Fortnite
Fortnite is the online game that is ALL the rage amongst the kids right now. Made by Epic Games, it came out in 2017. It’s how my kid, and many, many others, spent their summer.
There are two main game modes: Save The World, in which up to four players try to defend themselves from Zombie-like creatures called Husks. Husks were created when “the storm” wiped out the majority of earth’s population, and are there just to cause destruction for the game players. The goal of the game is to rebuild and defend oneself and objects against the husks.
The other game mode is Battle Royale, and this is the one that’s most popular. In Battle Royale, up to a hundred players are “air-dropped” into the game and vie to be the last player standing. There’s also a storm in this mode, but the purpose of it is to keep everyone contained within it to move the action along. Players who go outside the perimeter of this storm sustain damage.
The reason peeps such as my kid love this game is because during this game one can wear crazy looking “skins” such as a dude in a pink bunny suit, or Beef Boss, my kid’s favorite. Beef Boss is a skin with a cheeseburger for a head, with a tongue that lolls out a mile, and bug eyes set on the side of its head. Totally looks like a pug burger.
Then there are the dances these characters can do. The Carlton, Orange Justice, Rambunctious. They are performed to perfection by these characters, and it’s a common sight to see kids doing these dances out in public. My kid does ‘em EVERY time we are out in public.
These skins and dances cost $10-$20 a pop, which has proven to be very lucrative for Epic Games, making them a gazillion dollars.
So, it’s a game where someone in a pink bunny suit can run around and do a dance, AND shoot at other players. Pretty cool.
There’s also the interaction a player can have with the other players. In Battle Royale, for safety in numbers, players can group up in squads of up to four to help each other stay alive for a while. This meant my kid got to talk to other kids that he knew from school on his headset, and play with them.
This could be a good and a bad thing. As with most games, Fortnite creates frustration, and anger, and I can’t help wondering how the face-to-face interactions at school today, the first day back, are gonna go. Things would get pretty heated over the many hours my kid played this game during the summer, and I’m curious if genuine hard feelings exist or will be swept under the rug.
As I said, it’s my son’s first day back at school today, as it is citywide, and I WILL notice the absence of shouts coming from his room. Things like “I’m deadI’m deadI’m dead” rattled off in rapid succession, or “WHY CAN’T I BUILD?!” screamed out. My personal favorite, though, was the one day I spied him out of the corner of my eye looking at his computer screen with a look of disbelief and actual DESPAIR, shaking his head and wailing “This game is sooooo rigged”. I couldn’t contain my snicker at that one. Rigged or not, he kept playing it, and it’s how he spent his summer.
