Tag: fortnite

Fortnite Summer Tournament begins!

Starting this weekend, Epic will be hosting their Fortnite Summer Skirmishes. The series is 8-weeks long with the reward being $8 million! This is the first in-game tournament with prize money on the line for Epic. The prize is $250,000 for Duos (Two people on the same team in a Battle Royale). Epic chose specific players and Community Creators who are actually competitively good. Invitations have already been sent so if you’re expecting to receive one, sorry.

Each tournament will be a different format which will keep tournament interesting. There will also be different qualifying factors for each tournament so players will change accordingly.

Earlier this year, Epic announced that they will be starting their own competitive venue with the pot being $100 million. With Fortnite becoming the top viewed game on Twitch, their self-hosted tournaments will grab them a bigger audience. It will be more professional but it may lead to smaller tournaments disappearing as more players will compete for a higher prize and properly run.

Sources:

Fortnite Summer Skirmishes

Polygon

PUBG drops Copyright Lawsuit against Fortnite

It’s a common trend for big tech companies to sue others for copyright infringement. For examples, Apple vs Samsung for smartphone designs or Gamevice suing Nintendo for the Switch’s design. Every company wants to own the technology and make a lot of money. Recently, for the gaming industry, the biggest copyright battle was PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds (PUBG) versus Fortnite which ended today with a draw.

PUBG Corp. sued Epic for copying their Battle Royal- style gameplay. While the concept of Battle Royal isn’t new in media, PUBG and Fortnite have greatly popularized the game mode. The lawsuit started in January in Korea.

Why did PUBG Corp drop the Lawsuit?

While PUBG Corp. hasn’t stated why they dropped the lawsuit, there are speculations it was dropped due to Tencent. Both are part-owned by social media and gaming giant. It would a conflict of interest for Tencent to have the games they invested in sue each other. Epic created the Unreal Engine which is used to make PUBG so that may have also caused complications in the lawsuit.

Regardless, it’s ridiculous for PUBG Corp to sue Epic for mimicking the battle royal gameplay style. The game plays differently but just has similar genres. If PUBG had won the lawsuit, imagine the rest of the gaming companies to sue one another that used similar gameplay.

Bloomberg – PUBG Corp drops lawsuit

History of Apple vs Samsung

CNBC – Nintendo sued over Switch Design

Should Gaming Addiction be considered a Mental Disorder?

Today, the World Health Organization (WHO) has declared video game addiction is a mental disorder. For clarification from WHO, gaming addiction is prioritizing games over relationship building, interacting with others, daily activities and thought process. For it to be considered a gaming disorder, it has to be seen over the course of 12 months. Dr. Vladimir Poznyak, a member of WHO’s Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse, spoke further on the topic and stated only qualified doctors should be able to diagnose properly. While it stated it has to be seen over the course of 12 months, severe cases can be an exception. They have compared gaming addiction similar to gambling and substance use. Poznyak hopes” that inclusion of gaming disorder in the classification will stimulate debate as well as further research and international collaboration.”

Recently, BBC posted an article/video of a teen talking about his “addiction” as play games for 20 hours a week. The article became famous and spread throughout the internet on Monday which further villainized gaming. However, we should remain skeptical of the reasoning. Games have been villainized by organizations and government for causing violence and shootings despite huge lack of evidence. With the popularization of Fortnite in mainstream media, it has caused an even bigger target regarding gaming addiction.

Even researchers disagree on the gaming addiction as a mental disorder such as Anthony Bean, a licensed psychologist and executive director at The Telos Project, a nonprofit mental health clinic in Fort Worth, Texas. He stated, “I’m a clinician and a researcher, so I see people who play video games and believe themselves to be on the lines of addicted.” In his experience, they’re actually using gaming “more as a coping mechanism for either anxiety or depression.” He also noted that most clinical doctors aren’t too familiar with gaming habits, in general, to diagnose people with “gaming addiction.” If they aren’t familiar with a illness, how can you accurately state somebody with a mental disorder if you are unfamiliar with the topic? Bean also noted that different effects on different people. Someone playing “Minecraft” is going to be completely different from someone playing “World of Warcraft,” he said: “They’re two vastly different genres.” They have different effects because the games are in different environments and you interact with people differently.

Games often receive a harsh feedback because gaming isn’t age-gated like drugs or gambling. Anybody can play which is the beauty in it. Of course, anything done in excess is bad, whether it’s eating, watching television, or exercising. Scientist and researchers don’t have enough information to fully develop a conclusion on the effects of gaming because every game is different. Other countries like Korea and China have huge gaming addicts who go to PC cafes all day. Korea even has gaming rehab centers for addicts. It’s a tricky thing to solve but I personally believe considering gaming addiction as a mental disorder is too extreme.

What do you think about people who play too many games? Do you know anybody whose gaming has ruined parts of their lives?

Sources:

WHO statement on Gaming Addiction

NBC news

BBC – 20 hours weekly video

CNN – WHO and Bean’s statement on gaming addiction

Business Insider – South Korea rehab centers

Sony responds to Fortnite Complaints

Epic’s Fortnite is quickly becoming the biggest and most popular game in the world. Fortnite released in 2016 and is now on every major console, PC, and iOS. However, recent discoveries by users noticed that they couldn’t use their Epic accounts (Epic studio’s log-in) on other consoles. Sony and PlayStation have received massive complaints from Fortnite players regarding their accounts. If you connected your Epic Account, you were unable to use that account for the Nintendo Switch or any other platform and vice-versa. If you try to log in, you’ll see this image below.

The Nintendo Switch’s version of Fortnite allows you to play with Xbox One, PC, and iOS players while PlayStation players have no cross-console options. Sony didn’t inform players that they would be locked into one account. Essentially, all progress on PlayStation is non-transferable to other platforms including in-game items. Many players are frustrated, including fans of PlayStation such as Gameover Greggy and the PS4 subreddit.

 

Hey, Sony, it would be really cool to have my epic account unlocked for switch and be able to enjoy my money spent on the battle-pass from PS4

Unfortunately, Sony didn’t really respond to the feedback. On the BBC, Sony’s stated “”With… more than 80 million monthly active users on PlayStation Network, we’ve built a huge community of gamers who can play together on Fortnite and all online titles.” So not really a response but essentially they want to keep their players sticking to PlayStation.

Why did Sony do this?

The marketing answer is that Sony wants to focus on expanding their community. Fortnite recently reported that they have 125 million players. While the amount of each player per consoles remains to be seen, Fortnite is heavily promoted on the PlayStation Network and has been seen as the secondary platform to play it after PC.

Sony has a history of not allowing cross-platform for many of their games such as Rocket League and Minecraft. The business answer is Sony doesn’t want their player base to potentially switch to other platforms. By keeping their players to PlayStation consoles, they are less inclined to change over.

While Sony is stating this is for their community, it’s not good for consumers. Preventing players from playing with other consoles is harmful to their image especially if the Switch and Xbox One allow cross-platform play.

Sources:

BBC – Playstation statement

PSU – Fortnite Playercount

Reddit community backlashPolygon – Epic account locked due to PlayStation