Epic Game’s Fortnite is now the most popular video game among all the youth in America. Kids have been playing the game constantly even though its still in a beta phase. However, what people don’t know is the context behind the game and where the origins of Fortnite came from. Fortnite is considered a Battle Royale video game, a new genre of shooters that have become incredibly popular recently. So popular that huge video game title Call of Duty picked up their own Battle Royale add-on called Blackout. Game studios have been adding the Battle Royale game mode to their own game with very few twists causing tension in the game market. The list of games that have now been added to a Battle Royale category is around twenty, but the focus is on Fortnite, PUBG, H1Z1, and Call of Duty’s Blackout.

The games are very similar to each other and it brings up an ethical question in the gaming market. Is it really okay to take someone’s concept of a game and make it your own? Now I am talking about Battle Royale games in this instance, but it happens all over the industry. Upon research in to the topic, I was able to find out that this has been going on since video games have been created. Pong, one of the oldest games known to man was a rip off of Magnavox’s table tennis game. Atari was sued, and a 700,000$ settlement was made to Magnavox. Nintendo swooped in to block a game called The Great Giana Sisters because it was a direct copy of Super Mario Bros. The game didn’t have goombas, but instead had owls. The game was removed from the stores and was not able to sell any more copies. N.O.V.A was a copy of Halo, and the list could go on forever.

Battle Royale games are the newest addition to these lists. The origin of Battle Royale games starts from a Japanese book called “Battle Royale.” The book puts 27 students onto an island where they must fight to survive against each other. If they step into forbidden zones the metal collars they are wearing will blow up. The playing area gets smaller and smaller until one person is left alive. This book was then adapted into a movie called, “Battle Royale”, which is the same concept of the book. After the release of the film we see a similar movie released a decade later. “Battle Royale is a stepping stone of inspiration-okay, a lot of stepping stones, a full-blown foundation perhaps- for “The Hunger Games” (BuisnessInsider.com). “Battle Royale” was a help in the foundation of Battle Royale games, but little to no credit was given to the book or the film.

Breaking down the similarities and difference between the four Battle Royale games I have stated would take a long time, so I will just stick to the similarities. Every game has no respawns, so if you die you are out of the game. Every game listed has a safe zone and that zone gets increasingly smaller and smaller. Every game has weapons you must scavenge for and armor you can pick up to protect yourself. To win the game you must be last alive. These topics are key concepts to not only the games, but to the “Battle Royale” novel and Film. It is certainly unjust that people can not only rip off each other’s video games, but the main concept itself comes from a movie that many people don’t even know exists.

Another ethical dilemma is that of commercialization. Each game, movie, or novel I have talked about in this blog has commercialized its product. How can they ethically do that though? When something is commercialized it is said to be “a new product on the market”. Each one of these games has just been a rip off of an old novel and thus makes them not new. They have literally plagiarized each other and called it their own. PUBG went on to try and sue Fortnite, but they eventually dropped the lawsuit. How can they even sue when they themselves have copied something without giving it credit?

In conclusion, all of these games are very similar, but not similar enough to bring in legal action. They all have the same concept and they all market their product at different prices. Fortnite is free and that is why it is the most popular of the four, but in no way should it be deemed greater than the others. All of these gaming companies are ethically immoral and I feel sorry for the writer of “Battle Royale”. If there is one thing I have learned is that the gaming industry is full of rip offs and we are just suspect to buying the same games with different titles.

References

Acuna, Kirsten. “Here’s Why ‘The Hunger Games’ Is Not ‘Battle Royale’.” Business Insider, Business Insider, 3 Apr. 2012, http://www.businessinsider.com/the-hunger-games-is-not-battle-royale-despite-many-similarities-2012-4#battle-royale-is-a-punishment-solely-for-bad-school-children-2.

Grayson, Nathan. “A History of Gaming’s Most Shameless Rip-Offs.” IGN, IGN, 28 Feb. 2012, http://www.ign.com/articles/2012/02/28/a-history-of-gamings-most-shameless-rip-offs.

To many people color is something they can not live without. Color describes so much of people’s lives. Each individual color brings about a specific emotion you can feel. Color is eccentric and beautiful, it is what brings life to a picture and makes it stand out. I emphasize color a lot in my pictures to invoke emotion, because a picture that plays with your emotion is one that is truly a great picture.

My work is taking people’s dreams and making them into luxorious pictures that everyone can appreciate. There is no better feeling in the world than pride and my pictures make the owners of the instruments of my captures feel great when their beautiful item can spread to millions of others. As for this picture cars can be a thing of dreams for people and this picture captures one’s vision of their miraculous masterpiece and adds vibrancy into the visions of others.

The first blog post that I wanted to read was the five best EDM albums of 2018 by  Digital Zen. In this blog he discussed five albums that he thought had captivated the Electronic Dance Music community. The reason why I enjoyed this blog was because it was consistent and the layout of the page was an easy read. The numerical list countdown from 5 down to 1 makes you want to keep reading and captures your attention as you want to see what is the number one album of the year, however you start with five and one is at the end. Every album has the same length description as to why the blogger selected them into those locations and that gave a very non-biased approach for the reader.  The release dates were all correct and he included his favorite songs in each album to prove that he had done his research and was knowledge able of the subject. The only downfall about the article is he could have sounded slightly more professional and his grammar and punctuation could have been proofread and fixed. For example, in his last sentence of paragraph two of number 3 he forgot to capitalize the album name Visceral. Besides that the artist was knowledgeable of the subject and provided his insight of the best EDM album of 2018 without sounding biased to the audience.

The second article I chose to read was Player Development in US Soccer by ponchat. This article was a long read and that normally would turn me off as well as many other bloggers. We are taught to keep it short, keep it concise, but still be able to inform the public about what you are writing about. Ponchat had a lot of information on this blog, he compared international youth soccer players to american youth soccer players and used mathematics to help support his case. His argument was that the US will always continue to struggle to catch up to the international level because of how much time the youth plays at a young age. He did have an opinion and his voice was vocal throughout the article as he put forth is first hand experience to show his knowledge of the topic. Ponchat was a college coach and made that his first sentence to show that he is very aware of what he is writing about. Other than the fact the article was long he keep to a strong structure, easy to read layout, statistics that helped his point, and a professional tone throughout his writing. It was an informative long read that anyone who wants to know why the US is so behind the international soccer scene can take-in and enjoy.