Navigating video game culture (boys)

[Anonymous]

Who cares if it’s what other kids are into? You are the parent, OP. If you don’t like it, you are allowed to say no. We’ve told our 9 yo DS that he can get Roblox and Fortnite at 18. The reason is that we don’t want his younger brother to see first person combat until 16, and they’re two years apart. I let him play games that don’t include first person combat, but only on the weekends.

Maybe it’s because I’m a former teacher, but I’m very comfortable saying no to my kids on tech stuff. They get TV and a few video games. It’s not like we’re raising them in the woods.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Who cares if it’s what other kids are into? You are the parent, OP. If you don’t like it, you are allowed to say no. We’ve told our 9 yo DS that he can get Roblox and Fortnite at 18. The reason is that we don’t want his younger brother to see first person combat until 16, and they’re two years apart. I let him play games that don’t include first person combat, but only on the weekends.

Maybe it’s because I’m a former teacher, but I’m very comfortable saying no to my kids on tech stuff. They get TV and a few video games. It’s not like we’re raising them in the woods.

This. Just say no. You have another decade of saying no to things even though saying yes would make your kid cool. How are you going to say no to drinking someday?

[Anonymous]

I just say no. Where do kids have the 1hr a day for video games? We don't do a ton of activities or team sports, but between homework, music practice, a few days of activities and family dinner nightly, there just isn't time. Oh and my kids want to read books and their magazines all the free minutes between things. Because they don't have screens as an option. 2nd and 4th graders.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I just say no. Where do kids have the 1hr a day for video games? We don't do a ton of activities or team sports, but between homework, music practice, a few days of activities and family dinner nightly, there just isn't time. Oh and my kids want to read books and their magazines all the free minutes between things. Because they don't have screens as an option. 2nd and 4th graders.

For us, home from school at four leaves five hours until bed. An hour for homework and music, half an hour for eating dinner, and an hour for video games leaves two and a half hours for reading and such. On days with activities that changes and a bit, but not monumentally. That works for us and is a good balance. We didn't introduce game time until third grade and I've actually found that use of time got more responsible after not less.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just say no. Where do kids have the 1hr a day for video games? We don't do a ton of activities or team sports, but between homework, music practice, a few days of activities and family dinner nightly, there just isn't time. Oh and my kids want to read books and their magazines all the free minutes between things. Because they don't have screens as an option. 2nd and 4th graders.

For us, home from school at four leaves five hours until bed. An hour for homework and music, half an hour for eating dinner, and an hour for video games leaves two and a half hours for reading and such. On days with activities that changes and a bit, but not monumentally. That works for us and is a good balance. We didn't introduce game time until third grade and I've actually found that use of time got more responsible after not less.

Your 3rd grader goes to bed at 9??

[Anonymous]

I have two boys and neither are allowed to play Roblox (because kids are exposed to porn and creeps there VERY quickly). No shooter games, either.

They do play Minecraft or occasionally Zelda, but only for 30 mins a day.


My oldest is in 6th grade, and is old enough to hear why I am somewhat strict about this, and he is already thanking me. I also talk about addction and how it works.

It's OK to say no to something harmful even though "all the kids are doing it"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Who cares if it’s what other kids are into? You are the parent, OP. If you don’t like it, you are allowed to say no. We’ve told our 9 yo DS that he can get Roblox and Fortnite at 18. The reason is that we don’t want his younger brother to see first person combat until 16, and they’re two years apart. I let him play games that don’t include first person combat, but only on the weekends.

Maybe it’s because I’m a former teacher, but I’m very comfortable saying no to my kids on tech stuff. They get TV and a few video games. It’s not like we’re raising them in the woods.

So you are not going to let them go to friends' houses? I promise you their friends will play those types of games and your kid will play it at their house. DS is 13, he has several friends who have near unlimited screen time who he hangs out with.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just say no. Where do kids have the 1hr a day for video games? We don't do a ton of activities or team sports, but between homework, music practice, a few days of activities and family dinner nightly, there just isn't time. Oh and my kids want to read books and their magazines all the free minutes between things. Because they don't have screens as an option. 2nd and 4th graders.

For us, home from school at four leaves five hours until bed. An hour for homework and music, half an hour for eating dinner, and an hour for video games leaves two and a half hours for reading and such. On days with activities that changes and a bit, but not monumentally. That works for us and is a good balance. We didn't introduce game time until third grade and I've actually found that use of time got more responsible after not less.

Your 3rd grader goes to bed at 9??

Yes? Based on people in our neighborhood that seems pretty normal. Do you think that's early or late?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:DS8 is allowed to play video games or watch TV for 1 hour every day. We have a switch, but do not connect it to the internet. He mostly plays Mario Kart, Minecraft and Pokemon. He does not have a ipad/tablet/watch/phone and is not permitted to go on youtube/internet unsupervised.

this works for our family.

I wish my 8 year old could be friends with your 8 year old! Can someone make an app for that? "Luddite mom seeking friends for son"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You can teach your kid about the potential threats on any video gaming platform as well as social media outlet. Just controlling, controlling, controlling can and does backfire on parents as the kid ages up. There is nothing inherently wrong with Roblox or Minecraft, or the like. It’s when kids don’t understand the danger of unknown bad actors, or they play nonstop with no other outlets, that’s when these things become bad. Use these times as talking times and get the kid to come up with a plan of limits on the devices and games. Enable them to set a timer and then monitor their follow through. There are (gasp) educational aspects in some of the millions of games available on Roblox. I would encourage you (yes, you parent) to get an account to see what you like, what you don’t like, and what is attractive to the young folk. I promise it’s not scary. You may have fun. But, you will learn something from the adventure.

I mean who has time to find a handful of redeeming games out of millions? Let me guess, you were game addicts too.

I play video games and I backpack and camp and hike. There is this thing called balance in life. Yes, we pay attention to the games DS wants to play and we investigated them before we let him play them when he was younger. Even now, we look at the game reviews before we let him play it, he is 13.

Video games are fun, there is nothing that says you can't have fun playing video games in a balanced manner. It is not a black and white thing.

Well you are quite weird

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just say no. Where do kids have the 1hr a day for video games? We don't do a ton of activities or team sports, but between homework, music practice, a few days of activities and family dinner nightly, there just isn't time. Oh and my kids want to read books and their magazines all the free minutes between things. Because they don't have screens as an option. 2nd and 4th graders.

For us, home from school at four leaves five hours until bed. An hour for homework and music, half an hour for eating dinner, and an hour for video games leaves two and a half hours for reading and such. On days with activities that changes and a bit, but not monumentally. That works for us and is a good balance. We didn't introduce game time until third grade and I've actually found that use of time got more responsible after not less.

Your 3rd grader goes to bed at 9??

Yes fool does yours go to bed at 6?

[Anonymous]

Was this posted yet?
https://www.theguardian.com/games/2025/nov/05/roblox-game-robux-children-child-kids-safety-parental-controls

[Anonymous]

Video games are such a collective action problem and I wish our elected officials would do something to make these platforms prioritize safety instead of it all falling on individual families. These things are known to be addictive and have pedos on them and don’t have benefits that outweigh the harms/risks. There should be strict age limits just like we have for alcohol and penalties for enabling underage consumption.

[Anonymous]

I have a 5th grader and we are among the last of the “no Roblox” families. It’s sort of shocking to me what people allow.

[Anonymous]

We used to allow Roblox but have since changed our stance. We were less concerned about chat and privacy, since we had limited that, by more concerned that our kid couldn’t handle the constant overstimulation of the bright, jumpy, fast paced nonsense games that are made to be addictive.

We now allow Nintendo Switch games, which are not as addictive or as mindless as Roblox.

Everyone here says “you’re the parent, just say no” but don’t just discount your kid’s feelings. Our kid also really struggled with feeling excluded and left out by not having Roblox, and instead of just saying “oh well!” we really try and show empathy around that. It stinks to feel left out!