Skull Trooper Fortnite Skin Guide

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Cody is a writer who has been with Fortnite since the day it launched in early access. He adores the battle royale genre and Fortnite represents the bulk of his time in the space. Cody does not just play the regular battle royale modes but also spends loads of time in Creative modes that the community has come up with. Cody has been in the video game business as part of media and content creation for more than 10 years. During that time, he has contributed and even led some of the largest sites in the world dedicated to gaming and entertainment. He has also dabbled some in PR and was a tester for Activision in the past working on the Call of Duty series. When not playing games or writing about them, he enjoys cooking, sharpening his Japanese skills, and watching the latest anime shows.

Bottom Line Up Front

The Skull Trooper Fortnite skin is one of the most memorable outfits in the history of battle royale. Fortnite introduced this skin relatively early in the game’s lifecycle as one of the first premium skins you could get during Chapter 1, Season 1.

The battle royale title was still in early access at the time, and Skull Trooper was in celebration of Halloween. It features the classic Jonesy character donning a skeleton Halloween costume. It is rather simplistic in design but memorable nonetheless as one of the better skins in the first year of Fortnite.

Thankfully, it is an item shop skin, so it shows up every so often in the store for players to purchase, even in the current state of Fortnite. This fan-favorite skin will likely return in the near future.

Skull Trooper Skin Explained

2017 still feels like yesterday to me, but, alas, it is quite a long time ago in the grand scheme of video games. At the time, I was getting into a little game called Fortnite from one of my favorite developers behind the Gears of War series.

Little did I know what this seemingly innocuous battle royale title that copied the success of PUBG before it would become.

Fortnite had already come out earlier in the summer of 2017 with solely the Save the World experience. But in late September, it released its battle royale mode in early access for free. I jumped in on the very first day to find that its offerings were pretty modest at the time.

Everything we love and associate with the game, from seasons to skins, was not available just yet. Soon after, though, the first season of the game launched and, with it, the first set of optional skins.

It was only a month after launch that Epic Games made history with the Skull Trooper skin.

It was one of the very first premium skins for the game, besides the now-iconic default ones, to release. Coming out on October 26, 2017, Skull Trooper was there to capitalize on the impending holiday of Halloween. Epic Games did not even try anything super special or exciting for this skin.

It took what already existed in the game and put a spooky little twist on it. That said, there is no doubting that Skull Trooper is one of the essential outfits to release in the game.

Besides the fact that there weren’t many options at the time, it was many players’ first skin that they purchased.

Throughout the time since the release of Skull Trooper and the now three chapters that Fortnite has evolved across, Epic Games has paid homage to this skin. The developer ensures that fans are treated to unique versions and expansions of this original skin even now, nearly five years later.

Appearance

As I mentioned, the appearance of the Skull Trooper skin is nothing to write home about. Compared to what we have today, especially in the Halloween department, Skull Trooper is child’s play.

What Epic is doing these days is the difference between the Halloween costume you wore when you were five years old and the outfit used for Vecna in Stranger Things Season 4.

Admittedly, Epic Games did not even take the time to create a brand new character model for Skull Trooper. Instead, it just took the same model used for Jonesy, the now-iconic default skin character. With that base model, the team could come up with a Halloween iteration quickly.

It takes Jonesy and shows the Troy Baker-voiced character wearing a traditional skeleton Halloween costume. There is nothing unique or exciting to see here at all. In fact, it isn’t even that good of a costume since it looks like something that was homemade.

It appears like the same clothing that Jonesy usually wears but painted black. It looks like he took the baggy cargo pants he wears in his default skin and the tank top and spray-painted them black.

This includes everything from the belt he wears to the small equipment items he carries around to even the scarf around his neck. It’s almost like he ran out of time to find a proper costume and took it upon himself to make his own.

After spray-painted black, it looks like he designed his own skeletal figure across the entirety of the outfit, albeit one that is surprisingly well done. He is then wearing a hood over his head that covers his hair but does not actually cover up his face.

It is spray painted all white to look like a skull with a boney design on his facial features as well. I’m pretty sure I saw some kids in high school who showed up at the haunted house looking just like this.

But there is a level of charm to it that has pervaded over time to result in the new skin styles over time that it has.

Skull Trooper Accessories

The Skull Trooper is part of the Skull Squad set in Fortnite. While it started with this skin, it soon expanded into other cosmetic items and skins. As such, there are a few accessories that go along with the skin. One that goes really nicely with this skin is the Skelly Sailer.

It is a glider that has a skull on top that matches the Skull Trooper skin. There is also the Beef Bone item, which has some auspicious origins. If you prefer something a little less beefy, there is the Bait Bones, which are the bones of an unspecified fish.

My favorite pickaxe in this set, though, is the Skull Sickle. The reaper-like weapon is fantastic, especially the black and white Skull Trooper variant.

If you’re looking for other weapons to match your sickle, there is the Bony weapon skin that applies a good but not super interesting black and white aesthetic to them.

The final back bling accessory worth noting is the Bone Wings. These look like you are becoming a fallen angel reaper, which is terrific. This is one of the best back blings that you can find in Fortnite, offering an almost Roblox-like style to the player character. It helps, too, that it matches Skull Trooper pretty well.

I have my eyes on those wings for purchase the next time that they are in the item shop. There are other parts of the set, too, but some of them are not necessarily meant to match Skull Trooper.

There are some other skins like Yule Trooper that are the same skin but with A Nightmare Before Christmas twist. Or even Fishskull, where zombie Fishstick has arrived.

Skin Styles Explained

When the Skull Trooper first came out, things were much simpler in Fortnite (for better or worse). It was just the primary white and black skeleton costume, and that was it.

This is likely why it had a relatively cheap price tag in the item shop. After all, it didn’t come with a whole lot to warrant a higher price.

That said, skins since the release of this one are much more elaborate. If there is a skin that comes out that has clear potential for more styles and customization, and it doesn’t have that, that is a dud on release.

It is possible for this reason that Epic Games has supported the Skull Trooper in the years since its debut.

Nearly every Halloween since its release in 2017, not only has the skin returned but with a new skin style in tow. Besides the default skin style, there is also the Green Glow that players can get.

This one is similar to the original, simply swapping out the white parts for a green part that glows nicely.

Inverted also came out and swapped the default version’s white and black parts. It has a novel look to it that I really appreciate, being a nice twist on the typical skeleton look.

Then there is the Gilded one, which turns the white parts of the default into golden areas. This is my favorite version of the skin style, offering a Midas touch on the Skull Trooper.

The final skin style is one of the first: Purple Glow. This one is like the Green Glow, but with a purple glowing part instead.

Unlike the other skin styles, though, this one is locked. Only players who got in early and bought the Skull Trooper back in the day could get this one.

On the other hand, the four other main skin styles for the Skull Trooper are available to everyone. All you need to do is purchase the item in the item shop, and you will automatically unlock them; no quests are required.

Pros and Cons

Pros

There is a lot of beautiful nostalgia to the Skull Trooper skin.
It is simple but fun, somehow being better than some skins even released today.
The skin styles that were added after the Skull Trooper’s release help it to only get better.
Jonesy is a fan favorite Fortnite character for a good reason, and this skin was one of the first steps on his way to his eventual fame.

Cons

Since it is pretty old at this point, the Skull Trooper skin is far from the most detailed and interesting outfit.
It only shows up usually once or twice a year around Halloween.

Skull Trooper Fortnite Skin Mini-Review

I will be upfront that the Skull Trooper skin is one of the most basic that I have seen for the battle royale game. But, at the same time, there is a lot of charm there that is crucial to it. The Skull Trooper is, in many ways, like the Gen 1-3 Pokemon for many fans.

There is a reason that fans adore those original few hundred Pokemon, and it is not necessarily just because of nostalgia. They are pretty simple and straightforward in what they were trying to do.

This is a similar situation for this skin in that it was a relic of a bygone era in which skins were much more basic.

This is not a bad thing, either, as the Skull Trooper gets the job done. It fills the role of offering a Halloween-themed skin that is fun and cute without being too dull.

In fact, I would go so far as to say that it is one of the best skins that was ever released in the first four or so seasons of Fortnite.

I will be clear that I am not a fan of most skins from Chapter 1 of Fortnite. Until the last couple of seasons, they were mostly hit or miss for me as Epic Games kept churning them out.

Until the crossovers became commonplace, I think that there was a lack of creativity and intrigue in many of the Fortnite-original outfits.

The same cannot be said for the Skull Trooper, though. It captures exactly what I liked about the early days of the battle royale game. It is goofy but detailed enough. The skin is easy to get without being tied to the battle pass.

There is a chance to get it still today, and it fits in nicely with skins that are released even in Chapter 3. In fact, possibly even more so today since Jonesy has taken off as one of the most popular characters in Fortnite.

How to Unlock the Fortnite Skull Trooper

There was one way that players were able to unlock the Fortnite Skull Trooper skin, and you can likely already guess it. Only a short time after the launch of Fortnite into early access, Epic Games introduced the first season of the battle royale game.

This first season was nothing like what we have today, lacking many of the key features. In fact, there wasn’t even a battle pass system yet in place during the first season. Because of this, the best way to unlock new skins in the game was to purchase them in the item shop.

The only problem with this was that there were not many premium skins that you could buy in the game at the time. It took a few weeks before Epic Games released the first paid skins, and Skull Trooper was one of the very first. However, it was not the actual first.

It was released about a month after the launch of Fortnite in celebration of Halloween. Players could purchase it in the item shop. Interestingly enough, the price of the skin in the item shop is a tricky point. Players could unlock this outfit by spending 1200 V-Bucks in the shop when it first came out.

However, that is no longer the case. Soon after its release and some of the additional skin styles that Epic added to the skin, the developer changed the price of this epic skin.

It now costs 1500 V-Bucks, so anyone who is interested in unlocking it will have to shell out a little bit more money. But those who got in when it was first around got it for cheaper and later received the other skin styles.

Can You Still Unlock It?

Yes! It is very much still possible to unlock the Skull Trooper even in the current Chapter 3. However, it is worth noting that you cannot unlock it right this moment at the time of writing this. This is due to the fact that the Skull Trooper skin only shows up in the item shop every once in a while.

Thankfully, Epic Games has been fantastic about bringing back the iconic Skull Trooper skin for players to purchase if they have not already. It is a tradition now to bring back this skin once a year at the time of Halloween in the shop.

Epic Games has ensured that it brought this skin back every single Halloween since the very first time it appeared in 2017. So, it stands to reason that the Skull Trooper skin is going to make a huge comeback once more in the upcoming Halloween season in 2022 and beyond.

When that inevitably happens once more, players will be able to unlock it and the various skin styles that it has for the updated price of 1500 V-Bucks.

Fun Facts About the Skull Trooper Fortnite Skin

Here are some fun facts about the iconic Skull Trooper Fortnite skin that you may not have known about before:

Skull Trooper was not the first skin in Fortnite, but one of the first. It was released at Halloween time alongside the Ghoul Trooper female skin.
However, Ghoul Trooper is not the actual female version of this skin. That skin would be the Skull Ranger skin, which would not release until a whopping five seasons later.
Skull Trooper is based on the beloved Jonesy default character skin.
It is impossible to unlock the purple glowing skin style for Skull Trooper today if you did not initially purchase it in the past.
Oddly enough, the Skull Trooper skin was never available in China, presumably because of some restrictions regarding the look of the skin.

FAQs

Question: Will Skull Trooper come back in 2022?

Answer: Technically, I cannot give a sure answer to this question since I cannot read Epic Games’ minds. However, I would say that there is a 90% chance that Skull Trooper will return in 2022. The beloved skin has come back basically every year since 2017. The most likely time for its return is Halloween.

Question: How do you get the golden Skull Trooper in Fortnite?

Answer: As mentioned above, the golden variant of the Skull Trooper skin is a free skin style for all owners of the outfit. You do not have to do anything at all to unlock this variant. It was added after the Skull Trooper’s release as a bonus for owners of this nostalgic skin.

Question: Is Skull Trooper the OG skin?

Answer: Skull Trooper was one of the OG skins in Fortnite, but not the first one. It was roughly the third skin in the battle royale game’s item shop if you are only talking about the premium ones. Otherwise, the actual original skins were the default ones.

Conclusion

If you’re looking for a bit of Fortnite nostalgia, if that is even a thing yet, Skull Trooper is the go-to reminder of simpler times for Fortnite. A time in which there was no such thing as other chapters, islands, or even crossover events.

It was just about gathering your materials, (rather slowly) building your forts, and surviving the terrifying storm in hopes of victory.

There are times that I remember those early days of Fortnite fondly when Skull Trooper was one of the only premium skins that you could purchase. At the end of the day, though, the Fortnite gameplay is all the better now with the options and changes that have arrived.

One such change was removing building entirely, making for a more pure battle royale experience in the Zero Build modes. If you’re looking for a more accessible point of entry for the battle royale game, that mode is the place to be.

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