Travis Scott Emote Seemingly Pulled From Fortnite

If you’ve somehow missed the news over the weekend, on Friday, Travis Scott’s Astroworld festival kicked off with a tragic start. The third such event scheduled to be held between the 5th and the 6th of November led to the death of at least 8 people, with a further 11 going into cardiac arrest according to Houston officials. A further 300 were treated for injuries caused by a stampede within NRG Park (formerly Reliant Park). It goes without saying, but that should not have happened and was a failure of a multitude of staff surrounding the event.

Reports currently suggest that it was caused by overcrowding due to fans without tickets entering the event. That caused an increase of bodies being compressed together, resulting in an inability to breathe, and when the crowd did move, it inevitably resulted in injuries. As a result of this, legal action is being taken against Scott, organizer Live Nation, and Drake who was meant to be a surprise guest during Scott’s performance. With legal action mounting on Scott and the organizers, associations with Scott are looking at their current relationships, such as Epic Games and Fortnite.

In response to the events that took place on Friday, the “Out West” emote for the battle royale game where Scott’s ‘Astronomical’ event was held in Fortnite last year has seemingly been pulled from in-game storefronts. The daily selection offered the emote before promptly, and intentionally, going offline. Both the emote and Travis Scott skin within Fortnite seems to have been disabled from purchase for the time being. While players are unable to acquire the skin and emote, those who already own it are still able to use it within the game. Though, if I may interject my opinion for a moment: This should only be the beginning of the repercussions for the events that took place Friday night and into Saturday morning.

Scott has been involved in incidents similar to this in 2015, twice in 2017, and at the 2019 Astroworld event, three people were injured via trampling due to a stampede. Scott was arrested and charged for the conduct in 2015 and has a further misdemeanor conviction for such conduct. Given his position on-stage, and the myriad of failures from those holding the event, the performance should have (at least temporarily) suspended not only for paramedics to attend to those injured and get to those requiring attention sooner, but so the event could be brought back under the control of those holding it. I’ll be surprised if Epic continues its association with Scott following this event.