A somewhat curious spell: Normally, cheaters or fraudsters usually hit online games, now a boy has been locked out of Fortnite for four years who at first glance didn't do anything wrong.
The problem: Victor "Zenon" Hugo is just nine years old. The boy has a contract with the Brazilian e-sports team Detona Gaming, but is actually not yet old enough for Fortnites Arena mode. This is the qualification mode, with which professionals secure a place in tournaments. Before players can participate in these competitive matches, they must be at least 13 years old, as cash prizes are also distributed here.
Zenon has now been blocked by Epic for 1,460 days – that's exactly four years. Even cheaters that cheat in professional tournaments are usually not banned for so long. But there have also been lifelong bans:
more on the subject
Because of Aimbot: 17-year-old Fortnite professional suspended for life
What exactly happened?
Zenon is not only a professional player (on paper), but also streams regularly on its Twitch channel. The 9-year-old now has a total of 130,000 followers, many of whom only became aware of him after the ban.
The spell finally hit Zenon during one of his live streams. He was playing another game in Fortnite, then the lock was shown on the grounds that it was "younger than allowed". Zenon then burst into tears and became comforted by his fatherwho supports and oversees his streams.
Twitter users show pity
Just the length of the spell, the fact that his father was there and the clip of the crying child seems to have touched many players. The hashtag was trending on Twitter for a while #freezenon. Among them, many players asked Epic to shorten the spell of the boy or to lift it completely.
He’s only 9 and was playing arena which isn’t a tournament and he got banned, c’mon Epic you’re better than this … #FreeZenon pic.twitter.com/sHWOdhUzWu
– Erin (@EriniOS) May 5, 2020
The hashtag was also repeatedly passed on to big streamers like Ninja. Hoping that their range could draw more attention to the 9-year-old's spell. Ninja even commented on the topic and said that Zenon shouldn't be completely banned from Fortnite, just competitive modes like Arena.
Epic has often been very tough on minors in the past. In 2018, for example, a 14-year-old was sued by the developer and publisher for cheating.
