Fortnite adds “addiction” health warnings for playing too long in China

Epic Games are set to introduce an addiction time to Fortnite that would see Chinese players have their XP rewards halved if they play for more than three hours. 

With the hype for Fortnite Chapter 2, Season 2 in full swing, Epic Games dropped the V12.10 update on March 3, making it the first patch of the new season. Inside, players found the previously teased Proximity Mines and some fixes for problematic bugs.

As with any update, though, dataminers have been scouring through the files to try and some additional content. They’ve managed to do so with new challenges, cosmetics, and even weapons but some have also stumbled onto something else – text for an addiction warning message. 

Strings were uncovered that suggested players would start receiving a warning about their playtime if they had been playing for longer than three hours.

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“You have been online for 3 hours accumulatively. The in-game gainings will be lowered by 50% from now on and challenge progress has been disabled. For your own health, please log-off and get some rest. Appropriate physical exercise is good for your body,” read one of the messages. 

Similar warnings were also uncovered for five-hours of playing time, while an unnumbered “unhealthy gaming period,” was also mentioned. The loss of XP gain would apparently only return to normal once the player had been offline for five consecutive hours. 

As some Fortnite fans were left worried that they wouldn’t be able to grind the game as normal, iFireMonkey issued an update on the text strings, noting that one was linked to Tencent – the company which published Fortnite in China. 

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“These ‘Fortnite Addiction’ strings are ONLY for players in China, as seen by the following string,” the leaker tweeted.

Of course, that update addressed the fears of some fans, but it has left the door open as to whether or not it is something that might be applied worldwide.

It remains to be seen as to what Epic will do, but it’s probably unlikely that you’ll be forced to hop off Fortnite anytime soon if you’re not in China.