Fortnite is doing an 'I Have a Dream' anniversary event, again

Fortnite characters lined up watching MLK projected onto a screen ingame. — (Image credit: Epic)

Epic is once again collaborating with Time Magazine to host an in-game event, "March Through Time," commemorating Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech at the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom on August 28, 1963.

Last year, Epic debuted the event to a mixed reception, and quickly had to remove players' ability to perform most emotes while loaded into it. The defining images of it in my mind remain stuff like Superman and Rick Sanchez raising the roof in front of a projection of Martin Luther King Jr., a staunch critic of the government of the United States who was martyred for his political activity. Does this at all seem disrespectful?

The thing is, those strip out a lot of the Assassin's Creed to do it⁠—some things are true, not quite everything is permitted, and you don't have the sillier stuff getting in the way. It also doesn't hurt that the history in Assassin's Creed is not in living memory, or so intimately tied to present day issues.

They really gotta restrict your avatar for this thing, maybe even just assign a tasteful choice to you on loading in. I'm sorry, Sasuke Uchiha really has no place at a commemoration of the Civil Rights Movement. At that point, this project might be able to be appreciated on its own merits as an educational interactive experience rather than as a bad joke, but it also wouldn't go as viral, so who's to say what's right here.

Ted has been thinking about PC games and bothering anyone who would listen with his thoughts on them ever since he booted up his sister's copy of Neverwinter Nights on the family computer. He is obsessed with all things CRPG and CRPG-adjacent, but has also covered esports, modding, and rare game collecting. When he's not playing or writing about games, you can find Ted lifting weights on his back porch. You can follow Ted on Bluesky.