers, which could explain why they probably don’t have any kind of professional QA testing, but the shell map design can not be excused. They could literally take any kind of random graphics elements and later exchange them in the finished design. No matter how little effort is being put into a Fortnite Creative map, but they all have normal looking maps. There is absolutely no need to have these ugly grey square elements. “Early Access” is just a lazy and poor excuse.

The first two maps that got added were ‘Hammer Fall’ and ‘Storm Chaser Cove’ in April. Hammer Fall is based in a giant castle, while Storm Chaser is located in a facility right next to a beach. In May, they added the town map ‘Cinderwatch’ and in June the Korean city map ‘K-Zone Commons’.

I am currently working on a Map Ranking article, where I will be talking in more detail about the designs of the different maps and how I would grade them. Today I am just going to summarize my thoughts on them:

Hammer Fall and Cinderwatch are actually good additions to Ballistic. Hammer Fall is the only map besides Skyline 10 with an actual finished design and real visuals. It’s one of the larger maps and probably the best one for long range engagements. Despite the bigger size, the map has a clear structure and reminds me of classic 3 lane maps. The unique castle features, like open/closeable castle gates and a throne room, are the real highlights.

Cinderwatch has a pretty different, more winding, design. Thankfully the map is neither too large nor too small and got a really nice flow. Even the bomb sides are designed quite well. Not too huge, not too small, with just the right amount of cover. It is also the only shell map, where thankfully the ugly grey textures don’t dominate everything. 

The other two maps are more problematic. Storm Chaser Cove is probably a bit too small. You will rarely get to detonate or even drop a bomb on this map, since the two teams often just rush into each other. The rotation time is probably too fast. Before the map redesign however, had Storm Chaser also  a more confusing and convoluted design, like some kind of labyrinth. It improved, but I am still not a fan.

K-Zone Commons suffers from the opposite problem. The map is probably too big for its own good. Rotations take too long and new players can easily get lost here. I also think the B point is a bit too difficult to defend in comparison to the A point.

Ballistic additionally introduced 6 new weapons to the game during 2025. The Drum Gun, Burst AR, Sovereign Sniper, Machine Pistol and Veiled Precision SMG were permanent additions to the game, while the DL-44 only temporarily replaced the Ranger Pistol during the Star Wars Season of Chapter 6. There were also 4 new Flex Gadgets added to Ballistic with the Fire Grenade, the Nitro based Overdrive item, the Med-Mist Healing Grenade and the Wall item. Each player gets to choose one of the 9 Flex Gadgets before the beginning of the match.

I am overall quite happy with the weapon and item additions to Ballistic. While the Gamemode released with a total lack of maps, the weapon-/itempool was at least decent already. These additions however noticeably improve the variety and I particularly like the Fire and Med-Mist Grenades, as well as the Precision SMG and the Drum Gun. I would subjectively prefer if Ballistic had more weapons from the earlier (in my opinion much better) chapters, but I can understand why using Chapter 5 weapons in Ballistic was at least a lot less work to implement for them and most players will probably not mind this. As I said, overall those were clearly a step in the right direction.

Another really great addition, I had asked for, was the implementation of a separate sensitivity setting for the First-Person Perspective. This was desperately needed, since having one sensitivity for Third- and First-Person Perspective was not a good solution at all and lead to compromised setups. This thankfully got fixed.

This also helps with the balancing of the game. Aim Assist in first person mode is lower than in third person and with forced Crossplay in Fortnite and lack of proper FPS sensitivity options it was a noticeable disadvantage for Console players. I don’t think there will ever be a perfect solution with forced Crossplay, but this at least gives people options to fine-tune their aiming.

The Disconnect Problem I already mentioned in regard to the Test Grounds playlist is unfortunately still present even in Ranked. It is admittedly thankfully less common in Ranked than it was in unranked. I practically never have to finish matches in 1v2s or the like in Ranked, but 1-2 disconnects per Team can still regularly appear. Finishing a match with 5v5 is still not the most common case. This might change if you get into the highest ranks, but more casual players still have to suffer from their impatient teammates.

I also have to admit that fixing the disconnect problem is much harder to implement since it is mostly based on player behaviour. The implementation of a surrender option after a couple of lost rounds was certainly a good step in that direction, but it’s more of a band-aid on an open wound than a permanent fix.

A big part of the Ballistic playerbase are just very casual player who browse between gamemodes and try everything out. They don’t see a difference between disconnecting in Ranked Ballistic or quitting a Team Rumble or Solo BR match. If they get a disconnect penalty, but were switching gamemodes anyway, than the penalty doesn’t affect them in the slightest. I would therefore recommend extending the leaver penalty to all gamemodes of Fortnite. This would probably help to discourage players from leaving mid-match. I unfortunately don’t think Epic is brave enough to implement his. Ballistic is, based on the player count, probably not important enough to implement a gamewide penalty and they still want the leavers to buy skins in the shop. I unfortunately think this has a higher priority to them, than to keep the game clean.

Let’s talk about the player numbers. I already mentioned the very underwhelming Unranked/Test Ground numbers before the shutdown of that playlist. Ranked Ballistic started of with an around 170.000 player peak in December 2024, which they obviously couldn’t hold. In early February it dropped to around 20.000 and during April to around 10.000. Since September the daily player peak is varying between 5000 and 7000 players. Ballistic hasn’t reached Rocket Racing like numbers yet, but the trajectory so far seems clear.

We can also see this if we take a look at the update schedule. Except for some minor stat changes, Ballistic received no updates between December 2024 and April 2025. They just released it and wished people good luck, while losing all kind of momentum the gamemode had. In the next four months, there were actually a couple of content updates bringing in the new maps and weapons, but since August there have been 0 new Updates in the last 3 months. There are rumours of a new update arriving with the start of Chapter 7, but those are only rumours so far.

I think these long gaps of updates support my hypothesis, that Ballistic only has a very small budget and very few developers. Unless Epic drastically changes this, I wouldn’t expect to see much different in 2026.

Before I forget to mention it, but there are plenty of Bugs and Glitches still present in Ballistic. Sometimes its only minor things, like incorrect weapon holding animations, but other times you won’t be able to walk or shoot anymore. The first time this happened to me, I switched my controller 2 times, but nothing worked, till it magically fixed itself in round 5. I think game-breaking Glitches like these are another direct consequence of the very small dev team assigned to Ballistic.

 

Result:

Nearly a year has passed since the launch of Fortnite Ballistic. I originally criticised the gamemode for not having strong enough Gunplay, the broken matchmaking, the lack of maps and sensitivity settings. In some of these areas Ballistic clearly improved.

The first person sensitivity setting is greatly appreciated and the number of maps has significantly increased. A single Map was disgraceful. 5 is at least better, but it’s also unacceptable, that, at the point of writing, 3 are still shell maps. The experience in the unranked playlist got so bad, it had to be removed all together. At least the ranked playlist works mostly fine from a technical perspective, but there are still more than enough Bugs and the Disconnect problem present. Especially the later one negatively impacts the experience of most Ballistic players. The weapon and item additions are a clear improvement, however.

Despite these somewhat mixed results, I am still ready to increase my score for Ballistic from 5.5/10 last year to a 6/10 today. I do think Ballistic would have the potential to one day become a 7/10 or 8/10, but they would need to introduce even more maps in the future, with none of them being shell maps and radically redesign the First-Person gunplay. Fortnite is great at being a Third-Person Shooter, but the First-Person gunplay still lacks behind. This is not surprising. The Third-Person modes in Call of Duty or Apex Legends for example are also far worse than their FPS gameplay. The FPS gameplay in Fortnite is probably stronger than that, but it would require a lot of effort, time and money from Epic Games to get Ballistic competitive with dedicated FPS Tactical Shooters, like Counter Strike, Siege or Valorant. I sadly don’t think Epic is ready to do this and that we will only see minor Improvements in 2026, but obviously only time will tell.

 

6/10

Kellogg’s Cornflakes (Cornflakes) Review

 

Today we are taking a look at perhaps the most classic Cornflakes of them all: 'Kellogg’s Cornflakes'. While nowadays all kind of cereals are being referred to as Cornflakes, the original one was implemented by the famous Kellogg’s Brothers in 1894. It wasn't the first cereal, but it is arguably the most famous ever made. Same as Playstation for example has become a synonym for videogames, Cornflakes has become a synonym for Cereals. Cornflakes were actually created per accident. The brothers were working as doctors at the time and took some experiments to find a new healthy food for their patients. One of this experiments turned out to be extremely popular among their patients and the brothers took the opportunity to create their own company and go into mass production with these Cornflakes.

Till this day the Kellogg’s company is still selling this product. The box image has the iconic green Rooster, called Cornelius Rooster, in front of blank white background. I always found this image extremely fitting. Regardless of what you think of the quality of the product, it symbolizes the down to earth approach of this relatively basic approach to cereals. While other products are far more extravagant, both in design as well as taste, Kellogg’s Cornflakes keeps it simple.  You see the product, you see the caricature of the Rooster and you know what you get.

That being said, the basic approach also has some downsides. Even though I was very aware of Kellogg’s Cornflakes as a child, I always perceived them as a product for older people. All the other cereals had goofy animated characters on their boxes and far more extravagant or shiny looking cereals. You can say what you want, but as a kid, a visually attractive box image is what naturally catches your interest and decides whether you want to try out the product or not. I know many other children eating Nestles Nesquik or Kellogg’s Choco Krispies or Froot Loops, but I never met another kid, who ate Kellogg’s Cornflakes or cared for Cornelius Rooster.

Fun Fact: Even though Cornelius Rooster is in the minds of most people (including mine) so inseparably linked to Cornflakes, he actually just took over in 1957. Before that, the 'Sweetheart of Corn' was advertising the product and gracing us with her presence on the boxes. That being said, the sweetheart doesn’t seem to be based on one specific person and we can see many different versions of her, that vary very much in looks. Sometimes she is blond, sometimes brunette, sometimes she is older, sometimes younger and sometimes she is even a doll.

Apart from the sweetheart of corn and Cornelius, there were also some bland boxes without any promotional material in front of them and also some Cornflakes boxes with just a corncob as representative of the food. Once again a very basic design, but at the same time very fitting and on the point.

Most other cover variants were those with random children and those with some Celebrities at the time. There were however also some Disney versions to promote popular IPs of the time, like Snow White, Aladdin, the Goofy movie or Lion King.

The overwhelming majority of box covers however are based on Cornelius Rooster. Most of them feature Cornelius in a 2D caricature version as a green rooster. With a blank white background and only a bowl of Cornflakes in front of him, they are very simple and basic, but as I said it does fit the down to earth approach of Kellogg’s Cornflakes. They are often accompanied with the slogans “The Original and Best” or “The best to you each morning”. Some Boxes only feature Cornelius as an Icon image on the box or Cornelius face on a bowl of Cornflakes. One of the most extravagant boxes is probably the special edition for Chinese New Year 2017, which was the year of the rooster and featured Cornelius in red and gold colours. Fun fact: Cornelius has become so popular that he even got multiple different children puppets and even a Pop figure. And talking about extravagant box images, some of the more modern Cornflakes boxes feature pictures of a 3D version of Cornelius on top of them. There is even a commercial with a gigantic real-life Rooster in them. That being said, I personally prefer the more classic look of Cornelius, like on the last box I purchased for this review. It immediately symbolizes everything the product stands for and might even be my favourite of the Cornflakes box images.

The most classic way to actually eat Kellogg’s Cornflakes is to just soak them in milk, like with all other cereals. I unfortunately have to say, that Kellogg’s Cornflakes, in my opinion, taste like eating wet paper. If you eat them dry, which for some cereals, like Cini Minis even enhances the taste, than Kellogg’s Cornflakes already leave much to be desired. Since they are a particularly healthy cereals, they are lacking almost all kinds of sugar and flavour enhancements other products have and unfortunately you can taste that. It is a mix of nothingness and leaving your mouth dry, which makes them really uncomfortable for me to eat. This would be fine if Milk was able to save them. Unfortunately it is not. The milk doesn’t add anything to them and just makes them more rubbery. I have never actually eaten paper, but I imagine it to be exactly like this. The only way I found some kind of enjoyment in the Cornflakes, was to mix them with bananas and quickly swallow them down, so I didn’t have to actually taste them. To be fair however, in this case I only enjoyed the banana mixed with milk. The cornflakes actually made them taste worse. I am sorry to be this blunt, but in my opinion Kellogg’s Cornflakes just taste absolutely awful…

I previously mentioned that I never knew another child eating Kellogg’s Cornflakes, I however still have a childhood connection to this product. While I did try out all kinds of different cereals back than, I was still a regular Nesquik consumer. The only exception was when I was visiting my grandparents. They knew I liked cereals and they told me they also got cereals at home and as you can guess, those cereals turned out to be Kellogg’s Cornflakes. I already didn’t like them back than and I am sure I also at least implied that a few times to them, but there was always another box of Kellogg’s Cornflakes waiting for me each time I visited. After all those years, I can safely say, that nothing changed. I still passionately dislike the taste of this product.

Apart from milk, people have found all kind of other creative ways to eat Kellogg’s Cornflakes. Some eat them mixed with fruit, some together with some ice cream and some even with potatoes, with some fish or on top of pancakes… Each to their own I guess.

There are also many subproducts of Kellogg’s Cornflakes. Kellogg’s Frosties for example are just Kellogg’s Cornflakes with additional sugar. While Kellogg’s Crunchy Nut are Kellogg’s Cornflakes with additional honey instead. Sometimes Kellogg’s Special K is also getting confused with the Cornflakes and while they may look quite similar, Special K are made with rice and wheat, while Cornflakes consist mainly of corn. Special K are also more crispy than Cornflakes.

Apart from subproducts there are however also official different variants of Kellogg’s Cornflakes, of which I have never seen any being sold here in Germany. There are for example Kellogg’s Cornflakes with chocolate flavour. Those look quite interesting, but apparently they have been removed from sale in most countries due to health concerns. There also Kellogg’s Cornflakes with strawberry flavour and strawberry puree. They also look like they might improve the flavour of classic Kellogg’s Cornflakes. Interestingly enough there are also chocolate and strawberry versions of Frosties, which visually look very similar to the Cornflakes versions. I guess Tony the Tiger just really likes to copy his brother in spirit Cornelius. Another variant is Kellogg’s Cornflakes with real honey, which look nearly identical to Kellogg’s Crunchy Nuts, but Google AI ensures me there is a marginal difference between them. Crunchy Nuts apparently use slightly more intense honey and sugar than Kellogg’s Cornflakes with real honey. You learn something new everyday. There is also another rare subvariant called Kellogg’s Cornflakes Almond Honey, which mixes the additional Honey with almonds. Kellogg’s Banana Cornflakes mixes, as the name suggests classic Kellogg’s Cornflakes with Banana chips. Another one I would actually like to try, but it’s not available in my country. A really rare variant are also Kellogg’s Apple Cornflakes, which mix Kellogg’s Cornflakes with apple puree and apple pieces, similar to the strawberry versions. As an adjustment to the Indian market Kellogg’s also published 3 special Indian versions called Kellogg’s Cornflakes Thandai Badam, Rose Badam and Kesar Pista Badam. Apparently those are some popular classic Indian flavours.

The weirdest variant however has got to be Kellogg’s Cornflakes Crumbs and Kellogg’s Cornflakes Crisped Chicken, which is Chicken with a layer of crisped Cornflakes on top of it. Some even suggest using it as part of a Kellogg’s Cornflakes Chicken Burger. I guess now I have truly seen everything.

 

Result:

If healthy cereals like Kellogg’s Cornflakes are the key to long lasting health and perhaps even eternal life, than I rather die young. The price is just too high and I am not talking about a financial price. The taste is just too disappointing for me personally. Maybe some of the variants are better products, but I unfortunately don’t have access to any of them.

I feel bad for doing this, but I have to give Kellogg’s Cornflakes a

2/10

They are the worst I have eaten so far. I would recommend trying it out at least once for its cultural significance, but to quickly switch to other cereals the next time...

The Man in the Park 2 (PC) Review

 

‘The Man in the Park 2: The Second Man in the Park’ is the sequel to The Man in the Park. The premise is quite similar to the first game. You travel through a lonely park in the middle of the night, but this time you can encounter 2 different people sitting on park benches. The player has to decide who he is going to trust and this time there are even 6 different endings.

So far this sounds like a noticeable improvement to the first game and in some ways it is. The Man in the Park 2 is not as criminally short as its predecessor and there is at least a little more gameplay to it. The gameplay is nothing interesting, but something is certainly better than nothing.

My big problem with the Man in the Park 2 is however how it doesn’t take itself serious. It tries to be a self-aware Horror comedy, but is neither funny enough for comedy nor does it manage to create a Horror atmosphere. So in a way it has the same problem as the first game, but for different reasons.

 

Result:

Longer, more gameplay options and yet The Man in the Park 2 doesn’t really improve. There might be more of it, but the gameplay is just boring and the story lackluster nonsense (like a bad Reddit fanfiction). The first game at least attempted to be scary.

 

3/10

The Man in the Park 1 (PC) Review

 

The Man in the Park 1 is an extremely short Horror Game. I really have to emphasize the short part. I am no stranger to review smaller, shorter games, but The Man in the Park is criminally short. You can beat the entire game and unlock all 3 Endings in around 2 minutes combined.

The concept of the game intrigued me. You travel through a park at night, where you met a lonely old man sitting on a park bench. What happens next is up to the player. It reminded me a lot of ‘Last Bus Home’, which is a significantly better game on itch.io. 

The man in the park has practically no gameplay. I won’t spoiler the “story”, but after talking to the old man there is next to nothing to do. The premise is cool and you can also make a rather short game with a nice horror vibe, but the man in the park is too short to actually create something like a horror atmosphere.

The visuals are very simple, but that’s fine for a smaller Horror Game. The massive flickering of some of them however is a bit straining on the eyes and some of the few objects you can simply walk through, which is usually an indicator for lack of effort.

 

Result:

The Man in the Park is like a comedy event, where the comedian shows up, tells an okay joke, which started more promising than it ended, for 2 mins and walks off the stage. There is no follow-up act or anything else. The setup is good, but the “game” doesn’t do anything with it. No meaningful gameplay, no real story, just the attempt of a scare.

 

3/10