Top 5 Weird Fortnite Stories From November: Football, Bad Parenting, And Even Worse Dancing

Once again, it's time for Clickbait of the Month, a.k.a., weird Fortnite: Battle Royale news snippets that you probably didn't want to read about when they were happening but gosh darn if we aren't going to try and milk some SEO love about Fortnite anyway.

Remember, this isn't journalism; it's just regurgitating Fortnite news to get Fortnite searches to give us Fortnite clicks. If you don't like it, that's fine. I don't like it either. Seriously, someone put me out of my misery.

Also, Fortnite.

Parental guidance needed

Games have long been used as an excuse for bad parenting. Going all the way back to the “Satanic Panic” over Dungeons & Dragons in the '80s, parents who don't understand why their children would be so devoted to a game take drastic steps to explain – and to curb – their kids' “addiction.”

It's probably been like this since the dawn of history, when some Neolithic parents just couldn't grasp why their offspring seemed so excited about this new-fangled “wheel” doohickey. “Junior, when I was your age, we pulled loads on a sled, and we liked it!” (Then again, maybe those adults were onto something. If we'd never discovered writing, we wouldn't have social media.)

Now that Fortnite is all the rage, parents are still struggling to … well, parent. Why set guidelines about video game usage and deal with the inevitable resistance and tantrums that will come with it when you can just ship your kid off to a rehab facility?

OK, so the article above isn't too specific in talking about the kids themselves going off to rehab, instead talking with a health professions who “counseled” kids at a camp and someone who dropped out of school at 15 and now works as a public speaker. Still, the stories of the poor, overwhelmed parents who have to deal with their kids' Fortnite habits are darkly amusing on their own:

“I've never seen a game that has such control over kids' minds,” concerned parent Debbie Vitany says about her 17-year-old son Daniel and his 12-hours-a-day habit. First of all, the “mind control” analogy sounds waaaaay too much like how some parents thought D&D players could cast actual spells and entrance other kids. Also, your son is 17? He'll be a legal adult soon. Unless he's a pro gamer, let's see how well he does in the real world playing Fortnite half the day.

“It's World War III if a parent asks their son to come to dinner because if they leave they lose.” Then he eats cold food and maybe learns from it.

“I had a 13-year-old in my office who said he had 300 Fortnite wins.” I call BS on that. He's probably just bragging.

Sure, there was nothing quite as all-encompassing, and readily available, as Fortnite, or even MMOs in general, when I was a kid. But I had enough other interests that still consumed a lot of my time, and both then and now, I do/did a good job of working them around real life. Maybe it's because I was raised right, or maybe it's just because I hate when my dinner is cold.

Does this count as suicide?

Earlier this month, Epic Games teamed up with the NFL to allow players to purchase and wear actual team uniforms, with any number they chose, as skins. Some of these led to some poor decisions, like a New England Patriots #81 wielding a gun or a New York Giants #90 waving around fireworks.

But the best, and most light-hearted, moment came from Kansas City Chiefs quarterback and MVP candidate Patrick Mahomes II, who plays Fortnite and had a surreal encounter in a game:

Yesterday i played fortnite for the first time in a while and someone killed me with my jersey on.. don’t know how i feel about it...

— Patrick Mahomes II (@PatrickMahomes5) November 13, 2018

I don't play in the NFL (I totally could, though!), but if someone with my face jacked me in a PvP game, I think I'd feel just as confused. Then I'd realize that person helped put money in my pocket by purchasing my likeness and I'd feel a whole lot better.

Dance crazed

Epic continues to get a little flak from “stealing” dances and putting them in Fortnite, with the latest coming from former Scrubs actor Donald Faison. Referring to his “Poison” dance, which is available in Fortnite, Faison said, “Somebody got paid. No, I did not. Somebody stole that shit and it's not mine anymore.”

In this case, at least, Faison is correct about Epic paying someone. Scrubs creator Bill Lawrence said that Epic approached him about using the dance and jokingly said, “I made the decision and I knew Donald would be fine with me getting the money.” Maybe you could at least take him out to dinner?

Fore-nite

Speaking of dances, it's funny enough to see regular people try and emulate Fortnite dances. How about professional golfers, though?

When the legends of golf take on Fortnite dances...

Everyone wins. pic.twitter.com/KOEEhi55dv

— PGA TOUR Champions (@ChampionsTour) November 7, 2018

Most of the men featured in this video are probably old enough to remember when Pong was the biggest video game craze in the world, so asking them to understand Fortnite would be like explaining a freeway to a caveman. So let's just sit back and enjoy some near-senior citizens gyrating their pelvises. If you're into that sort of thing, I mean.

Nobodies prepared for this

Finally, I've fallen pretty deep into the Kingdom Hearts lore-hole after getting back into the series last month. Now I'm all prepped and ready for Kingdom Hearts 3 in January, so I found this graphic amusing:

No spoilers, but if you know what it's talking about, it's hilarious.