[jason46]

My 13yr old son has spent $100s on fortnite, I told him he's going to regret that when he wishes he saved for a car, or something that will matter in 6months.

I definitely blew my fair share on video games, but I also believe this is a generational shift. I do not believe charging $$ for "cosmetics" would have been as successful in "my day". But what does it mean?

[save_ferris]

One major difference to point out is that fortnite doesn’t have loot boxes, you know exactly what you’re getting when spending their online currency.

I keep hearing about the social aspects behind these games (kids who don’t have skins in fortnite are bullied at school, etc.) It sounds like goods that make a child popular are just digital these days as opposed to physical items like Pokémon cards.

[jason46]

I feel 20 or so years ago kids that spent money on something that didn't provide a clear benefit would have been bullied. My wife was a gamer, when my son first asked for a gift card to buy a skin it was fun watching him try to explain that there is no benefit and it only changes the look. My wife kept asking him why do you want this?

[save_ferris]

You and I grew up in very, very different worlds then. Most things that made kids in my community were purely consumerist.

Air Jordans, Pokémon cards, brand name clothes like hollister and AE, and then popular phones like the razer were ubiquitous among those that were popular. Kids who didn’t have those things were bullied relentlessly.

[tripzilch]

That sounds awful. I'm sorry you had to go through that. Sounds like an American high school sitcom TV series scene.

[save_ferris]

Yep, I’m quite happy to have peaked in adulthood and not in high school.

[amyjess]

20 years ago, kids were being bullied for not wearing Abercrombie & Fitch.

I was in high school then. The people who didn't care about aesthetics were always the ones bullied.

[thirdsun]

I always wondered who are these people/kids spending money on useless cosmetics, but the other day a friend of mine told me how his 11 year old, a fine kid, spent his birthday money (about 50€) on his PlayStation. Naturally I thought he bought a new game - it's the first thing we would have done at his age whenever we had some money at hand.

However, he wasn't interested in new games at all - instead he spend that money, all of it, on Fortnite cosmetics, which seems absolutely bizarre and alien to me. Growing up with Quake, Half-Life, Deus Ex and other classics we also loved games and didn't think twice about spending money on it, but I'm sure we would have laughed away any attempt to charge for skins and random items. Of course strong modding communities helped as well.

Anyway, this insight really surprised me - I always thought it's a few whales that participate in this nonsense, but apparently it's everyone, including the otherwise sane and reasonable kid from next-door.