Fortnite’s Grappler is being built in real life by a fan

Mobility items in Fortnite: Battle Royale became rare and weak after last week’s v7.20 Content Update. Vehicles like the X-4 Stormwing plane and the Quadcrasher started appearing less often around the map, and developer Epic Games reduced the spawn rates of Balloons and Gliders.

But the most extreme mobility adjustment was removing the Grappler from the game. It was an item that shot a plunger that was tied to the inner part of the gun. When the plunger hit an object, it would stick to it and propel the user toward that object at high speed. It was a great way of moving around the map or climbing big structures quickly.

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Fortnite player Tfoust10 misses the Grappler so much that he decided to recreate it in real life. He shared a picture of the prototype on the Fortnite subreddit last night.

The Grappler looks great. It looks very similar to the in-game version, and Tfoust said he and his friend are ready to test fire within a week or so. “The jury is out as to if it will stick,” Tfoust said, questioning if the flying plunger will really stick to another object like in the game. “We don’t really know how this will work out but we are confident we can shoot it about 60 feet or more.”

The plan is to propel the plunger with nitrogen gas at 180 psi, which is pressure about six times higher than the air pressure inside a car tire.

Tfoust said his main concern is adding a rope to the gun. The Grappler must be tied to the back of the gun somehow to replicate its in-game mechanic, but doing so in real life is risky. “Safety concerns exist but for this project, we had to accept that there is a level of inherent risk associated.”

Several users showed concern about the safety of the gun, questioning if the gun won’t hurt anyone in an unlikely process of propelling the user, or if the back of the gun won’t shoot toward the user. Tfoust thanked users for caring, but said a friend “who is licensed to create firearms is engineering this. He makes cannons in real life. I definitely would not try to resurrect my boy scout skills and attempt this on my own.” Tfoust also said they’ll take “tons of safety precautions” before trying to fire this real-life Grappler.

Tfoust also said he’s taking suggestions on what other game items he should try to build in real life after the Grappler experiment is over. For now, Fortnite fans will patiently wait to see if his first creation will work and take the Grappler out of the vault in real life.