The new game Fortnite is a craze that has more than sixty million people playing it around the world. However, with every great thing comes problems, and many adults are not happy with the way Fortnite has been affecting younger people.

Fortnite is a third-person battle royale game. One hundred players drop from a bus onto an island and the last person standing wins. However, this is an online-only game in which you can’t play just by yourself.

The game hit the scene in July 2017 and has remained the most popular game ever since. In the month of February, the game made $103 million. Even celebrities such as Drake and Travis Scott are playing. With all of these people playing, the game has been labeled “addictive” and “not good for kids.” However, this is not true.

Even though people can spend hours on the game, it can serve as a break from school. After a long day at school, a game or two of Fortnite is a great way to relieve stress. It can take your mind off of things before you have to go back to doing homework. The unhealthy part of it is not being able to stop playing the game. This has been a big problem lately, but this does not pertain only to Fortnite.

In the last year many adults have been pushing to have gaming disorder (a mental disease that causes people to play a game excessively and impedes other aspects of life) be an official mental health disease. In January of this year, the World Health Organization did just that. With Fortnite being so popular, people have been saying it is a main cause of gaming disorder. But there are plenty of other games that are addictive.

Games such as Overwatch, Grand Theft Auto V, Minecraft, Ark Survival Evolved, and many others are extremely addictive. Over the last couple of months, I have been playing Ark and have spent hours upon hours playing it. There is an adult who plays with me, and even he has lied to his boss to get home and play the game. There have been many other cases where I have been addicted to a game for a while, but in the end I got over it. Even though Fortnite has lasted a lot longer than usual, it’s the same as any other game, and just like other games the trend will pass.

Teachers are also very unhappy about the game and how it affects their students. Mr. Dugan said, “there is potentially more of a negative impact in terms of the addiction.’’ He then went on to say that students losing control of themselves with the game is affecting their grades.

Violence is also an issue that has been brought up with the game.

Fortnite is different than other shooter games in the sense that there is no blood or gore when a player dies. When you die, your person falls on the ground and gets turned into pixels. The game is also very cartoonish and does not resemble real-life people. Fortnite also involves building alongside the survival aspect.

With school shootings going on, video game violence has gotten attention from many people. In one of President Trump’s meetings addressing violence in video games, a Psychology professor from the University of Iowa stated, “we point around at different things such as mental health or violent video games or poverty or whatever. And none of them is it. What is it when you put them all together. And so would it reduce the risk – yes. How much – we don’t know.”

Also, many adults think that these violent games will lead to violence among the players. Multiple studies, including one from last fall, followed 200 kids who were exposed to violent games until the age of nine. Their behaviors were tracked and suggested that violent games do not increase aggression in kids.

Besides these studies, there have been very good reviews from parents about the violence in the game. In an online forum, Arvin T. said, “This game is family friendly and fun.” Another Parent Mason M said, “It is a pretty good game, not much to be concerned about, only guns, no blood or knives.” However, some parents think differently. Kerry D said, “This game should not be a 12+ at all.  It is too violent, I think, and should be at least [rated] a 16+.”

Many people playing the game have stated that they don’t feel any urge of violence from playing Fortnite. Sophomore Jack Murphy said, “I having been playing Fortnite since the beginning, and I have felt no need to do anything violent.” Countless other students have all said the same thing.

Overall, Fortnite is not negatively affecting kids. It is a kid-friendly game that is not leading to violence among players. The game may be popular and seem addicting, but anything without moderation can be a bad thing. At the end of the day, Fortnite is a trend and like all other trends, it will die out.