Fortnite Fever: Taking Over Shawnee?

Alex Volkerijk, Staff Writer

Everyone’s heard of, or been playing, Epic Games’ latest and most popular game, Fortnite. The battle royale game featuring 100 players on one large map has blown up and taken many schools by storm. Over 45 million players are now dropping from the battle bus, joining up with their friends in a squad, and battling for victory.

With the release of Fornite for mobile devices, it is even easier for students to bring the game into the classroom. As long as you got into the invite event, or received an invite code from a friend, you can play the game anywhere and with anyone. This has caused much dismay for many teachers. One college professor by the name of Mr Hillman even requested a message to be put into the loading screen of the game that read “Mr. Hillman says stop playing in class.”

Fornite has also taken over Youtube and the Internet. It is almost impossible to go online without seeing Fortnite somewhere. There are also many people making money off of playing the game. Ninja, one of the most famous Fornite streamers on twitch, makes at least 350,000 dollars a month from playing the game.

With more and more people being sucked into the game, should we be worried about unwanted side effects on grades? So far, there has been no definitive studies about how the games affects students’ performance. However, it is hard to go any period of time without hearing about the game, which might be worrying for teachers.