Video games (and children)

Was around some nephews this weekend of the pre-teen variety, and couldn't believe how much they flipped out about playing video games. Even though it was nice outside, it's like it was all they think about - one nearly pulled the damned TV down on himself when no one was watching because his dad had brought the Wii with to our house and the kid apparently couldn't wait another second for a grown-up to help him hook it up.

I'm sure that we have a lot of parents on this board. I played my share of video games as a middle schooler, but not much since then. Are they even more addictive now than they were back then? Do you let your kids play them? Limit the time? Etc., etc.? I'm curious.

 

All of my friends still play and I was addicted until college. Now my PS3 collects dust.

But I remember how much I would play when I was younger. Which was hours. I would just rotate games of Excite Bike, Paper Boy and Tecmo Bowl. You better believe my brother and I had the "Mustang Brothers Challenge" where we played against each other in every game of the NFL preseason, regular season and post season. Loser of the previous game got first pick of team.

Oh btw, that was like 300 games. Oh then there was Mario 3, Mario 2, Popeye and Heavy Barrel.

After those wore out we got addicted to Sonic on Sega and played a ton of Streets of Rage and Mario Andretti Racing. Then came the addiction to NHL Hockey '91, '93, '95, '96 and others - and yes I made Gretzky's head blead. Also Fifa '95, Madden '89, Madden '93, Montana Football, Triple Play Gold Edition, Bill Walsh College Football '96 and '97.

Man, I wasted a lot of hours on that stuff.

 

Video games are good for kids. They teach hand-eye coordination, problem solving and critical thinking.

 

Yeah. If your 16-year-old doesn't know how to hot-wire a car or find a hooker, he can work it out on Grand Theft Auto.

I think some of the Wii games are really good.

Lot of the shoot-em-up XBox and PS3 games are addicting and bad for kids.

 

They are really only bad if they are coupled with bad parenting.

If a parent lets a child play games as a way to keep them from bothering the parent, it's a bad thing.

Like Rick said, video games provide lots of good things. But they shouldn't be used as a substitute to reading, playing with friends, getting exercise. You should probably limit video game time to an extent. What extent is probably best left up to each individual set of parents.


As far as the shoot em up games, I don't see that as a bad thing either. It's not the video game that went and shot someone in real life. It's the person.

And that goes back to the bad parenting issue. If you raise the kids right, it can lower the odds/risks of them turning out bad.

 

I used to think video games were all bad. But now, thanks to the Guitar Hero genre, my son loves Tom Petty and covers his ears whenever he hears Taylor Swift. I love video games.

 

No, he couldn't.

 

You gotta limit it, because otherwise they would play all day every day. But they aren't bad per se.

I will say that I am a little skeezed out about the violence in some of these games and the age at which some kids are playing. At a recent family gathering my nephews (13 and 10) were playing Red Dead Redemption. I was familiar with the violence of GTA and this is from the same company...

And is awfully violent. I am not sure when my kid was 13 I would have been alright with it.

That said, I am not one of those people who claims kids can't tell the difference between real and not real. I knew the Three Stooges were fake and did not hit my brother in the head with a hammer. I knew the Looney Tunes were not real. I knew the difference, kids today know the difference.

But man, the blood.