Video Game Culture- any way to avoid it

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How do you manage this stuff?

Have something planned after 1 hour of Saturday video games so you can drag him away to whatever it is.

I allow one hour and then have something planned and my kid complains the whole time "This isn't fun". I'm at my wit's end.
I kept it away from him for as long as possible but the other boys are all obsessed and he wants so much to be part of the crowd.
It was much easier in summer since he loves being outside when it's warm but he doesn't enjoy winter stuff, museums, etc. at all.

My outdoor loving kids don’t like museums either but they like ice skating, rock climbing, indoor pools, and playing outside in the cold.

I am going to guess your kid goes to school and talks like he has unlimited access, and other kids to home and tell their parents they need video games to be like him.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Video games are so much better than watching TV and they are a creative and social activity for boys especially. I get keeping very young kids away and not letting kids play more than an hour or so a day, but there is a level is extreme hate on this board towards video games in particular that I find hard to understand. There is also a level of smugness / superiority from some posters, particularly among moms in my opinion, who have never played video games growing up, and don’t see the appeal themselves.

Disagree. Kids will get bored watching TV and will stop after an hour or so. But many would play video games for hours on end.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: games which are totally inappropriate( Fortnite/ roblox). I want I tell these kids parents WTF- what’s wrong with you?

I have zero roblox experience, my kid is solidly in the Minecraft camp, but what is so totally inappropriate about roblox?

I want to know the same thing

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I really don’t like how kids just want to veg out playing video games. We have tried fighting it but now allow our 7 year old 1-2 hours video game time on Saturday’s after chores. Our 4 year doesn’t get any time right now.

What really getting to me is that so many of the kids in his class seem to have unlimited video game time and access to games which are totally inappropriate( Fortnite/ roblox). I want I tell these kids parents WTF- what’s wrong with you?

My kids think we are the bad parents for restricting this stuff - I don’t want to tell my kid the truth that his friends parents probably just dump their kids of video games to get some peace and quiet.

these games are so absorbing I fear our kids won’t want to do the fun activities I love doing with them (hikes, bike riding, family game night). I just feel like I am killing myself doing what I think is right for my kids and society is pushing in the opposite direction.

How do you manage this stuff?

I feel this way a lot- parents in general seem to have such a blasé attitude towards their kids health in general. Sugar and ultra-processed foods to the extreme, hours of television or some sort of screen time a day...it's pathetic. There is no balance. Not saying these things should be forbidden- that's the other extreme and also not balanced.

[Anonymous]

How do I manage it? I just don't have a video game console in my house. It's simple. Why in the world would you use money to go out and buy video games and then fret about them?

Does my child play video games? Yes, at friends' houses or when camp takes him to the arcade. Today he rode his bike and now is building a fort indoors. He has not asked to watch TV, we don't have a kid's tablet, and I doubt video games have even crossed his mind this week.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: games which are totally inappropriate( Fortnite/ roblox). I want I tell these kids parents WTF- what’s wrong with you?

I have zero roblox experience, my kid is solidly in the Minecraft camp, but what is so totally inappropriate about roblox?

I want to know the same thing

I haven’t seen anything inappropriate on Roblox other than standard shoot em up stuff in some of the games. You can set up parental controls so kids can only play games “rated” for certain ages, hide/turn off chat, restrict in app purchases … Some kids will try to get around that stuff but others won’t really care. But that’s more of a kid personality thing it seems.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: games which are totally inappropriate( Fortnite/ roblox). I want I tell these kids parents WTF- what’s wrong with you?

I have zero roblox experience, my kid is solidly in the Minecraft camp, but what is so totally inappropriate about roblox?

I want to know the same thing

https://www.wired.com/story/roblox-online-games-irl-fascism-roman-empire/

[Anonymous]

StanHansen wrote:Totally get the vibe if video game culture isn't your jam. It's pervasive, no doubt! Exploring beyond the controller – anything non-gaming grabbing your interest lately?

No

[Anonymous]

DS is in 3rd grade. He has played Minecraft and Roblox, but I have always found it difficult to limit, so we pretty much took them away.

He seems fine just reading or tinkering with Legos. However, just the other night I did notice that he was at a loss when socializing with some other kids talking about or playing video games which made me question whether we should reintroduce some gaming.

I can see how it is the social currency of young boys, but it's just so hard to reign in. I also wouldn't mind if he played sports games, because I feel like at least he would be learning the rules of the game, but he has no interest in them.

Anyone have any specific age-appopriate game recs?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:DS is in 3rd grade. He has played Minecraft and Roblox, but I have always found it difficult to limit, so we pretty much took them away.

He seems fine just reading or tinkering with Legos. However, just the other night I did notice that he was at a loss when socializing with some other kids talking about or playing video games which made me question whether we should reintroduce some gaming.

I can see how it is the social currency of young boys, but it's just so hard to reign in. I also wouldn't mind if he played sports games, because I feel like at least he would be learning the rules of the game, but he has no interest in them.

Anyone have any specific age-appopriate game recs?

Pokemon. A 3rd grader should easily be able to handle the reading and the basic strategy. They can be played almost entirely single player. And the new games are fun and not too hard. They are good thinking and memory exercises for kids - like, what do I have that is strong against this opponent, what move can I teach a Pokémon to make it stronger against another opponent, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: games which are totally inappropriate( Fortnite/ roblox). I want I tell these kids parents WTF- what’s wrong with you?

I have zero roblox experience, my kid is solidly in the Minecraft camp, but what is so totally inappropriate about roblox?

Roblox is awful. I don’t know where to start but the popular games on Roblox seem much more like mindless dopamine rush repetitive games with inappropriate themes and unmoderated chat functions. I’m generalizing of course, but we prohibited Roblox at the beginning of the school year and my child’s mental health is markedly improved. Not kidding. It was scary. I thought it was harmless because a teacher had introduced the kids to one of the games during the pandemic. I much prefer the Nintendo games like Mario and Zelda etc. that my child can stop without being penalized bc he’s missing his “streak”. It’s like that old saying, if you aren’t paying for the product, then *you* are the product. Ymmv but Roblox was not for us.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Really, really easy to avoid at 7. Not so easy around 11-12 and on. Just don’t have the system in your home and enjoy the next few years while you can.

I have a 12 year old girl who today went to school, played outside, went to sports practice, and just beat her dad at Fortnite, now she is off to read or listen to an audio book before sleep. Video games are not the end of the world, you just need some limits.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: games which are totally inappropriate( Fortnite/ roblox). I want I tell these kids parents WTF- what’s wrong with you?

I have zero roblox experience, my kid is solidly in the Minecraft camp, but what is so totally inappropriate about roblox?

Roblox is awful. I don’t know where to start but the popular games on Roblox seem much more like mindless dopamine rush repetitive games with inappropriate themes and unmoderated chat functions. I’m generalizing of course, but we prohibited Roblox at the beginning of the school year and my child’s mental health is markedly improved. Not kidding. It was scary. I thought it was harmless because a teacher had introduced the kids to one of the games during the pandemic. I much prefer the Nintendo games like Mario and Zelda etc. that my child can stop without being penalized bc he’s missing his “streak”. It’s like that old saying, if you aren’t paying for the product, then *you* are the product. Ymmv but Roblox was not for us.

NP. Thank you for your very helpful explanation. They are a mystery to me, and it can be difficult for me to articulate why I won’t allow my seven-year-old to play, but now I will be able to.

[Anonymous]

I'm sorry if this isn't what you want to hear, but I think 1-2 hours is too long for a 7-year-old. I don't know where I read this, but I think 40 minutes max for this age.

I bet there are also kids at school who have limits; you just might not know who they are yet. To hear my 9-year-old son tell of it, all his friends have Nintendo Switches, but this is patently untrue (just like my 12-year-old says everyone at school has an iPhone--oh, everyone but the 5 people I can easily name?)

What about some movie/tv time instead of video games? Less risk that they will get so drawn into that dopamine hit, and you still get a little downtime.

For other activities, you can read to your kid, bake, make an obstacle course in the living room, go to Ninja Warrior class, or someplace with an open gym....We live in an area with lots of activities for kids through the local parks (Montgomery County, eg.) You can find something!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I say lighten up about “video game culture.” It used to be that the moral panic was about novels, then comic books, then movies, then TV. Now it’s video games. Video games can be a perfectly healthy and normal way for kids to socialize and have fun. Just be reasonable about it, like anything else.

100% this.

I totally disagree. There's real data that video games, social media usage, and screentime in general, have measured chemical effects. All 3 ramp up your cortisol and put you in a flight-or-fight mode. Video games can create dopamine cravings in lots of kids. There was that 2019 news story about the content that Instagram and TikTok share with 8th grade girls, whether they want it or not--eating disorder and self-harm videos. Yes, of course video games can be healthy and normal; my kids enjoy Minecraft with friends and other apps on their iPads, but I think it has a higher negative effect in higher doses than, say, comic books.