It's that time of year again. School's in!
Time to start "helping" my kids balance game-time with school-work and other activities like Karate and gymnastics, as well as refereeing disputes over who's turn it is to play. During the summer, I give them fairly free reign over a lot of their day. There are chunks of the day where they get to decide when to play games, when to watch TV, when to play with friends etc. But now that the free hours in the day are severely limited, announcing I need them to come with me to do the grocery shopping because they're no old enough to stay home alone goes over like an /afk by the healer during a final Boss kill.
The beginning of our week is jammed with school followed almost immediately by a sport followed by homework time followed by dinner. That usually leaves about an hour of "free" time, followed by pleas of "just a few more minutes" or "I'll shower tomorrow!" or "but SHE hogged all the time on the Wii, I didn't get my turn yet!" Yeah, life's SO fun during those times.
Not to mention that I have to watch my own play-time. After all, the laundry can only be put off so long, because now we actually have to leave the house in those clothes, so they'd better be clean. Plus there will be the "I need help with my math homework" and the "I can't find my yellow t-shirt and I need it for gym tomorrow."
By Friday, I think we're already to do something more fun, so Friday nights are usually Game Nights here. Far from the Parker Brothers version of game night, we are usually all playing a computer or console game, sometimes with each other, sometimes not. The boys are usually teamed up with others via the net for Friday Night Fights, while the girls are often play Warcraft together. Sometimes we challenge each other to a game of Wii bowling. There's always pizza, the age-appropirate beverage, and snacks. Sounds fun to me!
Friday, August 29, 2008
Thursday, August 14, 2008
Can Parents Really Raid?
My brother and I were recently having a chat about how once you have kids, your gaming time is cut waaaay down. He's got a work friend that plays Wow with us, and has been trying to recruit us for his raiding guild. We both were not willing to commit to it, as they wanted people who could raid one or two week-nights every week.
His daughter is just a year old, so he's at the peak of 'gamus-interuptus' (that's Latin for "just when you've got the boss down to 15% health, the baby cries"). My kids are in elementary school, and we're into the homework years, the bicker over who's turn it is to play on the Wii years, the "I know you told me to get ready for bed, but I'm going to ignore you and hope you get too involved in your game to notice" years.
All these interruptions are minor in the grand scheme of home life. But it could be major in gaming life. I play Blizzard's World of Warcraft. I consider myself a casual player, in that I am on a PVE server, and rarely enter the battlegrounds to do any PVPing. I spend most of my online time doing quests, or grinding for gold or reputation. And I've hardly run any of the big instances. Why? I have kids. "Bah!" you say, "many people who PVP or run The Slave Pens have kids." Yes, I'm sure it's true. What keeps me from doing the bigger instances or raids is the time commitment. It's rare for me to get an hour of un-interupted time. Oh, I will often play Wow for 2 or 3 hours at a time, but that almost always includes me /AFKing for a few mins every 30 minutes or so, and that would SO not go over well during a raid.
Most people on my server try to start an instance run by 7:00 or 8:00pm, so they've got 3 or 4 hours to run the whole thing. Smack in the middle of the run would be my kid's bed time - and I can't get away with a quick peck on the cheek, pat on the butt and off to bed with ya. Nope, bed time takes at least 15 minutes. Times 2 kids. Even after I've put the kids to bed, at least one but usually both of them will be up one more time for something, or I have to stand at the bottom of the stairs and yell "Don't MAKE me come up there!" in an attempt to put an end to the pitter-patter of little feet running between sibling's rooms.
The start time is often a problem for me as well. During the school year, we've got homework to check and discuss, backpacks to load for the next day and if I'm feeling organized, lunches to get ready. My husband often doesn't get home from work until 6 or 6:30, so a 5:30 dinner is not common in our house. Even if the group were to be ok with me joining late, (after all, that's what "summoning" is for, right?) and could put up with all the "I'll be afk for just a couple - go ahead, I'll catch up", there's the glaring fact that my character is woefully under-geared (read: no purple/Epic gear) because, well, I don't do instances, so I can't get the gear. I only can gear up with what I can get on the games Auction House or craft, much of which is fine for grinding, but "meh" for real destruction.
My brother and I have solved our immediate problem of guild members giving us a hard time for never joining in on guild instance runs by creating our own guild. Currently, it consists of only family members, including my 75 year old Dad (who has been playing Wow for almost a year) and both of my kids, who play only occasionally, and umpteen alts for each of us. Family always understands when they hear "Mom, I can't find my (insert favorite toy of the week)and I can't go to sleep without it" over Ventrillo. Family never /heavy sigh's when you've got to let the dog in/out for the 3rd time tonight. And Family never gives you a hard time when you post "I'm not going to join the run tonight, we're going to the Hannah Montana movie". Well, almost never. (Just you wait, brother dear, your time is coming!)
His daughter is just a year old, so he's at the peak of 'gamus-interuptus' (that's Latin for "just when you've got the boss down to 15% health, the baby cries"). My kids are in elementary school, and we're into the homework years, the bicker over who's turn it is to play on the Wii years, the "I know you told me to get ready for bed, but I'm going to ignore you and hope you get too involved in your game to notice" years.
All these interruptions are minor in the grand scheme of home life. But it could be major in gaming life. I play Blizzard's World of Warcraft. I consider myself a casual player, in that I am on a PVE server, and rarely enter the battlegrounds to do any PVPing. I spend most of my online time doing quests, or grinding for gold or reputation. And I've hardly run any of the big instances. Why? I have kids. "Bah!" you say, "many people who PVP or run The Slave Pens have kids." Yes, I'm sure it's true. What keeps me from doing the bigger instances or raids is the time commitment. It's rare for me to get an hour of un-interupted time. Oh, I will often play Wow for 2 or 3 hours at a time, but that almost always includes me /AFKing for a few mins every 30 minutes or so, and that would SO not go over well during a raid.
Most people on my server try to start an instance run by 7:00 or 8:00pm, so they've got 3 or 4 hours to run the whole thing. Smack in the middle of the run would be my kid's bed time - and I can't get away with a quick peck on the cheek, pat on the butt and off to bed with ya. Nope, bed time takes at least 15 minutes. Times 2 kids. Even after I've put the kids to bed, at least one but usually both of them will be up one more time for something, or I have to stand at the bottom of the stairs and yell "Don't MAKE me come up there!" in an attempt to put an end to the pitter-patter of little feet running between sibling's rooms.
The start time is often a problem for me as well. During the school year, we've got homework to check and discuss, backpacks to load for the next day and if I'm feeling organized, lunches to get ready. My husband often doesn't get home from work until 6 or 6:30, so a 5:30 dinner is not common in our house. Even if the group were to be ok with me joining late, (after all, that's what "summoning" is for, right?) and could put up with all the "I'll be afk for just a couple - go ahead, I'll catch up", there's the glaring fact that my character is woefully under-geared (read: no purple/Epic gear) because, well, I don't do instances, so I can't get the gear. I only can gear up with what I can get on the games Auction House or craft, much of which is fine for grinding, but "meh" for real destruction.
My brother and I have solved our immediate problem of guild members giving us a hard time for never joining in on guild instance runs by creating our own guild. Currently, it consists of only family members, including my 75 year old Dad (who has been playing Wow for almost a year) and both of my kids, who play only occasionally, and umpteen alts for each of us. Family always understands when they hear "Mom, I can't find my (insert favorite toy of the week)
Monday, August 11, 2008
Life as an RPG
Clive Thompson ruminated on dieting as a Roll Playing Game, and wished more parts of everyday life could be as much fun. As a Mom Who Games, I often try to make the mundane more fun buy turning it into a game. Not exactly an RPG, but we try to make things go by faster by seeing who can finish faster, who can find the most 'red' stuff to put on one shelf in their rooms, etc.
During the summer, the kids have a very lax schedule. We only have a couple of karate classes and the occasional day trip planned, but otherwise, they're free to choose what to do with their day at home. My husband works from home during the summer months, but he's actually working, and doesn't have time to prod them to get dressed etc. To keep things semi-organized, I leave them a To-Do list when I head into the office for my 1/2 day of droning. When my son complained that it wasn't much fun to do "to-do's", I started calling it a quest list, and he perked up.
They have the normal grinding quests like make your bed, and clean one section of your room, for which they get 1 point each. There are extra credit quests like Swiffer the kitchen floor, or put all the dirty clothes into the basket. If they do 3 extra credit quests in one week, they'll accumulate enough points to turn in for something fun on Friday. Some weeks it's a video game rental (shhh - I get free coupons from Blockbuster on-line once a month, so this is a cheep prize!) or a trip to McD's. They can even save up their points and redeem them for a larger prize, like a new Wii game or a Webkinz, which pays me back in quiet time when they're busy playing with their new prize. Plus I've got the bonus of having a semi-clean floor, and not having to gather the laundry from indiviual rooms myself. I usually do one "you choose" extra credit during the week, and it's interesting to see what the kids will choose to do as an extra help around the house. My son, the laziest boy on the planet, often will choose something like using the cleaning wipes to shine the bathroom sinks (a 30 second job - if you're slow). My daughter chose to organize the snack and drinks baskets, and even created labels for the front them. A Martha Stewart clone in the making? eek.
Still not very RPG. But that's why we play World of Warcraft - to get our fix of RPG!
Sorry, Clive.
During the summer, the kids have a very lax schedule. We only have a couple of karate classes and the occasional day trip planned, but otherwise, they're free to choose what to do with their day at home. My husband works from home during the summer months, but he's actually working, and doesn't have time to prod them to get dressed etc. To keep things semi-organized, I leave them a To-Do list when I head into the office for my 1/2 day of droning. When my son complained that it wasn't much fun to do "to-do's", I started calling it a quest list, and he perked up.
They have the normal grinding quests like make your bed, and clean one section of your room, for which they get 1 point each. There are extra credit quests like Swiffer the kitchen floor, or put all the dirty clothes into the basket. If they do 3 extra credit quests in one week, they'll accumulate enough points to turn in for something fun on Friday. Some weeks it's a video game rental (shhh - I get free coupons from Blockbuster on-line once a month, so this is a cheep prize!) or a trip to McD's. They can even save up their points and redeem them for a larger prize, like a new Wii game or a Webkinz, which pays me back in quiet time when they're busy playing with their new prize. Plus I've got the bonus of having a semi-clean floor, and not having to gather the laundry from indiviual rooms myself. I usually do one "you choose" extra credit during the week, and it's interesting to see what the kids will choose to do as an extra help around the house. My son, the laziest boy on the planet, often will choose something like using the cleaning wipes to shine the bathroom sinks (a 30 second job - if you're slow). My daughter chose to organize the snack and drinks baskets, and even created labels for the front them. A Martha Stewart clone in the making? eek.
Still not very RPG. But that's why we play World of Warcraft - to get our fix of RPG!
Sorry, Clive.
Thursday, August 7, 2008
Parental Controls in Games - why I like them
MCVUK.com recently posted a piece that says Microsoft will be adding Parental Controls to Gears of War 2. The violence filter will allow you to filter out bad language and change blood to sparks during fighting. The change of blood to sparks is something I haven't seen before, and is a nice way to clean up the game without changing the overall game experience.
I don't believe profanity filter is anything new, but I do believe this is something good. I have two kids in the house, and my PC is in an open area of the sun room mainly so I can be accessible to the kids. The downside of this comes when I want to play a video that may not be appropriate for kids to watch over my shoulder, or play a game that contains more violence or swear words than I want to expose them to right now. So I when I see information like Microsoft adding Parental Controls to Gears of War 2, then I might be more inclined to take a look at the game, rather than pass over it because it's got a "Mature" rating and I don't have enough late-night time free for yet another M-rated game.
I use the ratings on both games and movies with a grain of salt. The ESRB generally does a good job of rating games, but sometimes they error on the side of caution. For instance, earlier this year we picked up Transformers, The Game by Activision, which is rated "T" for Teen. Personally, I think the game would have been fine with an E 10+ (Everyone 10 and older) rating. I let my 10 year old son play it, and I don't feel the violence is excessive. After all, they're robots, so it's not overly realistic. Obviously everyone needs to make their own decisions about what games are appropriate for their own children, and I feel my son is mature enough to realize that it's just a game.
I've also given him permission to join my husband in his Friday Night Fights gaming event, provided they use the Parental Filter when available. My husband, my brother, a cousin and two or three various work friends get together online every Friday night to play. The game varies, depending on what they're in the mood for, or what's new. They started out with Call of Duty, which I would not allow my son to play at the time (I think that was 2 years ago.) They've recently moved on to Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon Advance Warfare 2, by Ubisoft. It's got a T rating, which I agree with. There is no Parental Filter, but as there is minimal swearing, and hardly any blood, I feel my son can handle it. I get the eye-roll when I comment "You know you can re-spawn in real life, right?" (I'm a Mom, I can't help it.) Before this game, they were playing Unreal Tournament 3, rated M, which does contain a profanity filter, and involved Aliens so while it looked scary, it was in a fun way, not something likely to induce nightmares.
I've also noticed that all the guys self-filter their Ventrillo communication when my son is joining them, which I appreciate. Most of them have children in their houses as well, so it's probably habit anyway.
The guys no long play UT3 together, so I've taken it over, and play on my own. I like it because I can practice WASD'ing to move around. I'm used to World of Warcraft - where you can move using the WASD keys has well, but I tend to use the two-mouse buttons instead as it's a smoother trip, and I need my left hand to hit the number keys to Kidney-shot, Backstab and Gouge. And I have the profanity filter turned on, so I don't need to worry about little parrots repeating inapropriate phrases while playing at their friend's houses.
So for me Parental Controls in video games is a good thing, allowing me to tweak a game to a level I feel comfortable with. As a Mom who games, I appreciate anything the game makers can do to allow me a wider variety of games I can play with kids nearby.
I don't believe profanity filter is anything new, but I do believe this is something good. I have two kids in the house, and my PC is in an open area of the sun room mainly so I can be accessible to the kids. The downside of this comes when I want to play a video that may not be appropriate for kids to watch over my shoulder, or play a game that contains more violence or swear words than I want to expose them to right now. So I when I see information like Microsoft adding Parental Controls to Gears of War 2, then I might be more inclined to take a look at the game, rather than pass over it because it's got a "Mature" rating and I don't have enough late-night time free for yet another M-rated game.
I use the ratings on both games and movies with a grain of salt. The ESRB generally does a good job of rating games, but sometimes they error on the side of caution. For instance, earlier this year we picked up Transformers, The Game by Activision, which is rated "T" for Teen. Personally, I think the game would have been fine with an E 10+ (Everyone 10 and older) rating. I let my 10 year old son play it, and I don't feel the violence is excessive. After all, they're robots, so it's not overly realistic. Obviously everyone needs to make their own decisions about what games are appropriate for their own children, and I feel my son is mature enough to realize that it's just a game.
I've also given him permission to join my husband in his Friday Night Fights gaming event, provided they use the Parental Filter when available. My husband, my brother, a cousin and two or three various work friends get together online every Friday night to play. The game varies, depending on what they're in the mood for, or what's new. They started out with Call of Duty, which I would not allow my son to play at the time (I think that was 2 years ago.) They've recently moved on to Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon Advance Warfare 2, by Ubisoft. It's got a T rating, which I agree with. There is no Parental Filter, but as there is minimal swearing, and hardly any blood, I feel my son can handle it. I get the eye-roll when I comment "You know you can re-spawn in real life, right?" (I'm a Mom, I can't help it.) Before this game, they were playing Unreal Tournament 3, rated M, which does contain a profanity filter, and involved Aliens so while it looked scary, it was in a fun way, not something likely to induce nightmares.
I've also noticed that all the guys self-filter their Ventrillo communication when my son is joining them, which I appreciate. Most of them have children in their houses as well, so it's probably habit anyway.
The guys no long play UT3 together, so I've taken it over, and play on my own. I like it because I can practice WASD'ing to move around. I'm used to World of Warcraft - where you can move using the WASD keys has well, but I tend to use the two-mouse buttons instead as it's a smoother trip, and I need my left hand to hit the number keys to Kidney-shot, Backstab and Gouge. And I have the profanity filter turned on, so I don't need to worry about little parrots repeating inapropriate phrases while playing at their friend's houses.
So for me Parental Controls in video games is a good thing, allowing me to tweak a game to a level I feel comfortable with. As a Mom who games, I appreciate anything the game makers can do to allow me a wider variety of games I can play with kids nearby.
Wednesday, August 6, 2008
The Game shelf is about to get overcrowded
Just read an article from my current fav magazine site, www.Wired.com that talks about how many Hollywood Studios are heading back into game arena after bailing out a few years ago. What does this mean to the Gaming Mom? It means I'm going to be fending off even more requests for games related to whatever movie and/or TV show my kids are currently excited about, which I already do, only more so.
I've already got proof that the game/movie tie-in works. We saw the Disney movie Wall-E the day it came out, and enjoyed it. Within a week, my kids discovered the Wall-E web site on Disney.com, and downloaded (with my approval) the demo for the game. They worked around the house for two weeks to earn enough "extra credits" for me to buy the game for our Nintendo Wii, and then played every chance they got. My daughter challenged me to some of the small multi-player games, and once I got the hang of it, we had fun.
I've also got proof that it works the other way as well. My son asked for and received the Lego Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy game for PC for his birthday, and played it almost daily until he'd gotten to the end. He'd played the PS2 version at a friends house, which sparked the request, but had never seen any of the Star Wars movies, and was only familiar with the characters in the context of the game. One rainy afternoon I decided to watch Star Wars IV, A New Hope, and he sat with me. He enjoyed it so much, he went straight to the DVD shelf and took out the next installment for us to watch as well. What was exciting for him was seeing scenes that were faithfully reproduced in the Lego game unfold on screen, and to be able to understand everything that was going on. He even used his own money to buy the Wii version of the game, so he could play with his friends when they came over. His interest in the games, and the DVD's of the movies has continued, and he's eagerly counting down the days until the release of Star Wars: The Clone Wars next week. If it weren't for the games, I'd be attending that movie by myself, or calling my other geeky friends and arranging a viewing with them.
Releasing video games to 'match' movies is an increasing trend, designed to get us to spend money not only at the theaters but later at Best Buy or Target when the game is released. And from what I'm getting from that article, soon there will be more TV shows with game tie-ins as well. My daughter already has Hannah Montana everything from the pillowcase, shirt, jewlery, wig and also the Wii game already. If they start releasing games for even more TV shows, I'm going to be in constant "No" mode - "No, stop asking me for the Fosters Home for Imaginary Friends game for the Wii, we've already spent our game budget for the next two months!"
Sigh. I haven't even checked. They probably already have a Fosters game out there. We're just going to have to avoid that section of the store.
I've already got proof that the game/movie tie-in works. We saw the Disney movie Wall-E the day it came out, and enjoyed it. Within a week, my kids discovered the Wall-E web site on Disney.com, and downloaded (with my approval) the demo for the game. They worked around the house for two weeks to earn enough "extra credits" for me to buy the game for our Nintendo Wii, and then played every chance they got. My daughter challenged me to some of the small multi-player games, and once I got the hang of it, we had fun.
I've also got proof that it works the other way as well. My son asked for and received the Lego Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy game for PC for his birthday, and played it almost daily until he'd gotten to the end. He'd played the PS2 version at a friends house, which sparked the request, but had never seen any of the Star Wars movies, and was only familiar with the characters in the context of the game. One rainy afternoon I decided to watch Star Wars IV, A New Hope, and he sat with me. He enjoyed it so much, he went straight to the DVD shelf and took out the next installment for us to watch as well. What was exciting for him was seeing scenes that were faithfully reproduced in the Lego game unfold on screen, and to be able to understand everything that was going on. He even used his own money to buy the Wii version of the game, so he could play with his friends when they came over. His interest in the games, and the DVD's of the movies has continued, and he's eagerly counting down the days until the release of Star Wars: The Clone Wars next week. If it weren't for the games, I'd be attending that movie by myself, or calling my other geeky friends and arranging a viewing with them.
Releasing video games to 'match' movies is an increasing trend, designed to get us to spend money not only at the theaters but later at Best Buy or Target when the game is released. And from what I'm getting from that article, soon there will be more TV shows with game tie-ins as well. My daughter already has Hannah Montana everything from the pillowcase, shirt, jewlery, wig and also the Wii game already. If they start releasing games for even more TV shows, I'm going to be in constant "No" mode - "No, stop asking me for the Fosters Home for Imaginary Friends game for the Wii, we've already spent our game budget for the next two months!"
Sigh. I haven't even checked. They probably already have a Fosters game out there. We're just going to have to avoid that section of the store.
Saturday, August 2, 2008
Not all gamers are Male, or under 25
I'm not ashamed to admit it: I Game.
An article in the Boston Globe a while back raised the question of whether is more socially acceptable to admit an addiction to drugs or porn, than to a game. Not that I have an addiction. I can stop any time I want to. Right after I finish up this quest...
I consider myself a casual gamer, a few steps above playing the Solitare that comes with Windows, and more than a few steps below having game-controller calluses. Why is this even worth mentioning? Well, I'm part of a new gaming demographic. Companies like Nintendo are hot to get my type of player, and I'm willing to let them.
Before I started playing games, I thought 'gamers' where under-socialized males living in their parents basements way past the age on consent. Oh, sure, I dabbled in a few games: "You Don't Know Jack" was a favorite in the mid-'90's, but never considered myself a gamer. Two years ago, I was visiting my brother in Georgia when he said "Take a look at this, I found this game that I think you'll really like." It was World of Warcraft. When I got back home, I loaded up the trial version, and played for a couple of hours. I was hooked. I promptly went out and plunked down my $39.99 (now it's available for $19.99) to get my full-access product key, and have been killing off mobs in Azeroth and Outland ever since.
I play most of my games on my Windows-based PC, but recently purchased a Nintendo Wii. Subconsiously, it might have been a secret plot to get my kids playing the Wii so they'd quit hogging my PC and cutting into MY play time. But I enjoy playing on the Wii as well.
In later blogs, I'll get into what games I play, what games I allow my kids to play and how I manage to balance real life with gaming.
An article in the Boston Globe a while back raised the question of whether is more socially acceptable to admit an addiction to drugs or porn, than to a game. Not that I have an addiction. I can stop any time I want to. Right after I finish up this quest...
I consider myself a casual gamer, a few steps above playing the Solitare that comes with Windows, and more than a few steps below having game-controller calluses. Why is this even worth mentioning? Well, I'm part of a new gaming demographic. Companies like Nintendo are hot to get my type of player, and I'm willing to let them.
Before I started playing games, I thought 'gamers' where under-socialized males living in their parents basements way past the age on consent. Oh, sure, I dabbled in a few games: "You Don't Know Jack" was a favorite in the mid-'90's, but never considered myself a gamer. Two years ago, I was visiting my brother in Georgia when he said "Take a look at this, I found this game that I think you'll really like." It was World of Warcraft. When I got back home, I loaded up the trial version, and played for a couple of hours. I was hooked. I promptly went out and plunked down my $39.99 (now it's available for $19.99) to get my full-access product key, and have been killing off mobs in Azeroth and Outland ever since.
I play most of my games on my Windows-based PC, but recently purchased a Nintendo Wii. Subconsiously, it might have been a secret plot to get my kids playing the Wii so they'd quit hogging my PC and cutting into MY play time. But I enjoy playing on the Wii as well.
In later blogs, I'll get into what games I play, what games I allow my kids to play and how I manage to balance real life with gaming.
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