Dads Gaming with Their Kids
Published June 4, 2007
In honor of Father's Day, TriXie recently asked the gamer Dads in the Xbox.com forums to share their experiences playing with their kids. Here's what some of them had to say:
I play Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved with my 18-month-old daughter. She likes all the flashy graphics. For some reason, she also likes it when I play Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. She says, "Wow!" quite a bit. She likes to take over the controller when I'm fooling around in Test Drive® Unlimited. When she was younger, she danced to the credits of Gears of War®.
—Butwheaty
My 8-year-old daughter loves Sonic and Viva Piñata™. She likes to watch me play Marvel™: Ultimate Alliance, Tiger Woods PGA TOUR® 07, Enchanted Arms™, Burnout Revenge™, Ninety-Nine Nights™, Cloning Clyde and Gauntlet®. I would say it really does help with bonding as it's something we can do together that she wants to do, and even when she's just watching she's cheering me on, saying "Aww" when I make a mistake and even offering advice from time to time. "Why don't you try the jumping attack?" or "Don't forget to grab that thing over there." It's also helpful in explaining the whole good vs. bad, people die and life goes on for those around them and so on.
—MN12 ShadowDrgn
MN12 ShadowDrgn 's daughter helps him play Enchanted Arms.
My 7-year-old daughter grew up with Leapster L-max type games so I was subtly directing her mindset towards the gaming mentality early. When we bought a Xbox 360™ she inherited my original Xbox®. Her favorite game was Spider-Man, especially the training mode when Bruce Campbell would say "Whoa whoa whoa there, Captain Jumpy," whenever she would make Spidey jump off the building. To her, that is the funniest thing in the world.
Gaming has definitely brought us closer because it's something we both extremely enjoy. Sometimes I let my competitiveness get the best of me and it takes a slap on the head from the wife to take it easy on the kid LOL! She watched me play GoW a few times but she doesn't like it. She's always saying how gross it is (gory), so now I never play it in front of her.
—Wheatious
My 12-year-old son and I play tons of games together. He was introduced to gaming very early on in his life, pretty much since the day he was born. I have pictures of him at six months old sitting on my knee, while his uncle and I played Mortal Kombat for hours on end. He spent endless hours at about three or four watching me play Shadowman on his N64. Still haven't beat that damn game. Now that he has his own Xbox LIVE® account, (which he pays for on his own) we enjoy playing Gears of War together, and countless XBLA games. Gaming has been great for us. I can't imagine ever stopping.
—Ace Octane
I have a 4-year-old, five next month, and I let her play any arcade game, though at the moment she likes Boom Boom Rocket (freestyle), Rayman Raving Rabbids™ (she laughs at the bird poopin' on Rayman), Dead Rising™ (she likes it, honest … LOL … when the zombies groan and go "Raaah!," so does she when running away from them) though I don't make it a regular thing as it has shook her up and she wouldn't sleep for 2 days. She likes Viva Piñata (she plays it with her Mum), TMNT™ (retail version, plays with both of us), Kameo™: Elements of Power™ (all by herself, won't let me touch it … LOL … she loves fairies, I guess). She likes Zelda on the Gamecube. I have three games on one disk, Ocarina of Time, Windwalker and something else, Super Mario Sunshine and Luigi's Mansion. I do find it hard at times to find a game that she would like and that I wouldn't have to worry about leaving her alone with it. (I have Gears and the like but keep them in a separate drawer when she wants to play.) That's why my list is full of games from the Arcade (I didn't give her her own profile, that was until she deleted my Saints Row game … We'll say no more on that subject, shall we? … No, we shan't, LOL).
—DarkNecros1978
Boom Boom Rocket is a great family game.
I have three kids, ages three, eight and 12, and all of them love video games. The only member of the family who is left out in the cold is my wife, who just doesn't see the attraction. My 12-year-old and I have been playing together pretty much since the day he was old enough to handle a computer mouse. I started him off on the JumpStart series on the computer at about three years old. From there, we progressed to matching Nintendo GameBoys, the PS1, PS2, Xbox (original) and now the Xbox 360. The kid is now a computer whiz and is every bit as good (and probably better) than I am at the gaming. He has his own Xbox LIVE Gold membership.
My 8-year-old is a girl and doesn't play as much as we do but she loves to watch us play. She really loved the Harry Potter stuff when that was popular. She also played a lot of the Jak and Dexter, Ratchet & Clank series on the PS2. (Sorry Xbox, but if you haven't tried these … they are really fun and clever.) Not to say that she is a sissy though. She will tell you that her favorite Halo® weapon is the rocket launcher! The 3-year-old right now is more into the PC than anything. Right now he is obsessed with Backyard Baseball (a highly recommended series for younger kids). But he also occasionally asks me to play Spyro the Dragon with him (again, PS2). He always wants his own controller and pretends to play along with me.
—SandRunner001
Well, my 4-year-old LOVES LEGO® Star Wars®! His reward for being good at pre-school is to play for about half-an-hour a night. We would play co-op but I would get mad when he didn't get the coins. I just purchased Shrek the Third™ for him after we went to the movie. We set up an egg timer, and when the ringer goes off, he knows that his playing time is finished … no complaining!
—RIDTHEGR8
My daughter is 13 months old. She holds the Xbox 360 controller, repeatedly hits it and then shouts something incomprehensible at the TV. Who said role models were dead? I remember being young and always hankering after the latest console, having to go round to the house of the one kid in school whose parents were cool (wealthy) enough to buy it, just to get a go on the latest magic box. I guess that I'm not alone in this experience. How different it will be for our generation's children, they won't need to hanker after the next best console, we'll already have it on pre-order.
—Chummp Change
My son is two, and he likes watching Feeding Frenzy™ (the fishy game as he calls it). And he tries to play PAC-MAN. The majority of the games I have however, must be played after his bedtime, stuff he shouldn't hear or things that might give him nightmares.
—simul8er
The fishy game as simul8er's son calls it.
My 14 and 13-year-old girls both love Viva Piñata and play as much as possible … except when my 7-year-old is around. He loves Call of Duty® 2 and plays multiplayer all the time, to the point where he is way better than me. Apparently, his new name is Vasily and everyone else is Comrade Commissar. He also told me that Potato Mashers are very bad as well and we have a mine field around the house!
—Jaime RH
I have a 6-year-old daughter and she really has fun playing games with me. Right now her favorites are Viva Piñata, UNO®, The Simpsons™ Hit and Run™, and Marvel: Ultimate Alliance. When she gets a little bit older, I'm going to hook up my old 2600 in her room so she can have her own system to play on. She knows that there are games that she's not allowed to play or watch because they're not meant for kids, and defining where that line is will be something I do myself as her and my 2-week-old son grow up. I'm looking forward to sharing my hobby with them, and I'm looking forward to the day when they start beating me at my own games.
My own Dad is a bit of a closet gamer himself. He was the one who got me (unasked!) my original Atari and I remember hearing him and my mom playing Stampede at night after they sent me to bed. After the 2600 days, he didn't want anything to do with games much, until I brought over my SNES on a visit and F-Zero. Now he keeps a 64 in his grandkids' room with a few racing games and a copy of Conker's Bad Fur Day. He's not a very big "laugh-out-loud" kind of guy, but he got a real big kick out of the humor in that one!
—Sir Razorback
Started playing games with my two kids when they basically knew how to say Nintendo.;) At the moment, I play Project Gotham Racing® 3 with them as, apparently, I am a fast driver in real life and they love the fact they can beat me. How true this is, I don't know :P I feel it brings me and my kids together, especially nowadays when it seems to be harder and harder to talk to your kids about things that are happening to them. I try and slip in the "So how was school today?" when I'm flying past them at 180mph, as it seems the only time I will get a truthful response. Only downside now is the general public can see my score, and see how bad I really am ;)
—No1Boys
So how was school today? Wait, I have to make a pass.
I have twin boys (not identical) that are just about two years old. They love to hold my controllers and sit in my lap while I play. They seem to enjoy my racing games the most. Of course, cruising down a straightaway at 200mph and all of a sudden your son decides he needs to get up, can really put a damper in that turn around the corner you're trying to slow down for. I can't wait until they are old enough so they can finally join me and give me some stiff competition!
—MiScOnCePt1oN
I have a 3-year-old son and he just likes to watch his Dad play games. He tries to help me by yelling some kind of advice that just comes out as garbled words. I try to get him to play but he just wants to watch. Maybe when he's older he can challenge me. I try not to play violent games in front of him though.
—Vinnysdad
My 11-month-old boy loves sitting next to me with the spare pad in his hand. For some reason Gears is his fav game, he keeps laughing at the locusts. I think he thinks he's controlling the player, even though the pads are turned off. I love it how he watches me and presses the buttons I'm pressing. Rayman makes him cry, dunno if it's Rayman himself, or the bunnies. LOL.
—Ray Tugly
My 15-year-old and and 11-year-old stepson play the Halo series and we all love them all. My 15-year-old is addicted to Guitar Hero II™ and is responsible for all the points the family has as achievements. The three girls (10, 8, and 7) love to watch, but the only shooter they watch is Halo. The eleven year-old loves The Lord of the Rings,™ The Battle for Middle-earth II™ and anything Star Trek or Wars. Really the only bonding we do through Xbox 360 though is with the Halo series. Yet another reason to love that Bungie creation.
—Lunar Hoax
I've been playing since I was 10 years old. My first system was the Atari 2600 … LOL, how games have changed. I was a Nintendo player and two years ago, made the leap to Xbox (best decision ever). My daughters are full fledged gamer girls. Xbox LIVE has been great as it allows us to play together, being that one of them lives in Tulsa, OK. We are a very hardcore family. We game in Halo 2 and the beta (Halo® 3 already reserved), Gears of War, Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter™ (1 and 2), Crackdown™, the list grows … LOL My Mom hates it, but gaming has kept me and my girls close even in their teenage years, and as we all know, that can be hard enough. Thanks, Microsoft for making a great system … Game on gamer dads!
—Internalconflic
I'm Everlast Boxer's Dad. He told me to post here. He's 17. We game on the same profile he posts with. We play GoW all the time. Although he is better than I am, I can hit him with a headshot all the time. We play a lot of the Halo 3 beta, Perfect Dark Zero™, and The Elder Scrolls® IV: Oblivion™ all the time. I started gaming back in the 80s with PAC-MAN and Galaga at the Arcade down at the lodge. Since then, I have been a moderate gamer. I owned the original Xbox on opening day and my son bought a Xbox 360 months after release. On average, we game for at least an hour every day, and every other weekend we have our infamous "Oblivion sleepouts" in which we get two TVs and play Oblivion all night, order pizza, and drink tons of Sprite. I think gaming has allowed many good things with my son and I. One, he learned how to win like a pro and lose like a pro, two, we get to spend more time together having a great time, and three, it's fun!
—Everlast Boxer's Dad
I have a 7-year-old son. Right now, we are playing through Pirates of the Caribbean™ together. He loves to play the Halo 3 beta but we haven't played it much since he outscored me in BTB on Valhalla. He likes to play Aegis Wing in the Arcade, and we usually rent kid's games for him to play. He is not allowed to play or watch me play GoW or GTA.
—SKINJURED
My 5-year-old daughter loves Viva Piñata, and she is very good at Burnout® 3: Takedown™ where she can often survive longer than me on the Road Rage multiplayer mode.
—SteveOll
I play GoW with my 4-year-old daughter and she also loves Marble Blast Ultra. I recently bought her Spider-Man and she loved that.
—N1NJA AssAss1N
