Dr. Tanya Byron’s report was published today, and rather predictably the journalists/comment makers have started to froth. Shame really, as it seems that it’s a well thought through and balanced report from experts in the filed… perhaps that’s the problem. It’s not slammed computer games as satanic spawn corrupting the minds of the young, but - in the briefest of summaries - has come to the conclusion that they should be treated just like films, and the internet akin to going out to play.   So we should have just one system for age rating here in the UK, rather than the funny Euro/UK mish-mash that we’ve got at the moment.   (Full report).

I’ve a little smug moment here, back in December I wrote about the startling revelation that 43% of parents didn’t know there were age ratings on games which seems to be what the report is getting at. So to quote myself:

Here in the UK, a big green U for universal means its soft and cuddly; jam it in and let them play. A yellow PG (parental guidance) means play it before or with your kids. 12 means be 12 for rude words, 15 means lots of cleavage for mid-teens and 18 means too much blood ‘n guts. Stick to the numbers and you can’t go far wrong.

Perhaps the boys will get hold of a game that is above their age, like we did with the old VHS around Halloween; and yes, they well see something that freaks them out a bit, like we did with Mr F. Krugar (I went three days without sleep). I escaped fairly unharmed from my childhood viewing habits because I loved watching films with my folks. So with any luck my kids will love gaming and films with daddy; and with just us much fortune, they’ll still want to game/watch/go online with their old man as the years go by.

In the meantime I’m going to continue to tell them that PG is for Parent Gaming.

You want well rounded children, do two things. Love ‘em and play with ‘em.

tag... playpeople, play, gamer, philosophising

Time seems to let memories seep away; which is why I went out and bought Lego Star Wars: The Complete Saga. Now the PS3 does a lovely job of the graphics, the cut scenes are a delight - being funny and star-wars-ey at the same time - and the game play is smooth. So why a paltry 3 stars? Because of the bicker factor. To be precise, because of the bicker factor and my parenting co-play philosophy.  It must be my memory, ‘cos it was just this problem with the first one in the series we had a few years back.

All multiplayer games have a bicker factor; that element of them in which you or your own turn across the room and say “come with me… now… hurry… quick… nargh… too late”. In mutiplayer gems like Marvel Heroes, or the Fantastic Four this is overcome by a game play in which every one bundles in to whatever is going on on screen. But in Lego Star Wars there’s a little too much co-op “we have to do this together… on the count of 3… 3!” which does frustrate the younger ones. Lucky they’ve parents who don’t mind being handed a controller, but that kinda’ takes away the sense of achievement for them.

On the other side the game promises online co-op, which - if we can get it up and running with the cousins - puts a certain amount of distance between partners, forcing cooperation rather than complaints. We’ll see.

tag... review, play for today, 5up, 8up, gamer

In a recent study, 43% of parents surveyed were not aware of rating systems that apply to video games. How come? It’s not hard. It’s like watching a DVD of a visit to the cinema.

Here in the UK, a big green U for universal means its soft and cuddly; jam it in and let them play. A yellow PG (parental guidance) means play it before or with your kids. 12 means be 12 for rude words, 15 means lots of cleavage for mid-teens and 18 means too much blood ‘n guts. Stick to the numbers and you can’t go far wrong.

Perhaps the boys will get hold of a game that is above their age, like we did with the old VHS around Halloween; and yes, they well see something that freaks them out a bit, like we did with Mr F. Krugar (I went three days without sleep). I escaped fairly unharmed from my childhood viewing habits because I loved watching films with my folks. So with any luck my kids will love gaming and films with daddy; and with just us much fortune they’ll want to game/watch with their old man as the years go by.

In the meantime I’m going to continue to tell them that PG is for Parent Gaming.

tag... play, gamer, philosophising

Perhaps the tide is turning; video game bashing seems to have been all the rage in the early naughties, but it seems that others are joining me in starting to acknowledge the place of gaming, as just another childhood thing. In the Guardian, Steven Poole writes:

Imagine the headline 100 years ago: “Children spending too much time playing outdoors with hoops and sticks, says minister; should be forcibly enclosed to study improving literature.” There’s always some apparently pointless youth activity to scapegoat.

So if English children are not so much interested in picking up a paperback, maybe that says more about the quality of books currently being foisted upon them than it does about the evils of digital entertainment. Children are, after all, quite discriminating. If someone writes a new Harry Potter, they’ll curl up with it for days. If not, there’s always the games console.

Kids and games, it’s just another way to play.  Nice to see the world starting to agree with me for a change.

(via Kotaku)

tag... play, gamer

Children and gaming are rattling around the news rooms again. The UK’s gaming violence study with Dr Byron has been up and running for a month or so. On the other side of the pond, a gaming poll has indicated that 43% of parents never ever play a video game with their kids, and only 27% play for more than an hour alongside their kids. Perhaps its a simple lack of time rather than a fear of pwnage from your own offspring. It is a concern, just yesterday I was asked the same question by three different parents, “how much should we let kids play?”

Games have changes since I was a kid. Growing up with a Dragon 32 and a geek-dad for company there were quite a few games for me to play. Granted we had to have a chittering tape player to load them over a timespan usually reserved for intercontinental drift, and in which choosing the wrong cassette led to one of pa’s ‘I’ll teach you to spell’ games. Though quite usefully this taught me to hack so as to achieve top marks, with probably more effort involved. But the one factor in all these games were that they were unanimously one player enterprises. The closest we had to ‘team’ gaming was to let one brother wiggled Tails lamely back and forth, whilst the other took full control of Sonic. Gamers were generally solitary oyster-like creatures whilst at play.

Things have moved on, Ultimate Alliance and Fantastic Four have four way cooperative play. Games can now be bought with pocket money. Games are now a lot more watch-able from the sidelines through their HD glory. And the umbrella is wider, games like Nintendogs or Scrabble on the DS have taken games to new or old places. Video games are now anything but solitary.

At casa welikeplay I’ve thought long and hard about this and I run the following with my kids.

You may play for as long as your dad/mum is interested. There will also be a mandatory day off every week. Arguing with the judgement of parents makes tomorrow a game free day.

Such an arrangement limits games to those which are either multiplayer, so we growed-ups can join in. Or games like the new Ratchet & Clank: Tools of Destruction which, though only a one player game, is highly engaging and watchable. Or games like Big Brain Academy, which we’re happy to feign interest as we’ve bought the line that they’re somehow making my kids smarter.

I’m lucky, I’m at home to see my boys after school. And I like play. So I do get time to do the whole interest-rule-thing. If I didn’t I’d have to find some sort of arbitrary time slot.  I also like to think that it this parent play lifts the genre, perhaps they’ll be up there with film one day. So I’ve got them young, and perhaps those teen years will be easier as a result; though I’ve a lurking suspicion that unless I hone my skills I’m going to get pwnd time and again in the next 12 years.

tag... play, gamer, geeky, philosophising

Welikeplay reviews games with one principle in mind. Can you play it with your kids?

Ratchet and Clank: Tools of Destruction on the PS3 (rating 7+)

I won’t beat around the bush. Tools is great. Unbelievably great. Over the weekend welikeplay Labs put it through its paces and didn’t want to stop until bedtime (or at least to the brink the mandatory ‘1 hour before’ exclusion zone). It’s a high-def beauty, it’s learning curve is pitched just right. It makes allowances for new players, but pushes you when you start to get good. It did lose half a star though for a sloppy installation bug that made me panic; but the game is glorious so much can be forgiven.

Now it doesn’t have any multiplayer mode, which I had made the assumption that it would struggle on the ‘playing with your kids’ criteria which we seek to uphold. But I was wrong, because it is watchable. The boys are happy to take a ‘world-per-turn’ whilst watching the other’s progress… and I could too. This led to little discussions about tactics and upgrading strategies with little potted reviews regarding the salient choice of insane weaponry comparing the predator over the buzz.

Yes, you do blow stuff up. But all innards are green or blue, and you dispatch monsters; which is a good skill to have as an imaginative child. I’m tempted to lower the age rating, but that is your own call as parents not mine. Chiefly because I don’t mind taking my own turn-per-world to play it alongside my kids. Even if they snicker when I get eaten by a heavily-armed robotic frog.

And to top it all it has the Groovitron. A bomb which causes all enimies to strut their funky stuff; with the side effect that players and their entourage to collapse into giggles. There was even an episode where the welikeplay guinea-pigs went bolt mining, just so they could purchase more to make the fishy-head baddies groove.

Easily the best PS3 games so far, and earns pride of place on my play shelf.

Enjoy.

tag... review, play for today, 8up, gamer

I’ve been playing quite a bit of Marvel Ultimate Alliance (on the PS3) over the last few months, and it’s been quite a revelation. Growing up with a Dragon 32 and a geek-dad for company there were quite a few games for me to play. Granted we had to have a chittering tape player to load them over a timespan usually reserved for intercontinental drift, and in which choosing the wrong cassette led to one of pa’s ‘I’ll teach you to spell’ games. Though quite usefully this taught me to hack so as to achieve top marks, with probably more effort involved. But the one factor in all these games were that they were unanimously one player enterprises.

I’ve found that playing ‘puter games with others is much more rewarding, especially when children no.1 and no.2 can put their father to shame. Hopefully this co-operative playing will stop them falling into the whole darkened-room-teen; we will see. read on »

tag... review, 5up, 8up, gamer

Yesterday I forked out the least I’d ever spent on a computer game; and that includes the version of Civ I picked up at Oxfam. For a penny under 2 quid I download the ‘interactive screensaver’ of Locorocco Cocoreccho for the PS3; and today me and the boys put it through its twinge inducing paces.

Perhaps this sees in a new era of pocket-money (allowance) games for which kids can save up a little over the cost of two weeks of the Beano to download their own games… and Sony have been very canny in allowing ‘master’ accounts to set up funds into wallets for just this sort of purpose.

Why only a two star game? after the jump

read on »

tag... review, 5up, 8up, gamer, pocketmoney

Ironic that, as welikeplay starts to go live, that a bit of news comes in about GamerDad; who is a bit of a hero here as a champion and poster-boy for the ‘video games are not evil, rather they can be an aid to development’ movement that we’re quite passionate about.

At the beginning of the month he had a heart attack and is now undergoing hospitalisation. We at welikeplay HQ wish him, and GamerMom, and GamerKids the best. And hope for a speedy recovery.

tag... playpeople, gamer