Get Your Money's Worth

The Flying Lizards are right! The best things in life really are free. Or at least that's what we're hearing from the kids these days. Almost every kid we know who likes video games is flipping his or her lid about something called Fortnite. A "fortnight," which is a thing the British gave the world, is a period of two weeks. Sounds more like a half-month than a fort-anything, if you ask us, but it turns out that the British didn't actually ask anyone. It's just their thing.

It also turns out that the British are incorrect, because Fortnite doesn't have anything to do with weeks or months. Instead it's a multiplayer online game where you either kill zombies or blast other players. It's the former if you're playing in Save the World mode, and the latter if you like to roll in Battle Royale mode. It's tough to say which is more popular, but what's not tough to say is that Fornite itself is more popular than a roomful of Infinity War-ing Avengers.

Getting back to our original point, however: Fortnite is free. Even cooler: The makers of Fortnite have raked in $1.2 billion just since last September. See, you can download it and play as much as you want without spending a nickel. On the other hand, if you feel like spending a nickel, or a couple of bucks, then you can buy in-game upgrades. Who knew that the secret to limitless wealth is convincing millions of 7th graders to give you their allowance?

If you're young and restless, then it probably seems pretty cool to spend your time focusing on something online that starts out free but costs money the more you get into it. At the end of the game — whenever that is; all the zombies and/or other players will be dead eventually, right? — you can claim that you killed a bunch of way less cooler players than you and that your Avatar now looks like John Wick and has a cool car and sick weapons.

Kids, am I right? Here's a better way to spend your money on staring at a screen. Get a subscription to our Library Suite and start certifying. You can still pass levels and unlock achievements. It's not free, but the most you can spend per month is $79. Best of all, when you're done, you can show someone your certification and get a job with a great salary! You might be able to pull that off by bragging up your Fortnite kills, but it's a lot less likely.