Fortnite Is Getting Referenced In An Increasing Number Of Divorce Petitions

It looks like there's trouble brewing in paradise... or in the case of some couples, the storm has already ruined the tropical vacation known as marriage. Epic Games' Fortnite may be one of the most popular pieces of soft in the world at the moment, but it also seems to be the cause of a lot of strife and turmoil within various relationships as well. To make matters worse for some ailing relationships, it appears that, to some spouses, spending more time trying to score a win in Fortnite was more important than trying to patch up their barely-held-together marriage, resulting in things becoming worse for wear for various couples. In fact, Epic's Battle Royale title has managed to make it into the petitions for multiple divorce filings as the reason the marriage was beyond repair.

A/V Club is reporting that more than 200 divorce proceedings have cited Fortnite in the paperwork for one of the reasons the marriage has fallen apart. In a press release from a divorce service known as Divorce Online, the legal representation firm noted that over 200 divorces showed Fortnite as part of the reason why the marriage fell apart in the U.K. in 2018 alone.

That means from the start of January in 2018 up until the middle of July, nearly every single day someone could have filed for a divorce using Fortnite as a reason to split.

It's kind of crazy when you think about the impact a game like that could have on a relationship, when that many people in a single year are splitting up over it.

But, then again, we don't really know all the details of the divorce proceedings. It could have been that there were a ton of other issues and Fortnite happened to be the icing on the cake, because someone decided to spend all their time (or money) on a video game instead of trying to repair what little scraps of the marriage were still remaining. Then again, it could have also been that someone was using the game as a way to cheat on their spouse by developing relationships with other people online all while their current marriage continued to deteriorate under the weight of other, more important issues.

A/V Club rightly points out that this is mostly used as a way to get more people to use the divorce services of Divorce Online, and bringing a popular game like Epic Games' Fortnite into the discussion raises people's awareness of the game, and possibly gives them a fun reason to cite as to why the marriage is falling to pieces.

It would be interesting to find out exactly how many people are getting divorced in America due to Fortnite or whether or not those numbers are increasing the more popular the game gets. I'm sure some stats on that will pop up sooner or later.

But, if divorce rates are seeing any sort of spike due to the upsurge in Battle Royale games, I can't imagine the releases of Battlefield V or Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 helping to decrease those numbers because both games also have their own Battle Royale modes.

Even still, we live in strange times when the major reason for anyone getting a divorce is over a free-to-play video game.