Video games review ( or how did it all work out)

In 1972 a video game called Pong was released. It was a simple game with two little white bats and a square ball, all you had to do was get the little square ball past the opposing bat and you got a point. It was simple and very addictive.

image courtesy of insomnia.ac

Nowadays people would only play Pong  if it was at a party and everyone was either drunk or trying to win money off each other. Then in 1977 Space Invaders was released and the rest they say is history. The games got better and better and the way you played them got wider.

Which leads us to today. Computer games dominate our children's lives (and adults ! Apparently the average age of a gamer is 35 ) and the range to purchase and play is staggering. How on earth do you determine what's  what ?

A little while back I posted about the video games we had decided on as a family. The time has come some months later to detail what worked and what didn't.

The games were

Lego Star Wars 3                          PC                                Steam                         USD39.95
Minecraft                                        PC                               Minecraft                      E14.95
Plants vs Zombies                            PC                                Steam                          USD9.95
Lego Indiana Jones                     Wii                                EB Games                 AUD39.95

So they have completed all the levels in Lego Star Wars. The youngest one goes back from time to time to play in free play mode and overall it has been a lot of fun to play. The graphics are great and it is quite funny at times. The violence levels are fine as it's all Lego, so it is quite family friendly. After all nothing is quite as funny as watching a little Lego man pop apart in to little Lego pieces after being shot.

Plants vs zombies got a bit repetitive and the challenges were a bit overly simplistic. They enjoyed it for probably about the first 5 weeks and then it hasn't been played since. It wasn't an expensive game so I'm  not too worried. I had a go and lost interest after 5 minutes, mind you I was supposed to be helping clean the house so I was interrupted as well.

Lego Indiana Jones has exactly the same engine as the other Lego games so the game play is very similar. Once they had finished all the levels they started to go back and free play them which seemed to suit them better. We have had issues around battery life of the wii remotes which has lessened the time spent playing. They still enjoy playing every now and then.

Minecraft is another story all together. They are still going strong on this one and it's playability is still going after the final version was released. It has even drawn in the youngest son into it's caverns, open plains and vast treasures to mine. They would play it 24/7 if we let them. They talk about it, they plan it. They make videos about it. The eldest is now coding mods and worlds for other users, so I can't see this one going away any time soon.

I'm very comfortable about all aspects of the the game, there's no violence to speak of (there is griefing, and some zombie like creepers and others that can kill you but its surreal in it's portrayal).

A couple of new games have also somehow crept in ( Curse you - easy to use Steam), Terreria  is a side scrolling game which we have all enjoyed very simple and lots of fun. Team Fortress 2 has also crept in with it's cartoon style shoot em' up game play. The newest is Dungeon Defenders and is so graphics intensive it cause the graphics card to over heat and shut the PC down, much to The Beloved's relief.

Anyway the issue now is how to get them off the damn things because I mean I think by accident I created a substitute babysitter. It's not the same as TV which presents the information in neat little packages that require little or no thought. No these games demand your constant attention and then feed you little rewards along the way to keep you incented to play.

If we don't get the to turn the computer off and go outside or literally drag them out ourselves they would just keep on going.

And going. So now we have instituted a series of times that games can be played for, of course on completion of other everyday functions.

I just have to work out how to give them more chores so I can get on with the serious business of getting my Galaga scores back up........

School Holidays are expensive

The school holidays are upon us once again. It's that time of the year that the wallet is used as a public ATM by anyone providing suitable (or not) ways of keeping the minions entertained or a least mildly amused enough to not destroy the house or its surrounds.

Lets face it it's not easy. You can't just say " guys, lets read this book" and hand them War and Peace and hope for the best.

No you have to come up with ideas and places that aren't  going to get - "Dad this is so lame"

This is where the devil is in the detail. The good stuff aint free. Take for example the time we went to a fish farm. Turns out whatever you catch you have to keep and pay for. Not only that, these fish have been waiting for you , in tiny bath tubs size ponds, to show up so they can commit suicide on your child's hook.

Over and Over again.

Couple of tips for all the readers for attending fish farms :
1- Do not hand any child the wooden club used to kill the fish and let them have a go at clubbing the fish they just caught. It just ends as a broken thumb.

2 - Do not let them fish in the salmon pond, those fish are huge (and 30 bucks a kilo)

So $150.00 later we are back in the car and heading home where I will eat baked beans on toast for the next month interspersed with trout and salmon 90 different ways.

Theme parks are another great little money removing system. They not only charge you to get in and ride on the rides, but manage to charge for food at the same rate as Vue de Monde. Not to mention the fact that  I'm pretty sure they add sugar to everything they serve to keep the kids hyped up and going all day.

And as soon as they start to come down from one sugar high you give them more, because we all know nothing is worse than them crashing in a public place surrounded by the disapproving glare of 3000 other parents.

Then you have the movie complex. Where else can you watch the latest film on a screen the size of a house whilst munching on a box popcorn the size of a domestic refrigerator, that cost the same as the GDP of Great Britain and contains enough salt for 6 lifetimes ?

At least they put adult jokes in most kids movies now days and most still contain a fart joke somewhere so it's not a total loss, but I will need to drink my own body weight in water afterwards.

Trouble is if I don't do something they will just sit in front of the TV watching Sponge Bob interspersed with video games ( if they they're really motivated they will sit in front of the TV with their laptop). So I have to come up with something.

So I tried taking them to work. It's fine until they need to go to the toilet in the middle of meetings - every 15 minutes. Not to mention the fact they aren't covered by work insurance so every time someone from HR comes around they have to hide under your desk.

Holiday camps presented themselves as an alternative. They take your kids to movies, parks, aquariums and other such exciting places. Trouble is not only do you pay for the places they take them and anything they eat, you pay an extraordinary amount to actually get them to take them. We have two growing boys so each time we use these camps I have to ring the bank manager and extend the mortgage.

I know I'm not alone on this problem and who hasn't secretly wished the industrial revolution was back so the kids all had to work in the mills ?

So once again we rack our brains for ideas, begging babysitting credits from Grandparents and organizing play dates with other non working parents.

So on we soldier and know in our hearts that one they will be old enough to manage themselves and the holidays. But until the kids turn 30, I am just going to have to continue to search for new and interesting things to get them to do.

That and get a second job....

Video games for all

I am not going to lie, I love playing video games. In fact according to the numbers from The Australian Bureau of Statistics,  35% of gamers are parents, so I am not alone. It's not easy with two boys under 12 in the house as the games I play are definitely not kid friendly and are rated MA15+ the highest current rating in Australia. So how do you incorporate the two things together? Well we are trialling some of the games that I would not normally play but are friendly to the growing minds constantly present, whilst still being fun. I know people will argue that they are just games and they are no different to cartoons but I say they are, as a cartoon has no interaction with the child, they just sit and receive the information / message and move on. The video games require constant input and decisions to be made. So we made a short list and then debated which games to buy. The criteria was that everyone could play the games and that they weren't 1st person shooters (wife gets motion sick and they are mostly inappropriate anyway )

So here is the list of games we settled on :

Game                                          Console                             Via                               Price
Lego Star Wars 3                          PC                                Steam                         USD39.95
Minecraft                                        PC                               Minecraft                      E14.95
Plants vs Zombies                            PC                                Steam                          USD9.95
Lego Indiana Jones                     Wii                                EB Games                 AUD39.95


I'll  monitor usage and publish the results later on.

Oh and we also have placed limits on how long each game can be played for (lets see how that goes !)