For the month of February and some of March, I’m working as the desk host for the Free Fire Europe Pro League Season II. Free Fire is a mobile Battle Royale game and, I realised a lot of South Africans hadn’t heard of it before. So I figured I’d do a quick write up to let you know a bit more about the game, that way if you do come watch the esports action on the weekends, you know what is going on.
Some fun Free Fire facts
- In 2020 Free Fire had more than 100 million daily active users at its peak
- In 2019 and 2020 App Annie data named it the most downloaded mobile game
- The Esports Awards 2020 named Free Fire the Esports Mobile Game of the Year
- 2.5 million concurrent viewers watched the Free Fire Continental Series on YouTube
- Last year the game partnered with Cristiano Ronaldo – who now is in-game as a character called Chronos
Those are all fun facts to toss around with your friends in discord to make you look smart – but they won’t help when you jump into game. So, I’m going to give you some noob basics to help you along:
Battle Royale, obvious
Free Fire is a Battle Royale game which means you likely know how it works. You drop into a map, you loot, the circle closes, you shoot. Last player standing wins. There’s the option to play as a squad, duo or solo. There are different maps in Free Fire including Bermuda, Purgatory and Kalahari. Different maps have different strong looting spots and different styles of play, so you’ll need to adapt to those and figure it out.
A few Free Fire specific tips
- In Free Fire you can choose a character to play with. At the start of the game you can choose between Adam and Eve – as you go you can then unlock other characters with Diamonds (in game currency). The characters are actually important. The characters have different abilities so ideally you want to figure out your game style and choose a character accordingly.
- Your sights are your friend. When they turn red it means there is an enemy nearby. If you shoot when the sight is red you’ll likely hit an enemy. The recoil on your weapons you won’t feel it all that much. So you’ll be able to track a bit better and can fire in bursts to ensure you land the most damage.
- There is a Free Fire SSA server for South Africa, West Africa and surrounding regions. FYI.
The game is available for free on Android and the Apple Store – if you’re looking to add a new mobile game to your smartphone. If you want to watch some top level Free Fire play then be sure to watch the Free Fire Europe Pro League every Saturday and Sunday in February from 2pm CET (so 3pm in South African time) – on the Free Fire Europe YouTube channel. I’ll see you in the chat.
