My partner is moaning softly as she watches her kids devolve into insanity. It is not the common form of crazy–at least it was not. This crazy that is eating away at her basic understanding of the universe is the skin crazy. Her boys are buying skins for fortnite. These boys who once argued about the stupidity of skins in general have become buyers themselves. I used to be the one who interacted with them about this stuff, but she was out in the living room when it went down and she is crestfallen. She should be. Hard earned wealth squandered on a useless bit of fortnite currency. Not just useless but meaningless as well.
Skins are a big business. They are the reason that fortnite, a free to play game, makes a billion plus every year. That is with a B. Most of the money comes from micro transactions over cosmetic items that players can wear in order to form a sort of social hierarchy. It is stupid, but as a sociologist it makes total sense to me. The sad part is that most players equate value to these skins when there is no actual value or purpose to them outside the value they themselves place upon them. You can play just as well with a default skin as with any other. In fact, certain rare skins make you a target as it argues that you are quite good at the game or have played for a long time.
Skins are dumb, but they and the meaning behind them are here to stay. That bugs me