Epic appears to have quietly enabled cross-platform play between Xbox One and PlayStation 4 in Fortnite.
Sony has thus far snubbed the idea of allowing cross-platform online play between Xbox One and PlayStation 4, but new evidence from Fortnite players appears to suggest that Epic Games has quietly enabled the feature in the game.
The proof comes mainly down to an issue of player names. A Reddit user named PRE_-CISION-_ (via Eurogamer) recently noticed a player with an Xbox Gamertag in an online match while playing on PS4. The giveaway was that the player's name had a space in it, something the is not possible with a PSN name. A search indicated that the player does indeed exist on Xbox Live. Later, another Xbox One Gamertag with spaces in it was spotted in an online match on PS4.
Further driving things home, another Reddit user, PyroBlack76, posted a photo of himself playing in the same match with his kid between Xbox One and PS4.
Theoretically, cross-platform play shouldn't be possible without the consent of Microsoft and Sony. It's possible, and likely given the lack of a formal announcement, that we could be seeing a glitch of some sort. For its part, Sony has remained opposed to cross-platform play, even as Minecraft has enabled it across Xbox One, iOS, Android, and Nintendo Switch. It's worth noting that cross-play was previously supported between Xbox One and PC, but it was removed in a patch citing a policy discussion with Microsoft.
If this is unintended, it's still a sign that cross-platform play should be relatively simple to implement — at least for Fortnite. All that's needed is for the red tape to come down.
Updated September 18, 2017: In a statement to The Verge, Epic has now confirmed that this was a "configuration issue and it has now been corrected." Here's to hoping cross-play is re-enabled in some official capacity in the future.