In a corporate move that surprised nobody, not one but three companies collaborated to “honor” Dr Martin Luther King Jr’s life by building a museum in a child’s game where children shoot each other’s avatars and do disrespectful dances after eliminating each other, while paying twenty four dollars for each premium avatar skin purchase.
Sony even threw together a trailer.
Behold, I present to you: TIME’s March Through TIME '63, Presented By TIME in FORTNITE.
Hear a moving speech, and immediately forget about the life and actions of this absolute giant man of action, the allies, the communities, and the accomplices, who fought for justice. Say to yourself, “that was nice”, and visit the in-game merch shop to pick up the Superman costume for twenty four dollars, and then a Funky Dance emote for an additional five dollars.
Indulge yourself in this terrible moment of late-stage capitalism, where the aesthetic of justice gets more play than actually fighting for justice, all wrapped up in this perfect box of corporate idiocy.
Don’t play Fortnite, this MLK Jr Day.
Instead, pick up a telephone and call your senator instead, and demand that the John Lewis Voting Act be passed.
“These activities progress players through the experience and bring to life important themes of Dr. King’s speech: we move forward when we work together,” writes Epic.
So the polar opposite of the Battle Royale game mechanic that is Fortnite.
But your measure of success is still defined in terms of killing other groups instead of coming together in the pursuit of a mutually beneficial goal, ideally one achieved without resorting to violence.
Also… that comment on the article about the loading screen message “Headshots do more damage!” while they were waiting to enter the MLK exhibit… ugh.
I wonder what it cost to get the King estate signed on? They’ve historically been quite enthusiastic about going after unauthorized use; so this, um, educational event would almost certainly have had to have gotten the nod from them.
The King Estate actually doesn’t have rights to the specific recording of the speech; Bernice King wrote that it’s outside of their purview. It’s all very tacky and tasteless but until Epic does something stupid like create a MLK avatar, there isn’t much they can contractually do.
