Although I’m not married myself, my parents celebrated their 30th anniversary recently. Having grown up in a loving two parent home, I’ve seen firsthand what it takes to maintain a successful and happy marriage. There’s of course love, but also compromise, understanding, commitment, cooperation, paying attention to each other, and a lot of other things you’d probably expect. Those things aren’t always easy, and external forces can get in the way. External forces like Fortnite. The massively popular game has taken off like a rocket for multiple reasons: it’s free to play, it’s constantly being updated, the sense of competition is palpable, and winning–knowing you beat 99 other players to claim Victory Royale–feels pretty good.
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There is one observable measure that proves Fortnite has impacted some marriages: In the U.K., over 200 divorce proceedings in 2018 have cited Fortnite and other online games in their complaints and reason for splitting, according to data from divorce-online.co.uk (via The A.V. Club)
“Addiction to drugs, alcohol and gambling have often been cited as reasons for relationship breakdowns, but the dawn of the digital revolution has introduced new addictions,” a spokesperson said. “These now include online pornography, online gaming, and social media, so it is no surprise to us that more and more people are having relationship problems because of our digital addictions.”
Two hundred divorces amounts to “roughly 5% of the 4,665 petitions we have handled since the beginning of the year,” but keep in mind that this data is just for the U.K. Let’s do the math imagining this same trend would apply to divorces in the US. In 2016, there were 827,261 divorces in the country (a figure that doesn’t include data from a handful of states), and five percent of that would be 41,000. It looks like marriage might be the true battle royale.
Is this news surprising? Let us know what you think down in the comments!
Featured Image: Epic Games
