‘Fortnite’ Is Entering Schools With the Same Playbook as ‘Oregon Trail’
The education system is a powerful sales engine.”
Earlier this month, L.A.-based startup PlayVS secured a partnership with Epic Games to bring competitive Fortnite games to high schools and college campuses. PlayVS charges $64 per player per season for its platform (the games it currently supports are all free to play) and offers schools tools to organize matches, track players’ performance, and connect students with potential college scholarship opportunities. As part of the partnership deal, and to encourage schools to start their own Fortnite teams, Epic Games is covering the schools’ fees for the platform during the Spring 2020 season. Students will be able to play Fortnite, for school, for free.
It’s easy to see why Epic Games would make a deal like this one: When PlayVS introduces kids to Fortnite in school, it helps turn those kids into lifelong customers. Apple, the most valuable company in the world, owes at least some of its success to a similar strategy and a very different game: The Oregon Trail.
The Oregon Trail was, in terms of its popularity, the Fortnite of its time. It was such a staple that people born in the late ’70s to early ’80s have been described as the “Oregon Trail Generation.” In the four and a half decades since…
