Video games and children (for parents only)

[lovecraft]

Hey parents out there!

How old were your kids when you started getting them into video games?  Do you restrict the type of games they play? 

[Llava]

I resent this thread being only for parents, and choose to rebel.

My dad got me into video games back before I started going to school.  I started on Dungeons & Dragons and Frogger on the Intellivision, and graduated from there.  My parents never restricted the types of games I could play- in fact, my dad was the person who introduced me to Doom when I was young and thought it was violent.  However, neither of my parents are really "gamers".  Doom was really just a novelty for him for a while, they've never totally understood my fascination.

It's worth noting, though, that I pretty much self-regulated regarding which games I'd play.  If something looked inappropriate for me, I usually didn't even want to play it.  The only hint of parental censorship was when my Grandma saw me playing Double Dragon and expressed concern to my parents about its violence.  She thought Mario Bros. was cute though.

[Signe]

No kids but I have three nephews.  Two of them started playing video games when they were around 4 or 5.  I'm not sure about the other as we don't see him very often but probably about the same time, though it was in the form of PC games or Gameboy as his folks didn't have a TV until recently.  He's 12 now and plays PC and has several consoles.  I don't know if his parents restrict but he's mostly into Soccer games anyway.  My other two nephews just played whatever we bought when they were very young, maybe up until 13 or 14 and then mostly played what they wanted.  I was the one with the PCs (Mac family) so they played computer games and online games on my machines.  I didn't restrict them.  No use.  I was mostly asleep or working late at night and probably wouldn't have anyway.  I used to get the eldest concert tickets to stuff like Slayer and Metallica when he was that age.  They were smart and responsible, for the most part, and not naive in the least.

[Venkman]

Two preschoolers here (4 1/2 and 2). I let my oldest start playing video games around 3 1/2, but only because online Playhouse Disney and Nick Jr are fairly self-consistent with their TV programming. And because I wanted her to start learning how to use a computer. I bought her a Leapster LMAX for Christmas, though there's not enough titles for it that she'd like.

Neither of them have ever seen me play any of daddy's games, and they won't for some time yet (because I don't play them myself until the rest of the house is asleep anyway). Of course they get exposure to the PS2/Xbox stuff from their cousins and older siblings from their playmates, but it's mostly just momentary big shiny stuff.

It's my responsibility to be a parental fascist, but I don't want them to be completely niave either.

[Strazos]

I started when I was 3 or 4, when my father brought home a new NES system. I then promptly had to be brought to the doctor's office, because I had strained my back; games were new, so I had the idea to physically "Will" Mario across the gaps when I made him jump. The doc called it "Nintendo Back." It was going around like a cold in winter among the younger kids. I finished Zelda when I was 5 or so, with minimal map-making help from Dad.

Growing up, I had Minimal restrictions on what I could play. Which is to say, none. My mother laughed at Mortal Kombat. She never really worried about what I played, because she had impressed upon me from a very young age that games are fantasy. I understood that, so she didn't really care about what I played. Then again, we didn't have things like GTA3 back in my day. My mother didn't care about what games I played, but she banned MTV from the house for years. Something about how they treated women.

So good luck. It must be tough to deal with young kids and games nowadays. Get 'em a Gamecube.

[Zonk]

My mother, as I'm reminded every chance she can squeeze in, managed to snag me a NES the Christmas they came out in the states by driving to a Toys R' Us about an hour and a half away. Brand new store, nobody new about it, etc.

I've never looked back. Considering that my livelihood, hobbies, and passions can be directly tied to that purchase, I tend to give the old bird a lot of slack. :D

As for oversight, the NES just wasn't that dangerous. Nintendo's strict oversight of what ended up on the console meant there really wasn't anything that could scar myself or my brother. "Oh no! The robot killed Scrooge McDuck!" By the time those sorts of games were coming out we were old enough that it didn't matter. Probably the only game I played while living with my mother, that she would have had a problem with had she known about it, was Diablo. I didn't feel bad about keeping it quiet, though: I was 16 when the damn thing came out. Not much really there that's too over-the-top for a 16 year old. As someone else said above, our mother instilled a pretty good barometer in us at a young age. We pretty much understood when something was too intense for us (movies, music, games), and stayed the hell clear of our own volition.

It seems incredibly pathetic, looking back on it, but I clearly recall returning the first copy of Vampire: The Masquerade I purchased at the age of 13. I got home, read through part of it, and realized that I was too immature to deal with what they were talking about. I did a *lot* of tabletop gaming in those days, and when I tried to envision myself playing a character that did that stuff I was like ... okay, no. I'd like to think my momma didn't raise no foo.

It seems germane to mention that my first article written for The Escapist was a gooey, ruminating look back at my life with games. It can be found here:
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/issue/24/12

[Tebonas]

We all could tell how our parents handled it. But be serious here, look where we hang out. They obviously failed to teach us not to overindulge in computer games

[CmdrSlack]

My parents had little involvement in my gaming.  They refused to buy me any consoles, so my very first console was a PS that I bought during my senior year of college (97-98).  They only bought me educational games for our Apple ][e, which was the only computer they had until somewhere around 1999.  Hey, getting sixteen years of use out of one computer is pretty damn impressive, IMO. 

I had to use my allowance to buy other games, and since we lived rather far from a mall, I didn't get to Babbages very often.  Most of my console and PC gaming exposure came from my friends who had the Atari consoles, etc.  My mom did capitulate very early on and buy me a Colecovision or somesuch at a garage sale, but it broke about two months after we got it. 

I have a 16 month old daughter who currently is a bit too tiny to really care about games.  My guess is that she'll get to play stuff as she gets older, and we'll just use our best judgment as to what's appropriate for her.  My guess is that she'll tell us what she likes and doesn't like -- she's certainly very opinionated right now.  If there was a magic formula for raising kids well, that'd rock.  As it is, we just hope that we're doing our best.  My rule of thumb is that if you don't feel like the worst parent ever at least once a week, your doing something wrong.

ETA -- We do let her listen to just about any music, and I think that she does a good job of expressing her likes and dislikes.  She isn't too hot on bands like Molly Hatchet, but she loves The Clash and KRS-One.  So I think she's on the right track.

[schild]

My babysitter was a Nintendo. The only restriction I had on gaming through my entire childhood was Doom. My mom didn't want me to play it - not because it was violent, but because scary things made me lose sleep.

I pirated and played it.

That was the first and last restriction.

On that same note, I wouldn't let my kids play Fatal Frame today, if I had kids.

[Strazos]

Oh man, I remember the first time I had the chance to put a lot of time into Doom in one sitting, on the PSone no less. After we were done and I had to go home, it was very dark out, and my buddy lived at the edge of some very spooky woods (well, spooky at night when you about 13). I was just a little spooked for whatever reason. I slept fine, but man....

Also, I didn't really have much exposure to FPSs until I was a teen, and when I was finally able to play them on my own at home, I was playing stuff like Tribes. I wouldn't exactly put Tribes on the same level as, say, Gears of War or some of the other pseudo-realistic shooters out there now. Mom didn't have a problem with Tribes, but I have no idea how she'd react to some of today's better FPSs.

[Margalis]

Restricting your kids based on age is a no-brainer. I am very liberal and my parents were very liberal with me but I don't think you want a 6-ear-old playing Manhunt.

[Cheddar]

1 month.  My 7 year old and I play GTA3: San Andreas.

She gets quote of the month:

"Daddy, you need to find your homies!!!"  <--- During a gang shoot out.

[hal]

My kids are your guy's age but I have allways had a computer if one was available and it was important to me to engage my kids until they wanted to play. Being familiar with computers is important in its self. That said I would not set a 5 year old in front of GTA. Frogger would be more what I would consider.

[schild]

There are more than enough kids games out there that will ready them for more complicated games. Among the tons of fairy tale tycoon/simulator bullshit titles going around, you've also got a slew of PS1 and 2 platformers that will gear them up for things like Ninja Gaiden.

My kids will be TRAINING at all times, they might just not know it.

[CmdrSlack]

There are more than enough kids games out there that will ready them for more complicated games. Among the tons of fairy tale tycoon/simulator bullshit titles going around, you've also got a slew of PS1 and 2 platformers that will gear them up for things like Ninja Gaiden.

My kids will be TRAINING at all times, they might just not know it.

Your kids will love MMOs.  I can see it now, it'll be like the whole teenage rebellion thing, but instead of doing drugs or whatever, it'll be EQ5 and World of Blizzardcraft.

[Signe]

Schild's kids will probably HATE video games... at least when they hit puberty.  That's exactly what they'll probably rebel against.  I know I would... just to annoy.     Absolutely right about MMO, though.  That'll teach him!

[Venkman]

We need to ensure this place is around for at least the next 13-20 years, depending on schild's current efforts/success in that arena :)

My own kids will probably hate all forms of interactive media, be all sorts of religious (I'm agnostic), have no interest in traveling ever, and go to school locally so they can come back and live at home once they graduate.

[Strazos]

depending on schild's current efforts/success in that arena :)

lolz

[schild]

Schild doesn't like children. I've been thinking of adopting one of those pro gamer types. They seem to hate MMORPGs...

Mostly because they can't form full sentences with real words.

[hal]

It will catch up to him. Been there done that. Read the movie, saw the book. No Tee shirts were involved. Sucks to be me.

[Selby]

I've got one on the way, so it's not like I can offer any grand experience with raising kids and gaming (whatever "it" turns out to be).  My parents bought the NES back in 1987 when it came out to keep me off of dad's IBM XT when he was doing tax return work.  They had no problem initially, but my dad got very upset about Castlevania 2 - Simon's Quest (mom bought it) since it involved collecting body parts and various crappy Japanese translations that made him distrust whether they were raising me to worship Satan.  I was so proud of my accomplishments and he flipped out over the dialog (I was 8, like I knew what it meant).  I never showed him another game as he considered me to be wasting my time with them.  This began a long line of me hiding most of my gaming from disapproving parents (along with music, movies, etc).  My parents had to screen the NES titles, but by the time the SNES came around it was more cartoony than anything else.  The first game I recall them forbidding was Diablo, so I played it late at night when everyone was asleep and I had come home from closing the grocery store.  I played Doom, etc and had no issues with the violence, it was fake and designed to entertain.  Funny how my parents freaked out about gaming for so many years and I turned out so normal with respect to violence and reality.

I would advise parents to at least talk to their kids and not go over the top with religious dogma on what is obviously a badly translated game.  I definitely plan on it.

[Phildo]

Schild doesn't like children. I've been thinking of adopting one of those pro gamer types. They seem to hate MMORPGs...

Mostly because they can't form full sentences with real words.

You're going to end up with a houseful of krishnas, and you know it.

[Nebu]

My daughter is older than most mentioned here, she's 13.  She's not much of a gamer, but has started gaming more since about age 11.  Her current gaming is mostly Runescape with school friends and a few PS2 titles.  I've never restricted her access to anything as I feel that would only make it more desirable.  If she's going to play something with language or violence, I'd rather she do it at home rather than sneak it at a friend's house.  Interestingly, she seems to either gravitate to "dress-up" type games, runescape, or nothing at all. 

[DraconianOne]

I let my son try to play Lego Star Wars on the PS2.  He was only about 1 year old at the time.  If his mother could have her way, he wouldn't even know what a video game was but fortunately he's his father's son.  He'll be allowed to start playing video games as soon as he knows how to.  I'm strong in the belief that, generally, video games are more educational than most of the crap on television and can promote problem solving skills, hand eye co-ordination and imagination.  At least that's my story and I'm sticking to it!

As for whether I'd censor stuff, that's going to depend on him and his attitude.  I'll let him play Mortal Kombat from quite early on but only because if I leave it until he's 12/13, I'll never be able to beat him!

[Riggswolfe]

Like most here I started with video games at a young age. If we went to other people's houses who had computers I was on it the entire time if allowed. (and now I'm in IT, big surprise.)

My daughter is 8 and her restrictions are as follows: no M rated games, and I have to decide on T rated games. No brainer really. And the T rated decisions usually come down to: "Is it scary?" If it'll give her nightmares, then she doesn't get to play it.

I just realized, I'm wrong. She does play one M rated game. DOA4. I'm not even 100% sure why that game is M rated except for the gratuitous panty shots. She plays alot on my gamecube and she enjoys a few 360 games like Marvel UA. She loves Dynasty Warriors and Samuraii Warriors and is somewhat decent at them, though in Samuraii Warriors 2 she gets distracted buying horses in the shop and riding them around the levels.

[lovecraft]

was kinda short sighted of me to limit this to parents.  I assume no one else would give a fuck.  To answer my own question, we have bought crap for my oldest (now 4) like the Vsmile, etc. in the past but she never really enjoyed them.  This week she saw me playing the Wii and asked if she could play.  I let her.  Turns out, she's pretty good.  She can play all the Wii sports games but Boxing and Golf.  Boxing b/c she can't get the coordination right (I think the game may be poorly made, I can't manage) and the problem with golf may be in her genes.  Not even in a video game can I hit the ball without a slice.  I was thinking about getting some more Wii titles for her, we picked up Cars, but she can't get the movements.  It is a little higher level.  BTW- Does anyone know why Shrek 3rd is rated E-10?  She has seen the movies but is there some weird thing in the game that would preclude a youngster?

[Yegolev]

If you have been playing F13: The Home Game then you probably already know that my son plays games a little.  I probably started him off by playing Metroid Prime with him strapped to my chest as an infant in his first year.  In the second year we set him up with a laptop (wife's old Dell 8200) and put a Baby Einstein "game" on it.  I also put JumpStart Baby (hard to find title in 2005) on my PC and he started getting into trying the mouse while I held him.  Age two had him playing JumpStart Toddler and Alphabet Express... Alphabet Express is a pretty good one, actually, made by School Zone or something.

He is three as of last January and is currently learning how to drive a katamari using a SixAxis.  This is notable because I see him using both sticks on the Wii Classic Controller to move Mario around the map in SMW, and I don't use the sticks in that game at all, so he is learning game-control paradigms already.  As for SMW, he can do a normal jump and a spin jump; the boy loves his spin jump.  He only just mastered grabbing a key and running into a lock with it yesterday, so maybe soon he will be able to time his jumps to avoid koopas soon.

He does not do so well with the Wii proper.  Kororinpa, for example, sees him trying to make the ball fall off of the tracks.  That is probably for the best since he doesn't have the coordination for that game.  Golf stops him because he just wants to swing instead of hold down that button and swing.  In general he doesn't want to play the Wii Sports or Wii Play games but he does like watching some of them (ride the cow game, for example).  One thing he does pretty well is draw on photos in the Picture Channel, and that can occupy him for quite a while.

He has a V-Smile, the one that connects to the TV.  I think he might enjoy it more in a couple months as his coordination gets better, but on the other hand it is a craptacular piece of shit and he's got access to numerous real game consoles (wondering what happened to my S/NES arcade pad), so the V-Smile doesn't come out much.  Mommy just got him a LeapPad Thing (not real name), a handheld unit with a stylus.  It seems a bit nonintuitive since it seems like you have to poke with the stylus and also press a button on the stylus to pick something, but I did not try it myself.  That also looks crappy, but I'm not buying a DS for a three-year-old and he is going to have to make do with what he has.

On the PC these days, he mostly sticks to JumpStart Artist.  GameTap is worth a subscription if you have someone in your house that is into JumpStart games.

[schild]

^^^^^^ best father ever.

[Yegolev]

OH YES, I missed a piece.  Restrictions.  I do restrict what he plays or even sees, because he is only three.  He asks us to turn the channel when The Flying Dutchman appears on SpongeBob, so I am certainly not going to let him see or hear any of my scary games.  My wife is very interested in not letting him see or hear games with gunshots, but I personally don't see the harm there outside the obvious violence bits.  The real irony is that she is the one with the Glock 9mm.

Future plans are to not be restrictive.  If he sits up too late playing Dead Rising and has nightmares, he will just have to pay the piper like his old man.  If he plays Ultima VII until the sun comes up (just an example) then he will just have to cowboy up and go to school anyway, just like me.

[schild]

That's how my parents dealt with things after they took my keyboard and mouse one night and on the way back home from school I bought 5 more mice AND keyboards. That'll teach them.

At the same time, you're raising him to run a webforum... heh.

[Strazos]

That's how my parents dealt with things after they took my keyboard and mouse one night and on the way back home from school I bought 5 more mice AND keyboards. That'll teach them.

Oh man, that is classic.

[FatuousTwat]

I can't remember what console game I played first/what time, but I think it was duckhunt around the age of 3 or 4. First computer game was Hero's Quest (before the copyright infringement and they had to change the name) when I was 6 maybe? It was on a 386 "laptop" that would have crushed my legs and made me sterile if I used it the way they intended.

[voodoolily]

I grew up playing Oregon Trail and Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego, then got to play the NES some at my cousins' house (we were poor and didn't have one). Sprinkle in playing Tron on the arcade machine at the Qwik-E-Mart with quarters from returning bottles and cans. Mostly played the SMB games, especially 2. Also lots of Kid Icarus and Bubble Bobble, cuz I liked cutesy stuff. The first (and only) game I programmed myself was in Computers! class in 7th grade - I made a nature trivia game - wheee!!  I played a shitloada Contra too. Then when I was around 15 my parents finally ponied up for an NES, even though I wasn't really into games anymore by then and the Super Nintendo had been out for awhile. Played a lot of Shadowgate on that thing. Flash forward 15 years later, 7-console household.

I will strictly use video games as a reward to maintain utter control over my progeny, when I have them. It will likely be the only thing I can hold over their heads, and they will have to earn their time on it. If they fuck up, it will be taken away. I will not be a "fun" mom.   

I will also prolly stick with the obvious ESRB rating restrictions, just out of common sense, but I will hopefully still be in the loop enough by then to know what's appropriate and what's not.

[CmdrSlack]

BTW- Does anyone know why Shrek 3rd is rated E-10?  She has seen the movies but is there some weird thing in the game that would preclude a youngster?

Well, the E-10+ rating includes stuff that has cartoony and mild violence.  My guess is that there's some of that.

EVERYONE 10+
Titles rated E10+ (Everyone 10 and older) have content that may be suitable for ages 10 and older. Titles in this category may contain more cartoon, fantasy or mild violence, mild language and/or minimal suggestive themes.

[WindupAtheist]

My dad had a Pong machine, one of those consoles with the two sets of dual sticks that played Combat, and an Atari 2600 all before I was old enough to know what was going on.  The NES was the first console bought specifically for the kids, but he still played.  (I'm one of probably very few kids to have two-playered his way through Contra with his dad.)  When the SNES came around, he scoffed until we showed him Final Fight.  Then we couldn't get him off it.  He also got into the SNES Doom, then the PS1 version, Quake, GoldenEye, and so forth.

Restrictions?  My dad would see me playing an RPG and say something like "What's this sissy crap? Play something violent!"  Mom liked a little Mario and Tetris, but never got into it like he did.  By the PS2 era though, he had quit playing.  I wasn't around justifying my hobby by forcing him to play new things anymore, and he just sort of lost interest.  Mom still plays Dr. Mario on that same old SNES on a regular basis though.

Now, I don't have any kids, but I do have a brother 16 years younger than myself.  I had Doom in the PS1 and the controller in his hand by age three.  Fuck it, shooting imps with a plasma rifle just doesn't strike me as a big deal, no matter how many grainy red pixels they spew upon death.  On the other hand, he had to turn 13 before my other brother and myself decided to give the parents the all-clear on letting him play GTA3.  He played it enough to get the fascination with the forbidden out of his system, and then seemed to quit giving a shit.

He's almost 14 now.  I think he's mostly playing Oblivion at the moment.  That and some Tony Hawk game.  But he inherited most of mine and my brother's old games, and they do get used.  He's played the original Zelda on our ancient but still functional NES, and he's pretty good at Killer Instinct on the SNES.  He'll rape me at any FPS, but I can still whip his ass in Street Fighter.