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The Family That Games Together Online
GamerDad has a piece talking about families gaming together online. The article profiles some gamer families. Brian Reynolds, CEO of Big Huge Games, is cited as an example; He games together with his sons. The article also touches on the more serious issues of addiction and quality time. From the article: "Another hidden benefit to online games is that families spread over several states can keep in touch and play online together. Thompson agrees, 'I never foresaw how important the games online would become, but I did actually get a line added into my divorce decree that guaranteed me three days a week that I could get on the computer with my kids, via web cam. So I could communicate and see them. At the time, I wasn't a huge MMORPG player, so I didn't envision the role it would play.'"
We used to WoW together: Him a 60 priest, me a 60 warrior. Then that rat bastard rolled on my Brainhacker, and I squelched his ass!
I'll form my OWN solar system! With blackjack! And hookers!
You mean, as in "Xbox LIVE"?
Grundes!
Until he signed up for WoW, we rarely ever spoke, even though we both miss each other very much.
Now that I've added him to my guild, he won't leave me the hell alone. I've learned to hate my family now, they're all ninka looters. FuXin n00b.
- Just my $0.02, take with a grain of salt, your mileage may vary.
My son and I have played been playing online games together since EQ1 came out.
:)
He is now 16 and we are playing EQ2 together. There have been a couple of other MMORPGs in between.
Before that though, we gamed on consoles and I introduced him to PC games at an early age.
Gaming together, and play in general, is something all parents should do with their children. My son and I are much closer than we might have been, and definitely gotten some deeper insight into each other.
Playing an RPG like EQ or WoW, gives a young person a chance to exercise their personal skills in a variety of settings, being their with him/her gives a parent a chance to mentor, observce and assist.
As for the insight part, my son and I play totally differently in some areas. Grouping up, we learn how the other thinks about things, like fair play, how to treat others, and prioritizing.
That sad, game play is no substitute for good parenting. So, if you're excuse for not spending any other time with yoiur family is that you play EQ together....well, you read the article.
Laters,
Tojosan
I spend time with my family doing activities such as watching things like Stargate or watching different movies or playing trivial pursuit or recently watching Olympics. It can be very quality time, because the quality of the time is not just about the activity you are sharing, but the way you share it. Watching an episode of Stargate that stimulates a discussion about a certain topic causes us to interact in a way we would not have interacted without the show. The same goes for trivial pursuit, it can stimulate a conversation about oh remember when such and such.
If anybody else in my family actually had an active interest in gaming, then playing a game we enjoyed in common would easily represent quality time with them. I certainly feel fragging nubs with my friends outside the family has been quality time. I have certainly enjoyed dominating a server with an ex-girlfriend before, it presented an opportunity for bonding over a shared interest and promoted thinking as a unit.
You are not permitted to come within __one_subnet___ of ____her_name____.
John
I don't take issue with your passing judgment; it's a critical thing to do in order to make decisions every day. However, your judgment was passed too quickly. I bring to this conversation real-world evidence, even if it is only one case. Man and woman are married, have daughter. Later, woman cheats on man. Man finds out. Woman continues to cheat. Weak-spined man continues to forgive, expecting something to change as he goes on and continues to be a good father. Woman divorces man and marries her latest boyfriend. Court grants custody of daughter and almost all possessions to woman. Man is stuck paying $20k/yr child support in addition to college for the next 12 years. There are more details that were not mentioned, but suffice to say every detail points to this: this woman is a bitch and this man is a good person. The man was treated wrongly by the court.
So one thing to take from this story is that sometimes good husbands and fathers are given a raw deal only because their wives are terrible people and they made a bad judgment to marry.
I don't know about you all, but there were moments during many an NES battle between my sisters and I that ended with a chunky controller being flung toward a skull. If you threw MMO drama into the mix, a family like mine may well end up pressing charges.
Those NES pads had some corners, I tellya what..
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I realise reading TFA is a quite an ordeal for todays ridlin fed ADD youth, but it even says in the SUMMARY, "At the time, I wasn't a huge MMORPG player, so I didn't envision the role it would play."
He didn't start gaming until AFTER the divorce. Most likely either he, or his wife moved and the wife maintained custody. He could have been the best father ever, and the divorce could have been amicable, but if he or his x-wife moved across the country you can't honestly expect him to commute 2500 miles for 4 hours 3 nights a week. Sitting in front of a web cam for 4 hours a night talking to your father could get rather boring for a child. Why not spend an hour talking about life, then playing a game together? Seems like a perfectly good way to hang out with a child from across the country.
-Rick
"Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
Her favorite configuration is Protoss (her) & Protoss (me) vs. Zerg (computer.)
I wrote about how she used to play the Terrans on my blog a while back.
If I'm lost in online stuff, I hear: "C'mon daddy, it's time to play StarCraft."
My girlfriend (who's at uni) and I play together, along with her mum. Talk about awkward
No shit.
On the plus side, her mum likes me without having met me.
Eh?........ Oh, computer games, I get it.
It's even more sad that watching TV counts as "quality time" for some people. At least in an MMORPG you're actually interacting with the other person, talking to them, and doing something together. Yes, it would probably be better to go outside and play catch or something, but that might not be practical if you're in another state (or it's raining out, etc). Then again, playing chess counts as quality time, right? Would playing chess on a computer be better/worse than playing chess with a real chess set? Anyway it's a lot more interactive that everyone just sitting in the same room staring at the TV.
Remember the days when Republicans were the party of fiscal responsibility?