Minecraft

[Dick Whitman]

Does anybody play this? It is all my kid talks about right now. He doesn't even play it. I think he's tried it a couple times at a friend's house. But he bought some books at his school book fair, and he's been hooked every since. He's constantly pretending to be in "Minecraft world," as he calls it, pretending to mine obsidian swords and battle moo-shrooms and whatever else nonsense he spouts that I pretend to understand. We signed him up for "Minecraft Lego Camp" which he went to last week for a couple hours each day.

Is it pretty harmless? It seems to me that he finds the fantasy world that they've created compelling, in the same way that kids before him have gotten into "The Lord of the Rings" trilogy or Harry Potter.

Right?

 

[da man]

That's just what they want you to think.

 

[LongTimeListener]

That's just what they want you to think.

Yep, the lure. "Mindcrack," it's called.

Seriously though -- it's the one game I never minded my boys playing because it really is creative. They were building some pretty cool worlds. I know one kid who used Minecraft as his "Build A Castle" project in seventh grade.

My 13-year-old was just telling me that there is a big split between those who are stuck in Minecraft and those who (like him) have moved on to Terraria. At that point I stopped even pretending to understand.

 

[Evil ... Thy name is Orville Redenbacher!!]

My kids love it. They play on their Kindles as well as on PS3.
My two oldest gobble up the books too.
They are also getting into Terraria.

I think it's a video game version of legos. And harmless.

 

[StaggerLee]

My 11-year-old and 8-year-old both play it and both watch those stupid YouTube videos. I've played along with them at times and it can be pretty addicting. One night I played with my 8-year-old and said I would just do 30 minutes or so with him. Four hours and a really nice house made out of jungle planks and cobblestone later, I looked at the clock and realized it was 1 a.m. and he was still going strong.

I think it's harmless, but I do not let them play in the online community. When they play, it's usually the two of them teaming up to build something really cool.

 

[Ace]

As immersive online gaming activites go, it seems to use and develop creative and thinking skills.

Maybe not social skills so much.

At least you aren't killing hookers and stealing cars, though.

 

[StaggerLee]

My 8-year-old is an absolute wiz at it. He's constantly moving in the game, mining ****, killing animals for resources, chopping down trees. It's like a friggin' Tazmanian devil out there. I have no idea what he's doing, I just see blocks here and there and then all of a sudden I look up and he's built an indoor pool on the roof of our house. It's completely enclosed by stain glass, yellow for the walls, blue for the roof.

It was a work of art, and I'm on the other screen laughing about how I can dye sheep different colors to get colorful wool.

 

[TyWebb]

Kids these days. What happened to playing video games that taught you real-life skills, like killing hookers or dodging the police?

 

[Batman]

Kids these days. What happened to playing video games that taught you real-life skills, like killing hookers or dodging the police?

Madden 16 comes out on Aug. 25.

 

[TyWebb]

Madden 16 comes out on Aug. 25.

Well. Played.