It's interesting to me to watch a video about a new gaming platform and have that video show me all the ways in which said platform will destroy nearly all forms of real human interaction with others, reducing us to unthinking drones looking at screens moving little virtual characters around while our brains whittle away.
This is the problem with the gaming industry. It's the equivalent of very smart engineers using their skills on the web to find ever more effective ways to make people click on ads. It's such a waste of human talent.
Gaming is different but not really. Most of the popular games have no real redeeming qualities. They are black holes into which youth can get sucked into, burn hours, days and years and, in extreme cases, ruin their lives. This, I think, is despicable.
If you want to do well in gaming you have to use your skills to find ways to create addictive games that shift a person into a Pavlovian state where they want more, they keep clicking the buttons and, eventually, they send you money. This has certainly been proven by the iOS space. Games like "Clash of Clans" is one of many examples of this.
Getting truly creative to find ways for people to engage with more intelligent and useful activities is very, very difficult. And so, to usurp part of a phrase that paints an amazing image...when they go low, we go lower.
I have long been disenchanted with what the gaming industry has done to kids. It's making money at the expense of their brains and emotions. It's selling drugs in digital form.
I didn't used to think this way until I saw the effect on my own kids. To make a long story short, my two little ones started to lie to us and play a couple of these addictive games on their iPods.
We have a simple rule at our house: On Saturday's you can play the available games for a couple of hours. The rest of the week play with legos, go outside, play with the dogs, etc.
This worked very well for many years (almost 18 to be precise). In fact, in a lot of cases they'd play less than two hours because they'd get sick of it and prefer to go for physical play.
Until a couple of games surfaced. And they, like evolved bacteria, became immune to the mechanism that made my kids decide to stop playing. Soon we would discover them playing the games in secret under their blankets at 11 at night instead of sleeping. Warnings did not work. And, after a couple of them we took the iPads and iPods away. They had become destructive devices rather than the opposite.
My kids were lying to me in a manner which I would imagine was no different than kids lying about taking drugs.
They've been off the iOS devices and these games for a year. They get their devices back in January. Cleared of all the addictive games. We'll see what happens.
So, yeah, I look at a video like the one for the Switch and immediately imagine how many lives it will destroy if used as portrayed.
I share your feelings when it comes to many games, but I don't think it generally applies to Nintendo.
The problem is that the word 'game' is too vague. Nobody would think to put 'viral videos' and 'Tarantino\'s latest film' in the same pile (except perhaps those who really dislike Tarantino), and yet that's what we do with gaming.
Some games were as good as some of the best novels I've read (Planescape Torment, Thief, System Shock). Some multiplayer games left me with friends for life (UT, Quake, Halo). Some games offered a creative outlet just as rewarding as the Lego or tin soldiers I had growing up (Minecraft, Neverwinter Nights level creation, Chip's Challenge), and some games actually tricked me into learning interesting things (Assassin's Creed 2, Civilization, etc.)
I'm not a parent, but if I had kids I'd probably limit their gaming too, but I'd put way more emphasis on controlling the kind of games they played. Cow Clickers (or most MMORPGS)? Not so much. Minecraft with coding mods? Hell yes!
All that said, if you'd be making an argument against sitting inside and media consumption in general, I'd probably agree a little more. There is still something fundamentally different about playing outside and interacting with other kids directly, and I hope I can make my kids do that instead of just staring at screens all day.
Of course, there are no absolutes. There are good games out there that, with moderation, do no harm. That's what I tell my kids. It's not that I don't want them to play. They need to have fun and some of these games are fun. It's about moderation.
Here's reality, it is well documented that gaming addition is hard for adults to kick. There are stories of people wasting years of their lives on this stuff. Young kids don't have any self moderation skills whatsoever other than physical exhaustion. Addictive games are a perfect match for young one's.
I wish I had taken videos of my kids lying about their "use". The look on their faces was that of addicts. Nothing less, nothing more. You could tell a mile away they were in denial and their little brains just wanted more drugs. Dangerous stuff.
I actually agree with you, a lot of games are being designed to keep you hooked. Which is not the fault of the developers as they have no choice but to try and extract money from their users if they are to survive. Those addict like qualities you saw in your kids, I saw in myself a couple of years ago and made my self go cold turkey. My drugs of choice were team fortress 2 and left 4 dead. I have thousand of hours logged between the two. I've made a lot of positive steps in my life since then and can't help but wonder how far I would have come if I had stopped playing a long time ago.
Congratulations, at least you were able to extract yourself from that road-to-nowhere and have positive things to look forward to. I am sure you'll be very aware of this in the future and help your own kids not get hooked.
As far as this not being the fault of developers. OK, sure, at a basic level, you are absolutely correct. Just like it is far easier for thugs to sell drugs to kids than to go find a real job or start a real company with real products.
The issue here is that all of these game studios go for easy-and-addictive without a care in the world about what damage they are causing. Trying to find new creative and positive gaming experiences is much, much harder. The formula for addictive games is known and relatively easy to implement these days.
This is the problem with the gaming industry. It's the equivalent of very smart engineers using their skills on the web to find ever more effective ways to make people click on ads. It's such a waste of human talent.
Gaming is different but not really. Most of the popular games have no real redeeming qualities. They are black holes into which youth can get sucked into, burn hours, days and years and, in extreme cases, ruin their lives. This, I think, is despicable.
If you want to do well in gaming you have to use your skills to find ways to create addictive games that shift a person into a Pavlovian state where they want more, they keep clicking the buttons and, eventually, they send you money. This has certainly been proven by the iOS space. Games like "Clash of Clans" is one of many examples of this.
Getting truly creative to find ways for people to engage with more intelligent and useful activities is very, very difficult. And so, to usurp part of a phrase that paints an amazing image...when they go low, we go lower.
I have long been disenchanted with what the gaming industry has done to kids. It's making money at the expense of their brains and emotions. It's selling drugs in digital form.
I didn't used to think this way until I saw the effect on my own kids. To make a long story short, my two little ones started to lie to us and play a couple of these addictive games on their iPods.
We have a simple rule at our house: On Saturday's you can play the available games for a couple of hours. The rest of the week play with legos, go outside, play with the dogs, etc.
This worked very well for many years (almost 18 to be precise). In fact, in a lot of cases they'd play less than two hours because they'd get sick of it and prefer to go for physical play.
Until a couple of games surfaced. And they, like evolved bacteria, became immune to the mechanism that made my kids decide to stop playing. Soon we would discover them playing the games in secret under their blankets at 11 at night instead of sleeping. Warnings did not work. And, after a couple of them we took the iPads and iPods away. They had become destructive devices rather than the opposite.
My kids were lying to me in a manner which I would imagine was no different than kids lying about taking drugs.
They've been off the iOS devices and these games for a year. They get their devices back in January. Cleared of all the addictive games. We'll see what happens.
So, yeah, I look at a video like the one for the Switch and immediately imagine how many lives it will destroy if used as portrayed.