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Seriously...

Game Changer: Fortnite on 4

Seriously...

BBC

Documentary, Society & Culture

4.1885 Ratings

🗓️ 14 August 2018

⏱️ 30 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

If you are a parent, you probably do not need an introduction to Fortnite Battle Royale. It's the online video game that's been absorbing the minds and time of millions of children and young adults since its launch last September. To the uninitiated, it's an online shooter game that has elements of The Hunger Games movies and the building video game Minecraft. In each match, 100 people are air-dropped onto a cartoon-rendered island where they run around searching for weaponry, building defensive forts and fighting to the death. The winner is the last one standing. It's free to play on multiple devices from computers to games consoles to smartphones. Presenter Kevin Fong (medical doctor, broadcaster and father of two) asks, is Fornite more like the new crack cocaine or more like the Beatles? It's estimated that more than 125 million people have played Fortnite Battle Royale and that 3 million people around the world are playing it at any one time. Its creators Epic Games have earned more than US$1 billion from Fortnite within the last year, and that is just from players buying virtual outfits and victory dances for their avatars. These dances or 'emotes' have leaked out of Fortnite's virtual world into the real one as anyone watching the World Cup will have seen. Football players now emote on scoring goals. There are also professional Fortnite players who are making millions by playing the game while vast numbers of people spectate via live streaming internet channels. Fortnite's Ronaldo is Ninja, a 26 year old man in Illinois, USA. It's said he makes US$ 500,000 from the 300 hours he spends playing the game each month. There are now Fortnite e-sports scholarships offered to students at one university in the United States. Is Fortnite a revolutionary development in video gaming and what is the formula of its undoubted success? With the World Health Organisation recently adding Gaming Disorder to its list of disease categories, how concerned should parents be about the risks of gaming addiction for their Fortnite-playing offspring? Kevin Fong explores the culture and conversation around Fornite with gamers of all ages, games creators, games culture experts, psychologists and psychiatrists. Producer: Andrew Luck-Baker.

Transcript

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0:00.0

This was an impregnable fortress. The only way you get out was in a wooden box.

0:05.0

The controversial maximum security prison impossible to escape from.

0:09.0

And one of the duties of a political prisoner is the escape.

0:12.0

The IRA inmates who found a way. of a political prisoner is the escape.

0:12.5

The IRA inmates who found a way.

0:14.5

I'm Carlo Gableer and I'll be navigating a path

0:19.5

through the disturbing inside story of the biggest jailbreak in British and Irish history.

0:25.0

The narrative that they want is that this is a big achievement by them.

0:28.5

Escape from the maze, listen first on BBC Sounds.

0:34.0

This is the BBC.

0:37.0

Hello, I'm here to tell you that if you want a quick taste of some big name comedy performers and the best new talent over the

0:43.2

Edinburgh fringe this August all you have to do is ask your smart speaker to

0:46.8

give me a late night laugh simple as that a different comic a different gag every

0:51.8

night.

0:56.0

Hi, I'm Riana Dillon. Welcome to Seriously.

1:02.0

You're just about to parachute into the bizarre universe of Fort Knight, a massive multiplayer online game where a hundred gamers at a time from all around the world dive onto a cartoon island, forage

1:16.4

for resources and weapons, and then fight it out until there's only one person left.

1:22.0

This is the Battle Royale.

1:26.0

What happens at the beginning of every fortnight match is that you get into the Battle Bus,

1:29.0

which is this vehicle strapped to a high air balloon.

1:32.0

If you imagine a hundred people in there partying and preparing for a fight.

1:34.8

Three, two.

...

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