The Existential Nightmare of Fortnite

I don't understand Fortnite, and that's potentially thrilling.
Support the show on Patreon - / writingongames
Podcast - anchor.fm/writingongamescast
Second Channel - / @writingongamesextra9177
---
I like to think of myself as pretty au fait with all things video games, but recently I watched something that truly reminded me of how I'm getting older; of how quickly time is marching forward, and how I'm losing touch with a medium I love. On a recent family trip, I watched my nephew play a match of Fortnite-a game that has changed so much in the years since I last played it, that I could barely tell what I was looking at.
Rather than make me sad though, this got me thinking about all kinds of things-the potential for games to help people bond; the wild path of this industrial titan of a video game; how my parents felt watching me play games like Metal Gear Solid as a kid and the mechanical abstractions within; the dangers of growing up with games like Fortnite, hellbent on getting you to buy your way to popularity, and how my experience with similar crazes might help guide my nephew through the scarier aspects of this industry. Let's talk about how this daft game sent me into an existential spiral, and reminded me how much I love this medium.
0:00 - Intro
0:21 - Getting older and video games
2:44 - The rapidly shifting nature of Fortnite
3:48 - Old man can't make sense of Fortnite
5:19 - Building in Fortnite is WILD now
7:19 - The match's explosive finale
8:36 - Old man is no match for John Wick
9:40 - How did my parents feel watching me play games?
11:03 - I don't understand, and why that's thrilling
12:37 - What were the crazes of my own youth like?
13:26 - The darker side of Fortnite
15:31 - Conclusion
16:18 - Outro
---
Thumbnail by hotcyder - / hotcyder
Intro text animation by Isaac Holland - / drazgames

[@gustavosimoes1995]

I remember the time i played a match of Halo 3 with my little cousin, when i landed the first few shots at him he started spinning like crazy, after killing him i asked what the hell he was doing, then he told me he was trying to build something. Of course he knows that Halo doesn't have any building mechanincs (not outside forge at least) but his first instinct after getting shot was to start building something instead of, you know, shooting back, it shows how muscle memory demanding this mechanic is and how natural it has become for them

[@shiwakao]

well in fairness u do carry over muscle memory from games you've played before to others. i imagine your cousin hasn't played many shooters outside of fortnite or at least has more playtime in it. it's definitely an interesting side effect of learning the genre while also interacting w a mechanic unique to one game.

[@chromie6571]

@@shiwakao I remember for a long time I would press the Y button to jump in other games after playing Skyrim for a while

[@lilithstenhouse267]

He was obviously activating his spinbot, don't be fooled

[@veganbtw111]

I sometimes do something similar in other games due to muscle memory from Halo. If I'm getting shot at and don't know from where, I'll snap my aim to the ground in order to hide my character model's head so that if I'm being shot from behind I can't get headshot. There probably are other games where that does work too though lol

[@dotd1tdot]

To a lesser extent, I've had the same experience changing from smash to fighting games and back. Shielding in smash is so much different than in traditional fighters, that anytime I swap, I'll muscle memory into a wanted outcome. I remember vividly that I was playing some smash and started crawling backwards when my opponent was coming in with an arial, or when I started SFV and kept jabbing out of block mixups because I was buffering what in my mind was a shield input. I do find it interesting how muscle memory works around game mechanics and how our brains react to the constantly changing environments we play in.

[@aneonfoxtribute]

Don't worry. I, as a spry young 24 year old who plays Fortnite regularly, cannot keep up with build mode. Those people are genuinely insane. I sit comfortably in No Build mode and focus on keeping myself alive rather than learning how to build genuine fortresses in a manner of seconds.

[@AdrianVM19]

Same here lol. Never was into building, and Zero Build has been AMAZING for us young boomers.

[@gracelandtoo6240]

Same, build mode would probably be my cup of tea if it was at worst as quick as in Minecraft, but this is too much for me to process lmao

[@xastroboi771]

24 isn't young in gaming tbh lol I was playing in cod/halo, and fighting game tournaments at like 13 lol

[@teyrns]

Same age, same mindset. I don't have arthritis or anything like that but I just don't have the eye-hand coordination necessary for the types of maneuvers mentioned in the video. Skill issue, I guess, but I like everyone being on a more or less level playing field (usually literally) in no-build mode. I've had more fun with the game since its inclusion.

[@AdennBeroya]

21 and I second this. I play no build with my dad(60) on weekends and it's a blast!

[@chrisakaschulbus4903]

Even at age 16 i probably complained about "these kids today" more often than my father and his father combined. Now i'm 22 and feel like an old man when i can't keep up with the fortnites and battlefields.

[@Doctor-Infinite]

i’m 20 going on 21 and,like, same dude these dang kids. BACK IN MY DAY WE DIDN’T NEED TO BUILD TOWERS!! WE JUST SHOT WHOEVER WAS IN FRONT OF US LIKE THE GOOD OLD DAYS (grumble grumble)

[@Redcloudsrocks]

@@Doctor-Infinite I know 30 year olds who play fortnite just as well as the kids if not better, It's not rocket science just takes you know, actually playing or doing something and getting more effective at doing it

[@dip.918]

@@Redcloudsrocks Hey, 17 year old here, I adore playing Fortnite with my friends but I simply don't care enough TO practise. It's that simple, I don't find it fun to build and I don't see myself finding it necessarily "fun" if I did. When we play No Build I have fun, when we play Build I play support, and get the advantage on the building players by weaseling around the structure and using the mantles and such, still having fun.

[@Doctor-Infinite]

@@Redcloudsrocks i just dont want to and the act of trying to practice building towers brings me great stress that i do not find fun fortnite just ain’t for me man 🤷🏾‍♂️

[@pecantwiz6041]

@@Doctor-Infinite i appreciate people like you that admit the game is just too hard instead of claiming it sucks

[@RacingSnails64]

As Hugo Martin (the Doom director) once said during an interview, kids want chess. Kids want complex games. Kids are capable of way more than we think of! Even as a kid myself raised on Mario and Banjo Kazooie, when I first saw a first person shooter, I was kind of intrigued. This was a whole new kind of game to sink my teeth into.

[@Extremezotako]

banjo kazooie gud game

[@pandora3224]

This is why kids loved when World of Warcraft required so much 3rd party resource and min-maxxing; the rewards for putting in that extra effort felt immensely rewarding. Then, the casuals/adults complained about how much time they werent able to commit to the game, and lo-and-behold, Pay4Convenience grasped the publishing team at Blizzard like someone whispering "Its free real estate" into their ears.

[@TheAlison1456]

if kids wanted chess we'd have more chess players

[@pandora3224]

@@TheAlison1456 kids want to know people that know how to play chess.

[@inendlesspain4724]

Completely unrelated genre, but as a kid I loved JRPGs (mostly from the early 90s up to the early 2000s) but at the time I was mildly disappointed at even some of the best games in the genre because I wished they were a bit more mechanically complex, as there's always a point were you feel like you've "seen it all" (even if you didn't necessarily 100% it, maxed out all stats for each character, etc.). As an adult revisiting these games there were several times where I thought to myself "man, why does this have to be so complex? I can't believe I used to think this was so simple". I don't know what changed about me because I feel like if anything I've become better at games; I've drifted away from JRPGs over the years towards more skill based games, like many platformers and side-scrollers I would've never been able to beat in the past without save scumming, all while still thinking of JRPGs as my "comfort genre" (and a part of me still does). I don't know what the point of this is besides that, my experience with gaming growing up hasn't been that straightforward, in terms of how good or bad I've become at games.

[@roonkolos]

Like everyone else I'd recommend Zero Build mode. The game feels a lot different when you're opponent isn't suddenly building a damn hotel fit with indoor pool & wifi when a single shot misses them by a wide margin However it's always fun to see such a structure be build on a single platform, destroy it and see them plummet from like 40 stories up with no way to save themselves

[@antomanifesto]

I started playing again at the start of the newest season, having not played since the original season 2 (mostly just to check out the Unreal 5 changes). Got to the final two, and other player was so consumed with building that I just unloaded my shotgun at them, punched through the wall and won the game. Also won the second game by bouncing over their wall with my hammer, again they were so consumed with building that they didn't notice me there and I shot them in the back. Makes me wonder whether building is actually that good of a strategy compared to flanking and good gunplay, or if it's just the "done thing"

[@ileutur6863]

The kiddie builders are so fucking annoying

[@0uttaS1TE]

Honestly, zero build has given me new appreciation for Fortnite's mechanics. It feels faster now, allowing for evasion as an alternative to turtling up. It also rewards game sense. Optimal rotations, resource conservation, stealth and ambush tactics. The kind of things that get lost in build mode

[@bubkusjones]

​@@antomanifesto A lot of people build just because that's "what you do" in Fortnite, even in situations where it's not necessary or beneficial. It can be used strategically (building out in one direction to double back and go another way), but not everyone understands that sometimes it's better not to build. For one, building a base/tower, while it provides good defense and an elevated POV relative to the rest of the area, is also a pretty obvious target. Sometimes it's better to be relatively invisible and use the "natural" terrain as cover/concealment.

[@cringedmossy5260]

bro i enjoy zero build but i enjoy uild more because i am good so i can use it to my advantage and youve got to admit watching a build fight between to of your favourite players in thrilling

[@roonkolos]

The second half of this video reminds me of my Mum She grew up around the Amiga days and has been an avid gaming mom, playing different ones with her kids over the years. She's played all sorts from classics like Legend of the Dragoon to Fortnite, Horizon, Elden Ring and a lot of others She would always have that feeling of wonder when seeing her kids play something she's never done before (like when her one son played Demon's Soul & seeing how quick fights could end) so she always got to relive that sense of wonder of how others played something and she would then begin to pick it up herself Gaming as an older adult can sometimes be odd when it's it's outsider perspective looking in. But like it was when we first picked up a controller, you eventuslly begin to understand. Takes time to get good, but as long as you're having fun, that matters most

[@roonkolos]

Except for the excessive amount of MTX Even she will go on a whole rant about that bullshit like most other gamers XD

[@HibiTeamQueso]

Exactly, getting good at anything takes a lot of time. Most of us are addicts so we take that for granted 😂

[@Bam_Bizzler]

Wholesome

[@shadowstrikerdev]

Yeah, the building system combined with shooting can create a really unique combat experience, but also be quite intimidating. But, I think it's worth noting that even the highly skilled players all started off playing slowly and passively. I remember when the game first started becoming popular, most players weren't even building. Then players started placing a couple walls, which turned into towers, then full blown "Build Battles" where you'd quickly switch between shooting and building to maintain highground. Eventually, people started editing walls to setup the perfect angle to shoot at players, which led to a new playstyle called "Piece Control", which focused on predicting player's movements so you could "box them in", preventing them from having control over the battlefield. Unfortunately, for the average player all of this has now become muscle memory. Which makes it really difficult for a new player to get in and start learning like everyone else did when Fortnite first released. (Although, game modes like Creative do make it easier for you to practice if you are interested.) I think one of the reasons Fortnite's building became so complex, is because Epic Games didn't really think in the long-term what sorts of emergent gameplay would come out of the combination of building, editing and shooting. So we ended up with a system that can feel chaotic and confusing to a new player. I mean, you can even see in the older trailers, Epic Games expected people to just build a base and play more passively.

[@dakat5131]

IIRC the build system changed at some points during the game. So there was a time where you couldn't just drag+buttonmash a fort in a few seconds. The speed the storm changes and time to kill builds makes fortresses a much more ephemeral thing. Save The World has a lot of defense based missions where you can sit in your castle and watch zombies walk into a trap, but in Battle Royale builds are small, short lived structures that can take a few bullets and give the player a better position to fire from.

[@shadowstrikerdev]

@@dakat5131 I think it was around season 3 they added "Turbo Building", which let you build by holding down a button instead of tapping it every time. Building on controller became way easier as well, since each building piece was eventually mapped to its own button rather than having to "scroll through" each building piece and choosing one. Actually, you're probably right about the storm making bases less useful. There isn't really much point in building a fortress if you know it's going to end up in the storm. Plus, it costs a lot of materials.

[@HibiTeamQueso]

It's not unique tho. Minecraft and Fortnite have a lot in common. Tho competitive Minecraft is a very small niche. UHC (it's a gamemode) can even be considered a Battle Royale and it has existed way before any BR The fishing rod was like building in Fortnite. Nobody used it until players like Huahwi made it popular and everyone started using it. A regular Minecraft player would be as shocked seeing a Minecraft pro playing 😂 You can search UHC or Build UHC montages on KZbin if you are curious

[@shadowstrikerdev]

​@@HibiTeamQueso Yeah, there's definitely similarities between Minecraft and Fortnite. Although I'd say that Fortnite has more in common with Infiniminer, which inspired Minecraft. I had a look at some of the UHC videos, it looks pretty hectic! I didn't know there was a competitive scene in Minecraft. I think the editing mechanic combined with choosing from four different shaped structures is what makes Fortnite's building feel quite different to Minecraft.

[@HibiTeamQueso]

@@shadowstrikerdev Yeah the editing is quiet unique. A lot of pro players had an easy time switching to Fortnite thanks to the similarities. The Minecraft competitive community was awesome. Everyone knew each other. There was a lot of events between players of different countries. It's a bit sad that it's dead nowadays. Badlion tried pushing Minecraft into becoming an e-sport but that was a failing

[@aslandus]

To be fair, I'm sure those are the kinds of skills you be able to develop if you spent hours and hours playing Fortnite specifically rather than gliding between different games like many players do. Being adequate at First Person Shooters isn't quite the same as mastering the system to the point that you know how to use even the most obtuse parts of it to gain an edge.

[@chap3509]

It dont take hour it look hard but I learn the basic in like 20 minutes

[@Elfangorax]

I see a lot of folks chalking up being bad at Fortnite to their age, and I think it's kind of short-sighted. In the same way that my dad was able to get to grips with then-modern games when I was growing up, I'm sure I could gradually build (heh) the muscle memory and mechanical familiarity for Fortnite.

[@Sanquinity]

Sure you could, but as you age your reaction time and finger dexterity will start to dwindle slowly. There's a good reason that pretty much all pro gamers are on the younger side. You can learn the muscle memory and advanced gameplay no matter how old you are, but kids will still hold at least a bit of an advantage.

[@DamonPlantaseed]

Everyone will use it as an excuse until some old guy goes crazy. It’s hard to convince people of something they haven’t seen before

[@johntimothyvalenzuela8146]

@@Sanquinity unless youre in your 50's i dont think anybody could lose their skills that easily, i know of a few old guys that wipe the floor with me on mechanically difficult games, (and i consider myself good too) the only difference is, they never stopped playing it, ever.

[@scrilla4047]

It's just because he hasn't played the game it seems so confusing. Same thing happens watching high level play of any game you're not familiar with. But if you put in the hours, seemingly insane mechanics become rote. It's being way over exaggerated as an age thing when it's not

[@johntimothyvalenzuela8146]

@@scrilla4047 i agree, most of the games i play, i actually pick up from my little brother playing it first, and in the end, i almost always surpass him in skill, not because he sucks, but because i usually get addicted to games im interested in and play a lot.

[@frogery]

it's good to remember that you can learn anything, no matter how complex, with enough time and effort. the only problem with getting older is that you have less free time to do so.

[@GreenBlueWalkthrough]

But you also get more expernces... like I'm 27 and have played thusneds of games ad most well because I played so many.

[@bugjams]

^ Yeah this. People who feel depressed or lonely because they have no hobbies or things they're "good at" aren't trapped. You can pick anything up. Obviously some hobbies are more expensive than others. But your advice holds true for stuff outside of gaming, too. Photography, crafts, woodworking, foraging, painting, you name it.

[@frogery]

@@bugjams i think a big problem is that people feel like something isn't worth putting the time into if they aren't going to make money doing it, which i can understand but at the same time it's not a good mindset to have if you want a fulfilling life.

[@SnappyDude]

I never see this as an issue caused by age its just what you play. You could take the most advanced fortnite kid and throw them in LoL for example and they'd have the same issue. Anything your not playing regularly is going to have a learning curve.

[@Mattzerater]

eh, not really. Take benjyfishy for example, hes completely tearing it up in valorant rn i think hes one of the best in EU. Im a high level fm player myself and honestly im pretty damn good at a lot of other games such as smash bros melee, or even terraria or soulsborne games (ive beaten multiple bosses in tjose games without getting hit for example)

[@Mattzerater]

FN^

[@redeem5]

I completely agree with this sentiment. Competitive/Multiplayer games like these definitely have a certain degree of learning curve to them and obviously if you don't understand the "tech" then its going to look crazy difficult (or impressive). For example, Fortnite at its most basic is a shooter which if you've played shooters before you pretty much know what to expect, but the thing that you will not understand immediately going into the game is the whole building mechanics. That will come with practice as you play the game and by looking up guides, etc..

[@simon133000]

I agree 100%, I play Fortnite with people 20+ yo and I like to play in construction even if I am not the best doing it, but I win quite often, maybe because back in TF2 I was pretty good. It happens to me when I see people playing Smash, often older than me, they push buttons and win, I try to learn but I am not that focused. Kids are now focused on learning how to play Fortnite like a pro, we can too but they want it more because it is popular in their generation just as we had TF2. That also means that there are kids that are just casual with Fortnite and doesn't know how to play like that. It is a thing of searching for big youtubers and streamers, now almost all are 25+, some are fathers (at least the spanish speaking I know), but they play this, they are not playing TF2 or Mario Kart Wii, and sometimes they are pro. A kid can't go to tournaments.

[@jangxx]

Yep 100%. What he was describing is exactly what I felt when I was like 16 and watched my friends playing WoW or Guild Wars when I wasn't playing those games. If you don't play these games, you don't know what going on, plain and simple. But you can totally get into them if you put in the time.

[@bamfyu]

Dude, I'm 19 and got that feeling after checking out fortnite after 4 years again. 😵‍💫

[@soniaiboyako4023]

That might just be because of how insanely rapidly the game feel and contents change, like it's getting a bit ridiculous and Fortnite isn't the only culprit

[@ketrub]

same lmao

[@Lin_Eileen]

@@soniaiboyako4023 it's our own fault it's complicated and im not making a moral judgement my reasoning is as time goes on more and more people are able to spend more of their time playing games. The more people who spend lots of their time gaming the more the industry will expand and grow to meet the demand which only seems like its going to increase. If things were different maybe gaming could grow and become accessible to wider audiences without becoming oversaturated

[@soniaiboyako4023]

@@Lin_Eileen I wouldn't say that's our own fault. You could spend more and more time playing games without said games having an insane turn-over rate or feeling like a different game after a 2 months break so i'm not sure that it's on the player-base growing or anything you mentioned tbh

[@HibiTeamQueso]

@@soniaiboyako4023 people get better. If you see pros from a few years ago playing, they would be average now. That's just how it is. It happens with every game, people keep getting better

[@Devilbless]

I find that its the other way around too, these kids, while insanely skilled at their own craft, fail miserably, just as we do, when faced with the things that we do on the regular. Dropping my young gaming cousin into a game of Dota 2 was quite a funny experience, he was awful, and got frustrated by his quick demise. When you're immersed in a culture and speak it fluently, an outsider looking in is going to be impressed. But yes, I do sometimes envy their reflexes, as mine have just gotten slower.

[@AndrewTheUltraBoss99]

Dota Is a whole other level of complex. You Need ti study that stuff, whole fornite Is a mix of simplex things that can do complex stuff

[@haldir108]

It feels like yesterday that my dad, who loved city builders, business sims, and any kind of isometric expression-optimization game would watch me zoom around trying to build, produce, siege positions, and micromanage drops in starcraft. In a format he ostensibly understood, i was on a totally different mode. Camera hotkeys were barely optional, multiple control groups a strict necceccity, and the fast and precise clicking on all the buildings in synch with my taps on the keyboard to create something probably incomprehensible to my dad. He understood my joy of winning, and coached me to be less juvenile about my losses, which was fantastic, but the game really didn't make sense to him.

[@dudeguy6883]

Good to see someone here who also plays StarCraft

[@Games-tx1zc]

Oh my God this just about summed up my recent visit to my Parents' house. I'm 31, my brother and sister are much younger than I am and it was baffling watching them play any game they played often. Just totally above my pay grade. Never felt older.

[@BusinessWolf1]

I remember being the absolute authority in my class on minecraft. I knew everything, even the buggy secrets. I can't imagine how good it must have felt for your nephew to be lecturing an adult on his field of expertise.

[@Sanquinity]

I'm 35. And holy shit your explanation of what your nephew was doing impressed me. It's not confusing to me what he was doing, but at such a speed and with such apparent precision that I can't help but feel like I've become my dad now. For context, I was like that nephew when trying to explain playing the first pokemon game to him, and then watching him play...very...slowly...

[@Twisted_Logic]

They're currently only 4 and 2 respectively, but I can only imagine what sort of crazy, incomprehensible games my niece and nephew are going to be obsessing over when they start picking up a controller. I can only hope to be as good an uncle as you when that happens!

[@Chickensea10]

Show them a hat in time and slime rancher! What blast of games for you to hang out with your family!

[@Grimmlocked]

I am old Gandalf, like butter spread over too much bread.

[@cecyllavellans]

"it's not just wee weirdos like me online anymore, it's everyone" - oh my g-d you put it into words. this is it exactly! there's just such a different character to Online now that's so hard to explain to people. also as a 27 year old elderly man who mostly sits in my little single-player rpg corner (rocking chair?), i relate to all of this so much.

[@Dazen101]

Just play zero build. As a boomer, that has worked best for me.

[@AluinKali]

Tbh, this sounds more like a skill and knowledge gap between you two. I think the same could have happened in Dota if you never played a moba before and were tossed into a game with people who have years of experience. Fortnite seems incomprehensible for me too but I don’t think it’s so alien that I couldn’t learn it given time and motivation to do so. Funnily I had kinda the opposite experience playing Genshin Impact with kids of my friends. In that case it felt we weren’t to different despite being more then 2 decades older then them.

[@Evanz111]

Fantastic idea for a video. Fortnite was one of the first times I realised that I’m now part of the older generation, despite only being 27.

[@SiegmundCG]

I would also say i'm too old for Fortnite like a week ago, but now I tried it with No Build mode I get the fun of it. It's also like 10x more fun when you're not playing as the default skin lmao.

[@0uttaS1TE]

It is odd that part of the fun of Fortnite involves spending money for personalisation, either because you like a character design or because that character represents something about you, such as your actual appearance, or your interests. It is as much a game of dressup as it is Battle Royale

[@zacfor4454]

@@0uttaS1TE Can't you say that about any multiplayer game with cosmetics?

[@fnkyron]

Yes, but it’s still true. It can be odd and also indicative of all gamified gambling through monetization in video games

[@SiegmundCG]

@@fnkyron I don't think so but only because the battle pass pays for itself at a pretty low level so you can easily get every battle pass by buying it once and casually playing the game. That is the part that's missing from other games trying to copy Fortnite's Battle Pass, they're not pro-consumer enough and need to be bought multiple times with real money. Same with sub-based games.

[@zacfor4454]

@@fnkyron idk I only really see the gambling side of it if you like didn't know what you were paying for you know? Like loot boxes or something. With fortnite if you buy a skin you get it

[@BenFoilHat]

“Unceremoniously took me out” I feel that man. I’m 35, and play with my son. You really captured the essence of Fortnite in this monologue. 🎉

[@Antipode]

The essay seems a lot less, "I'm an old gamer now," as it says, "this popular game has a mechanic that I don't understand/haven't trained." The two aren't completely unrelated, but one doesn't necessarily beget the other. By necessity, game mechanics need to grow, evolve, and sometimes transmute themselves into something else entirely. That's the nature of the medium. oh sorry i meant git gud lol

[@cameronjeffries]

I like the way you articulate and describe Fortnite in such a poetic way

[@RayVa0]

I am 17 now and when Fortnite first came out I really hated it for it's building mechanic for how complex it was. I felt pretty much just like how you described when watching my friends play the game lol.

[@CreditedJester2]

It wasn’t complex for me so much as boring and a gameplay killer

[@drewhuscher496]

Your experience was captured perfectly in the recently released Carbot video "Fortnite". I'm right there with you. I found myself less inclined to climb the twitchy combo shooter curve that was Doom Eternal about halfway through bc it was just too frenetic.

[@DanielCoolDC]

I'm going through the exact opposite feelings with Fortnite. Played a bit Fortnite when it came out and could not figure out the build mechanic. Recently I've checked the game out again and discovered the no build mode, and the various other custom modes. brings me back to gmod and hl2 deathmatch.

[@peckc16]

I feel this on a general lovely with any competitive game mode. I just don't have the time or patience to pour into learning maps and muscle memory to play anything like that. Now I just get furious when destiny challenges force me into crucible to eek out a few kills and the other players are like Perma sliding and momentum jumping left and right

[@jedidm99]

This video, especially the part about being fluent in the language of control of the game, reminded me so much about my experiences playing pre-Steam Dwarf Fortress.

[@purebaldness]

Seeing Doom Slayer here reminds me of Doom Eternal's game director citing Fortnite's gameplay as an influence on Eternal, by way of it being demanding on the player.

[@cluxdemax234]

This is a small thing in the video but the last line of the first section was pretty funny and made me weirdly exited to hear what made you feel so alienated.

[@0uttaS1TE]

Whenever I see high level Fortnite footage, or the latest Warzone movement tech, I always think to myself "The children yearn for the movement shooter". Had Titanfall 2 or Quake Champions been marketed better, or had Apex inherited more of TF|2's mechanics, we would've had a whole generation of gen alphas who were brought up on that faster gameplay style, playing games that would've been built for that, rather than juryrigging what they have. It certainly tracks. Gen Z's and alpha (I'm Z, my lil bro is alpha) live in a culture that's a mile a second. It'd only track that high level play involves bringing that into your games. Faster, faster, faster, to the inevitable end point of something akin to Armored Core for Answer's PvP.

[@GreenBlueWalkthrough]

Huh maybe that is why Ace combat 7 is doing so well for the first time like ever.

[@someguy166]

God if only those games would have as much impact as fortnite does, even just 10% of the player base would be amazing

[@0uttaS1TE]

@@GreenBlueWalkthrough I once found my little brother playing Ace Combat 7's multiplayer mode and I just watched him play. Although I'm an AC fan, I never introduced him to the series, so it was surprising and nice to see him take to the skies in that game, and have fun. Younger players will take to complex games with high skill ceilings. It's not the case that "they wouldn't get it", it's just the case that publishers are too gunshy to make a game with that complexity built in. Hell, Fortnite's build meta feels like an accident more than an intended part of that game

[@0uttaS1TE]

@@someguy166 It does feel like things are changing. We're seeing dormant franchises with high speed combat, like Ace Combat, Armored Core and Devil May Cry come back to rave reviews and long lasting fanbases. Along with that, the enduring legacy of Doom '16 and Metal Gear Rising in memes and internet humour proves that fast paced games are still in

[@painovoimaton]

Give them Tribes...

[@RainSenshi]

I'm a above average player when it comes to shooters, call of duty, battlefield, split gate, csgo, I tend to be good at whichever fps I play. I played fortnite when I was 19 even now at 24, I cannot keep up with the mechanics in fortnite. Its genuinely insane how quickly and complex the building and editing got.

[@ni9274]

It has nothing to do with shooting, but building like these guys isn’t that hard if you train enough

[@julianorozaa]

As a 24 year old with the same experience, I feel like I'm no man's land. I don't feel particularly old, but I definitely don't feel young (in the gaming landscape).

[@SodaPopBot]

I only managed to get decent with building after looking into custom keybinds for the few extra buttons I had on my mouse. After a bit of practice, it's just muscle memory to make a floor + wall + ramp in a second, moving two fingers in a certain way.

[@cerpintaxt97]

35, started playing in March of 2020 with college buddies during the pandemic, now we're hooked and have the best time ever, we're terrible, but we're happy

[@lrgogo1517]

The majority of the brain cells I spent on Fortnite are probably the ones from all the time I've spent in the control options, trying to figure out a button scheme that makes sense to me. I swear, every verb you can perform in this game correlates to four additional buttons that need to be set.

[@tgmidaz223]

I feel u

[@gytux0258]

Everything you're describing is something I've felt every time I tried a complex game I hadn't played before or hadn't played in a long time. Once you play a game like this for a bit, the complexity melts away. Every complex action occupies its own categorical box. You no longer need to think "wheres the key to do this?" you simply do the actions. It took me around 100 hours of playing dota 2 before all the concepts clicked into place and I was no longer fumbling around trying to work out whats going, and simply did what I had to. And I spent my entire teen years playing league of legends You simply assumed that since you've played similar games before, you should be able to play this one at the average level too. This assumption is as wrong as thinking that just because you can play guitar, picking up piano should be no sweat. If you put in as much time as your nephew did into fortnite none of this would be confusing. And because of your previous experiance with gaming, it may even take significantly less time to understand the specifics of it.

[@ToraVanguard2004]

Very good point raised. Minecraft was our "Fortnite" for the older half of Gen Z, and building intricate structures for me was just second nature, whereas to my parents it seemed totally alien.

[@thatcheesy8613]

Except one is a lot more slower and easier to understand than building in miliseconds as a basic function of gameplay

[@stuff42069]

@@thatcheesy8613 well first it starts at minutes, then goes to seconds, etc etc. every game has a learning curve, when fortnite first started no one could build like this because no one had learned how to.

[@tgmidaz223]

@@stuff42069 exactly took me forever to get down builds but sooner or later ur brain patterns it out for u and u do it instantly learning fortnite was the best game I ever played

[@elenadirectorofmiiss7942]

I can say that as a parent (and gamer), I have consistently been amazed by the skill and ease of use that can be harnessed by skilled players. Unfortunately, the skill can be used to quickly make bad and impulsive decisions and that's what companies like Epic have counted on.

[@sageoftruth]

I'm always up for learning more about noobology. I can be fascinating to learn just how much we've picked up as gamers without realizing it. I remember how revolutionary it was for a friend of mine once when she discovered that she could move forward AND jump at the same time in order to clear a gap. I doubt I'll ever get into Fortnite, as I tend to stick to single player games, but I can imagine picking up on the high-speed building/shooting hybrid. Once you're good enough at something that you don't even need to think about it, you can start learning to do it in tandem with other things. While playing Grounded, eventually I'd internalized the attack patterns of enemies so well that I could fight two or three of them at once, thoughtlessly engaging in melee combat while watching the others to see when they'd try and attack. And I'm 37 by the way. There's still time to learn new tricks.

[@Sanquinity]

I've been baffled lately at how few people know that VR tech is an actual thing now. Like, I have to explain to them what a "virtual reality headset" even is. And they're usually both confused and amazed. Like, guys...I know we're getting older. I'm 35 myself. But VR has been a thing for like 6 years now, surely you've at least heard about it? But apparently not. ^^;;

[@greenhowie]

@@Sanquinity The irony of thirtysomethings being Meta's target demographic when so many don't even know about VR as a concept is just perfect.

[@Sanquinity]

@@greenhowie It's really weird...the quest 2 was clearly marketed to kids and teens. Or rather, to the parents of

[@shimadabr]

The feeling you described made me remember of The Duel, it was super popular in Brazil and some other countries. It was an unpolished mess, but the unintentional bugs and glitches gave room to emerge a lot of mechanical techniques that made the combat super fast paced and intense. The community was very active so a lot of players had practice on this kind of gameplay. Also, League of Legends gave me this feeling as well sometimes.

[@shimadabr]

@@zaandam0172 Yep, that one haha.

[@XxXNOSCOPEURASSXxX]

K style induced Carpal tunnel syndrome

[@dannythrust]

Some of the really early fort players like Daequan played gunz competitively! Dope game!

[@Soin3000]

Totally relate to this. Seeing the latest crazy IP-leaden developments of Fortnite makes me feel totally lost and unable to keep up, like older people often express about new technologies.

[@darcienyx]

I'm 31 and feel the exact same way about Fortnite. Back in 2017 when it was released, I was still into competitive fighting games but at 26, felt like I was genuinely struggling to keep up with younger players so when I decided to check out Fortnite around that time, it felt like I was completely in over my head with the building mechanics. Watching how fast people react to stuff in streams makes my head spin and it felt so intimidating then that I completely noped out. Stuck to single-player games mostly since with the exception of stuff like Overwatch and FFXIV. Fast forward a few years where you've now got no build mode and can play as Kakashi or Doomguy and Fortnite actually looks like something I'd pick up for a laugh which is what it's all about really. Just a case of muscle memory (putting the time in when you can as everyone can learn) like some others have said here. I'm always impressed at how quickly kids pick stuff up and it's nice to see gaming flourishing in that it's more popular and accessible now.

[@MommaDusk]

I think that is honestly a good representation for how Fortnite is overall. Even in no build mode you are thinking about the intricacies of everything going on unlike any other kind of shooter out there. Battle royale's just have a different feel to them versus traditional shooters and knowing that and trying to figure it out have helped me win a few matches despite the fact that I'm just a little bit older than you are and I don't like going into a build mode

[@IcyXzavien]

Honestly one of the few times I've been interested in this game since 2018 was earlier this year when they updated the game with gyro and flickstick on my birthday.

[@thecluckster3908]

I honestly feel like it would be really entertaining to watch you play a co-op match with your nephew

[@literalcharlie4171]

Playing fortnite with my little cousins and some of their friends (all below the age of 12) is quite humbling as i get destroyed and they all trash talk me lol. Their level of skill in fortnite is incredible. As soon as someone starts building, I know I’m done

[@rabbitenjoyer6320]

Wholesome AF bro. Loved hearing your experience

[@Yzerbruh]

This is the feeling me and a couple of highschool buddies had when we got introduced to Skate by a different friend. The controls looked utterly insane, and the friend pulled them off effortlessly. On the flipside my buddies liked Warcraft and RTS games and similarly blew the friends mind when they showed him "basic play". Fortnite is a slight outlier in a continuously homogenizing landscape of games, this video essay is just a cope for experiencing a "skill issue".

[@nikpad5822]

Try zero build my G, no lie when that was added the game became accessible for all ages. Not that building can't be learned but damn that was irksome for me. Zero build took out that one mechanic and it felt awesome imo anyway. I could focus on the others skills and strategy.

[@MarquisVonMonster]

This video made me think about playing video games with my dad back in the 90’s. He use to peek into the living room occasionally when I’d be playing King of Fighters or some Jrpg and ask me questions about the game. Sometimes we’d play fighting games together and I wondered why he was so bad with them and thought he let me win. He even kept playing Tekken 4 and SF3 Third Strike after his health got worse later in life to regain motor skills in his hand. He was really just curious in the hobby and trying to bond with me. I get it now and I feel like crying. Thank you so much for your perspective on getting older and being a gamer. This was therapeutic for me as an old 39 year old. Time really flies.

[@nostopit179]

Fantastic video! Well put together, well paced, you earned yourself another subscriber

[@iatwiatw]

Awesome video! This seems to be a great companion piece to Razbuten’s Non-gamer plays X game series, where he documents his non-gamer girlfriend’s experiences, questions and more while playing a popular game. You’re right that video games have established a language and standard of sorts that have been ingrained in all of us. It’s like using a mouse with a wildly different sensitivity or encountering Hot Corners on MacOS for the first time. But I think it’s not that Fortnite is a relatively new game or that it’s aimed at kids that made it so alien to you. I’m sure there are other genres you haven’t explored, or at least games in those unfamiliar genres, that will give you that same bewilderment and thrill. For example, I feel that way about battle arena games like LoL. Or hardcore sim and factory games. They have specialized languages, strategies and emergent gameplay that simply make no sense or are completely invisible to my ignorant eyes. But JRPGs, action RPGs, roguelites and card games seem incredibly simple and yes stale at times for me because those are my jams. 😊

[@frogery]

what really gives me an existential crisis is how much people value cosmetics in games nowadays. i'm more than happy to have a fun free game to play, but it seems like people get ANGRY when the game doesn't provide an adequate flow of cosmetic unlocks for them to grind towards. i noticed it first with halo infinite, and now recently with overwatch 2.

[@bounderby99]

It’s really the logical next step from when TF2 went F2P. People love nothing more than feeling important and superior, so when they get the chance to put someone else down (however unwarranted it might be), they’ll take it

[@NateTheGreat368]

The problem people have with halo infinite is that the cosmetics system is so dumb, in halo reach you earned cosmetics... In infinite you have to pay 10 bucks... For the color white. But I still agree, I used to play apex legends before it fell to shit and people would get so mad if they brought back a "rare" skin 😂

[@frogery]

@@NateTheGreat368 i play both halo infinite and apex without even thinking about the cosmetics and they're both a good time for me.

[@pandora3224]

The next generation of conssoooooooommers is being conditioned at the expected rate.

[@mattd5240]

When a game has no other content besides the campaign like Halo infinite, what else is there left?

[@florjangjolaj4436]

Hey mate! This was an expertly crafted script that kept me super engaged and also touched on some beautiful points. I loved the excitement and story telling with your Nephew's battle royale win. More so loved the perspective on being a great support for the next generation of gamers. Our kids are SO capable. And giving them the attention and genuine curiosity and engaging questions helps them feel their autonomy and sense of self. I feel like THAT'S the way we can stay connected to our youth, by meeting them in THEIR domain. Rather than belittling their true earned skills, knowledge and understanding in whatever medium they connect with. Beautiful work as usual. Thank you!

[@marwanalshafei3862]

Personally, I find it tough to figure out what's going on in most games unless I've played them myself. It's not really a sign of old age, more of a sign that I'm not familiar with the mechanics since I haven't played enough.

[@Oldhandlewasabitcringe]

The real nightmare is the amount of money these service based games receive, its making previous single player AAA games not being greenlit without some live service elements E.g valhalla isn’t the best of the series by far and its riddled with issues, but its made more money from live service elements than anything ubisoft has made before

[@isidoreaerys8745]

Yes. Monetization in games has gone too far. And we need to use political organizing to regulate it. Before they capture Washington like The rest of the tech industry already has. Europe limits gambling elements in gameplay. Chinese consumers demand that items be available with in game currency and developers make accommodations. Meanwhile Americans will mindlessly give 20 dollars for that same item. And so the companies keep asking for more and more.

[@sarougeau]

Man that part about not being able to stay up any more really hit me. A decade ago I was college student making pizzas and getting home at 4am. Now I've been guilty of passing out on discord calls after midnight on multiple occasions...

[@leoforte4912]

What a beautiful video! Congratulations and thanks for uploading such amazing videos and ideas.

[@mattd1466]

I don't think this is necessarily growing old that's making you feel this way. From the sounds of it you haven't played Fortnite for a long while and with how rapidly it changes of course you're gonna feel a bit confused initially, but if you kept playing it until now since you first played it or just gave yourself some time to learn all the new stuff and play it regularly it'd be more intuitive. Kids don't have as many responsibilities as us so they can sink many hours into playing these games and learning all the mechanics so really I wouldn't stress about it.

[@madness1931]

Your skills scenario reminds me of what happened to me a few years back. What I soon realised was that, Fortnite was their (two kids) one gaming skill. I could play just about any game, but their skills were not transferable. We tried so many games, different genres, but they couldn't keep up. Whether it was Batman's combat (Arkem Asylum), Pokemon's strengths/weaknesses, or the pace of the original Crash Bandicoot. I would dread to think of what might have happened if I tried MGS, but I don't think it would've ended well. Yet if I tried going up against them in Fortnite, I wouldn't stand a chance. A slower game like PUBG, sure, but Fortnite... no way.

[@jamespeake4883]

I think this is one of the best videos you've made, thank you.

[@shopnil4]

I'm the same as you, despite probably being closer to your nephew's age than to you. I've always watched older youtubers when I was younger, so I always gotten good with older games, or games that aren't that popular with younger people.

[@nostrace]

Even if I'm getting older (29) and can't keep up with the Fortnites of this world, I don't care because there are games for every age level. Gotta think that a lot of games are made by people in their 30s and 40s But it's kinda insane to see how more complex kids games have become compared to the games we grew up on and how fast they can adapt.

[@twilightvulpine]

I don't play much Fortnite nor I am any good at it but I always had some respect for newer players and how thoroughly they integrated building strategies into their playstyle. Whenever oldschool gamers talk of Fortnite players building fortress in a moment like it's anything but amazing, like that's silly and the wrong way to play, it only makes them look out-of-touch and jealous. Building is part of the game just as much as shooting is.

[@Noon-jt7gi]

My gaming gang are 30-50yo. We play Fortnite most days. We turned off public voice chat almost instantly and mostly stick to Zero Build, because it makes me feel old and lost, in a way that the 14yos screaming swear words at me on CoD never did. The building LOOKS more chaotic than it is. There’s more stuff flying on the screen than is needed. And (maybe it’s just me) panic smashing buttons in a rough direction seems to be a valid building tactic. (I love hammer)

[@shinescythe]

This is a great video, and one of the funniest thumbnails I’ve ever seen

[@stupid90able]

I didn't get the hype around fortnite until zero build came out. Then i fell in love with the game

[@gozinator_btw]

Do you still play it?

[@Spubbily01]

I'm 16, I'm not good at building, but I feel like I could learn it if I force myself to. The thing is that I don't want to learn building, I absolutely adore zero build and watching build mode gameplay made me realize that build mode is the complete and utter opposite of everything I like about the game.

[@tgmidaz223]

It's too fast im 31 my sister kids all play fortnite it's just very fast thinking fast building fast shooting fast lol 😂

[@AintFredoYou]

29 and I play fortnite. I feel you. I’ve been feeling old since 24. A lot has happened since and I’ve realized I’m not that old. I’m just old in the gaming community. But who cares bro, yeah our bodies aren’t the same but if we can play and we enjoy it. Ball on em my guy. I honestly feel grateful I’m seeing video games come as far as they have and will only get bigger. There’s room for us too brodie. We’ll be the ones in our 50s crankin 90s talm bout back in our day 🥲

[@kanji3434]

Yo this is an absolutely great video, I honestly haven't been this captivated to a KZbin video in a while. I know that's weird to say but its true, great work dude!

[@13thxenos]

This was pretty much my own story. I do call my self a gamer, and I have developed some stupid games before so I can also call myself a little bit of a game developer. So, I can too say my job revolves around games. I recently married, and gained a new nephew who is 12. If you want to be that guy, you can say he is my nephew in law. We went to their home where almost the same thing you described happened. I'm also 32 and felt old as a dainasour. I also got demolished because he had a PS5 and I'm a PC gamer. So I couldn't even aim the right way. Let aloan building stuff.

[@edsterrock]

I started playing Fortnite yesterday because I wanted to get the MHA stuff that is currently available right now. While it’s fun to play around in the game, I don’t see myself playing this game full time like how I used to do when I played Smash Bros. I have a lot things going on right now in my life for the moment and recently I have becoming more picky on what games I want to play in my spare time these days. I’ll probably get around playing Fortnite whenever I’m bored or something.

[@NanoNutrino]

Those Are Rookie Numbers

[@aaroniscool7521]

I made my nephew's accounts for the game about a week ago andi sat there telling them both what they should do and because of it they both won their first victory Royale games and I'm so proud of them both

[@Mattzerater]

Thank you for making this video. Im an ex competitive player and amassed around $1,200 from public and private tournaments, playing alongside some of the best of the best. I know it sounds like im tooting my own horn (because i am, im pretty proud of my skill in fortnite haha) but this disconnect between you and your nephew was something that was literally hurting my friendships with my irl friends. Because of the difference in skill, my friends often wouldn’t want to play with me because the skill based matchmaking would make it impossible for them to succeed. Im so glad you made this video. I feel like this video scratched an itch that has always been bothering me but couldnt put into words. Well done!

[@HOTD108_]

Getting old is pretty normal. No big deal.

[@mattblack3813]

Wow, this hit home. As a 32 year old expecting my first child soon, I always thought it'd be neat if I had a boy and could play games with him (not to say I wouldn't play games with a daughter, but of course less young girls get into gaming, and I would never force it). After seeing what my 9 year old nephew is into, I couldn't help think just how... lame, I felt it all was. And it made me feel so damn old. Not one iota of my being could be bothered to even think about trying Among Us, Fortnite, the new COD, etc... But of course, it would have been right up my alley as a 9 year old, I'm sure. Honestly, as I'm getting older, I find that I gravitate more towards Nintendo games for a brief taste of fun, fantasy and color before jumping back into the real world.

[@headwreak1768]

so fortnite changed so much since 2018. before people would barely make a wall to shoot out of, but now you get large hunks of wood and stone cobbled together in a matter of seconds! i can't even see what's happening in front of me. 9:34 seeing john wick holding the crucible of hell has got to be one of the silliest things i ever seen

[@Itryhardder]

I'm 30 and I've played Fortnite since it came out, like the day it dropped, at first the game played simply, people didn't build the way they do now, I loved it it was fun and a great party game. Fast forward a year after taking a break from it and coming back to sweaty building and box fighting and I was flabbergasted. It took me a 6 month solid block of playing only Fortnite when I gamed to become a very mediocre builder. I since then have switched over to the no builds mode and me and my buddies have been playing it nonstop! It's honestly more than a game, it's a whole experience and it evolves over time and becomes something else. Great video and I agree now that I'm in my 30s midnight comes around and I'm falling asleep at my PC lol

[@WhoIsSirChasm]

Honestly, this is why I just try to avoid PVP/battle royale games as a whole, because if you make one mistake you're looked at like a pariah for, at minimum, the rest of the match. Even Tetris 99 made me anxious because even though I'm pretty damn good at Tetris, each time I was targeted it felt like a personal attack even though it clearly wasn't. Nothing like the one-two punch of aging and being overly anxious.

[@Sanquinity]

It's one of the reasons I'm avoiding pvp games as wel. Like, stop being such a tryhard towards others, let me just have fun playing the game. The other reason is: I just want to relax while playing games these days. And PvP games are the opposite. So I mostly stick to single player and co-op games. (Darktide being my most recent one. :P)

[@HibiTeamQueso]

@@Sanquinity tbf what's tryharding for you can be chilling for others

[@Sanquinity]

@@HibiTeamQueso "tryharding TOWARDS others" as in telling other people they're playing the wrong way and insult them for it. People just tryharding for themselves, I don't have a problem with.

[@HibiTeamQueso]

@@Sanquinity oh, I agree with you then

[@TheStorrman]

My dad is 44 years old and he loves playing Zero Build Mode

[@mr.foxasmg]

my mom dad and i like playing together before but we decided to stop

[@benallen2942]

I agree with the first half of what you said, but the second part about the item shop, popularity and social interaction I think just depends on the value system we choose to instill in the kids. As a father of four, I have plenty of experience with the kids asking for v bucks or wanting the battle pass. To me, it's an opportunity to teach them the value of money for non-tangible assets (e.g. zero capital), as well as teaching them to think critically about how much it really matters what skin you have. I admit it is fun to get new visuals, and I play along with them sometimes, but also show them moderation. I've shown them games from when I was young, and how all the modifications are free and the game is completely open to create and change, versus how game makers now use every opportunity to create a microtransaction and capitalize on easily duplicated digital property. My youngest also learned a lesson when he nearly got his account locked out (not for cheating but by trying to authenticate something without a "proper parental" control resulting in a time delay lockout and ultimately account deletion). He quickly learned that all the money spent on all those vbucks could disappear in the blink of an eye. This is something that people of all generations need to realize in this digital age. The convenience comes at a cost, and it only takes the flip of a switch to lose everything stored on a computer possibly being gone forever.

[@24_Benadryls]

That popularity and social interaction he said is the ultimate opposite in reality, frankly where I come from you are ridiculed and dismissed and laughed at but that's just gen z though.

[@wooshur]

ive been playing fortnite since it came out and i keep up with the game mostly and yet im still confused about the game sometimes so i feel you on this video.

[@BrainLapseFilms]

As I always do and will with videos that even mention concern surrounding fortnite and its monetary practices; I cant recommend the Folding Ideas video on the subject enough. He goes into great depth on the predatory practices used and social pressure surrounding the game and its younger players.

[@eyvahehyeh8927]

Welcome to the 30+ club! :D I'm 35 now, and I remember trying to play Arkham City 2011, which is -- oh my god -- 11 years ago now, and just giving up, and feeling that yeah, this was probably one more game further pushing me away from the mainstream. Too many buttons, too many moves, too big a world - too much for the brain to process, and remember in-between playing the game. Arkham Asylum from 2009 I BARELY got through, mainly by limiting the amount of different moves I made. Hell, even Metal Gear Solid 4 was too complex for me, honestly. I basically don't play 3D action games anymore. Having Chronic Fatigue Syndrome of course is part of this, but yeah, my solution is simply to play a bunch of visual novely walk-and-talks like NORCO, Citizen Sleeper, Frog Detective, The Stanley Parable - to mention a few from 2022.

[@audiotap8332]

I don't know man I feel like you're describing how I feel when I watch people play Starcraft. Similar to the feeling my girlfriend described watching League of Legends Worlds with me. I suspect (and hope, for all of our sakes) that the feeling of alienation has more to do with being unfamiliar with a given game than with gaming in general. Cheers to getting old and, presumably, dying. Banger vid.

[@acat5770]

Its really interesting how different some games can be within the same genre now. I mean I know a lot of friends that are really into fortnite and despite that they also have a situation where they need to rethink everything they thought they knew about how you take fights just to understand what I'm doing in splatoon due to how these games get complexity through completely different systems.

[@lazycouchman]

I feel bad for kids nowadays. My early experience of online gaming was halo. Like, you could buy an Xbox gold subscription to play and then map packs and that was it. I can't imagine how having all those small things to buy in games like fortnite would mess my kid brain up. Lol. I'm not good at dealing with that kind of stuff now, so growing up with it feeling normal definitely seems not so good. Also I really like the tekken/fighting game reference. Awesome video!

[@typehere6689]

Back when the ARM gaming ecosystem wasn't entirely saturated with drivel, I avoided buying things in F2P games as that negated the point of getting an F2P game. If I wanted to make a game related purchase, I'd buy a game.

[@dakat5131]

The crazy thing is how much stuff costs effectively $20+ in the game. "Oh you want this character, but in a different color? Time to shell out $10-$24 worth of un-earnable in-game currency" (Yes I know about STW Founder's edition, but that's not relevant to players joining the game now) It's not just availability, it's also time. "Spend all your cash on this item now or else you might not see in the shop for a year, if ever"

[@HibiTeamQueso]

@@dakat5131 yeah that sucks, I got a lot of skins just from playing that. I get why they removed it but I still disagree with that decision. They'll eventually remove vbuck rewards for us founders too

[@esotericmissionary]

As a 43-year old, seeing this video, and hearing your commentary about what's happening on-screen, makes me think this (game, Fortnite,) is preparing the future generation for "utility fog," as featured the amazing book, _Accelerando,_ by Chares Stross. By that I mean, when this generation is a bunch of old fogeys, 3D printing my be at a point where structures seemingly right out of nowhere on the horizon. In other words, it's visually preparing them for the future, albeit, in a very subliminal way. More so than just reading, me thinks, thanks to technology. Call it prediction or preprogramming, but consider what might be an everyday thing 50-100 years from now, using the past 100 years as a measuring stick. The advance of tech ain't going to stop anytime soon, as the future is finally starting to spread out evenly in 2023.

[@truthseeker7815]

tf

[@esotericmissionary]

@@truthseeker7815 The book, get it, read it, and be amazed at how lame your mind is.

[@mus1c3gg]

@@esotericmissionary i see what you mean but honestly i think its a cool coincidence that fortnite looks like that future to you. it was never planned to be like a 1 sec mega-building shooter

[@esotericmissionary]

@@mus1c3gg No coincidence, just observation. And I dare say that every game -- or whatever piece of media -- is made with the hopes that it becomes what _fortnite_ has: a cultural significant meme generating machine that prints money.

[@truthseeker7815]

@@esotericmissionary, lmao

[@WebstersYouTube]

I feel you on this. I do not understand Fortnite, my nephew is mad on it, and my borhter (his dad) has been caught short before despite being a gamer himself.

[@HibiTeamQueso]

Your brother probably spends way less time playing than his son. Makes sense. Kids may have it a bit easier but what makes the difference is practice

[@LiterallyPolio]

I have a similar experience with this. I started playing Rainbow Six Siege when it released back in 2015. I was 18 at the time and loved it. I've played it constantly ever since, and now we're 8 years in and I see people doing movements and techniques that I have absolutely no hope of replicating. It's sorta discouraging sometimes.

[@Yamartim]

I think it doesn't have anything to do with age dude, just language as you said yourself, heck if you're thrown in next to an eve online pro player regardless how old a gamer you are you're gonna be extremely lost as well It's just a matter of the game's high level play not being accessible to who's watching

[@Creeper333pl]

okay this is gonna sound boomer especially for someone that is 18 yrs old, but man do I miss the times of being 7-12 and playing games such as Minecraft, classic Roblox before it became so corporate and Blockland. I feel like those were some of THE childhood games for a lot of Gen Z people (well, Blockland might be a bit more underground but I digress). anyway, i can’t help but feel a bit sorry for the kids that have Fortnitr as their childhood game nowadays. not because it’s a bad game ( i really enjoy it actually), but because it’s just such a corporate cash grab designed to make use of FOMO and sell as many skins as possible. I do miss the times of games designed to make use of your creativity that had those “make your own fun” type of experiences.

[@GreenBlueWalkthrough]

Funnly enough Epic believes it's a tech demo souly meant to test stuff for Unreal engine the real money maker.

[@ileutur6863]

Everything is so corporate and artificial for the youngest generation of gamers. I remember I was already pirating games and browsing forums by age 10, now you just have lootboxes and screaming in group chat

[@newschwarz]

My brother is one year younger than me and I feel exactly like you described your experiences in this video

[@52Legend]

I get it. I've been playing Fortnite for around 4 years now. Once I miss a week, I'm relearning most of the game. And since that 4 years ago,. everything has changed. Nothing has stayed the same

[@bobfranks4442]

Hey man nice video! I agree with your opinions.

[@owlson2527]

You gotta watch it first lmao