Mini-Addicts

Over on the Huffington Post, Rachel Mosteller is wondering if some parents are now raising mini-addicts - a worry raised by seeing a computer (and collection of games) being given on a fourth birthday. This leads to some reflection on an evident lack of moderation and parental guidance in the use of technology. For her own children, Rachel wants them to “learn to use these items in moderation while still enjoying the non-technical side of life.”

Sensible enough, and hardly controversial.

What got me though was the story related in one of the story’s comments:

I’m having that problem with my nephew. He’s 6 years old and tops the charts in Call Of Duty 4. His little hand is stretching across the keyboard to precisely pull off moves. The problem is that’s all the thinks about now. He hasn’t been going to sleep lately.

I don’t know where to begin.

Edutainment for the masses

Proof (if any was needed) that commercial serious gaming is here hit me last night when I saw adverts for UbiSoft’s My Health Coach on television - a Nintendo DS game that comes with its own pedometer! The ‘game’ advises you on your diet and daily exercise, providing advice and encouragement to keep a healthier lifestyle. From a series of My Coach ‘games’ that include the likes of My Word Coach (improve your word-power) and My Life Coach (improve everything, presumably).

Meantime, global games publishing giant Electronic Arts are taking the (apparently well known in the US) Brain Quest school curriculum based card decks to DS -

Brain Quest is EA Casual Entertainment’s first educational game and we are thrilled to bring this beloved brand into the videogame space,” said Robert Nashak, VP of Casual Studios, EA Casual Entertainment. “By adapting the series to the DS, we are able to reach today’s tech savvy children and provide them with an educational experience that is interactive, engaging, and fun.

I don’t think anyone would have predicted this Dr Kawashima effect - educational games are now fully part of the mainstream. That didn’t take long…

Root of all (modern) evil? Alcohol or GTA IV?

(Found this in my box of draft posts… )

When GTA IV was launched - going on sale at midnight on a Monday night - the launch was marred by a stabbing incident. This confirms that GTA IV is somewhere near the root of evil according to the Daily Mail and Keith Vaz.

MCV took the time to get some witness statements, and found that perhaps drunkenness and general loutishness was more to blame - with quite possibly no connection to GTA IV at all at all!

Branded for Virtual Life

Continuing developments in the continuing efforts to turn virtual playgrounds into spaces every bit as brand sensitive as real school playgrounds…

Millions of Us has launched a new company to specialise in creating branded goods for virtual worlds.

The Barbie Girls subscription service is now live. Subscribers get exclusive content and get to wear tiaras to help mark them out, and presumable to lord it over the non-subscribers. After all, why launch a subscription service if non-subscribers can’t be easily identified and mocked by those whose parents can pay? I may be being a little bit cynical here, but this seems to be a deliberate tactic to leverage the power of the ‘in-clique’.

A billion virtual world users… 10 years from now

From Game Daily. Analysts ‘Strategy Analytics’ forecast a staggering billion virtual world users ten years from now. If we are including NeoPets, BarbieGirls, Lego Universe alongside the likes of Second Life and Habbo Hotel and including the games like Runescape and World of Warcraft, then that that might not be too far off.

Commercial health and education games

French games publisher UbiSoft has announced a line up of casual games which include a game to help you quit smoking, and a game for children to play teacher. Its clear that they are following the lead of Nintendo’s huge success with Brain Training, Nintendogs and the like - but also indicative of the recent leaps made (with the help of these games) towards games becoming socially acceptable. Or at least, certain types of games…

BBC’s Virtual World praised by the BBC…

Children’s BBC (CBBC) have been beta-testing a virtual world for children - ‘Adventure Rock‘. A major launch is probably imminent given the appearance at the weekend of the article “Web worlds ‘useful’ for children” on the BBC news site. (I think that the world is actually now open to all, but haven’t seen the launch yet… maybe I don’t see enough CBBC)

A little comment below, and a minor ethical dilemma…

Pay to Play

Short article here from the Charlotte Observer looking at the phenomena of virtual worlds for children - and their methods of getting children (or their parents) to part with money (via BJ Berquist at TappedIn).

I think it is very easy to criticize companies from trying to get children to part with money - and there are many examples of unethical marketing practices that do target children. On the other hand, games are a form of entertainment - and it is not unreasonable for companies to try to make money for providing entertainment. Acceptable for DVD or music sales, certainly.

I think I remain more concerned about, and interested in, the content of games, and the behaviors and values that they can promote and what is being learned by the children playing the games. But the marketing value of virtual worlds has not escaped companies with products to sell to children - and the online world remains unaffected by many of the legislative controls on marketing and advertising. Also of interest are the ways in which games use the allure of premium content to turn trial users/free players into subscribers - can these methods cross some invisible line into exploitation?

I want to pick one example from the article… from BarbieGirls which has till now been free to play. A two-tier system which allows free play as before - but provides special content to subscribers - is now on the way:

But a collection of some games and fashion items will be off limits unless they become a V.I.P. player, which requires cash. VIPs are distinguished from the other Barbies by their sparkling tiaras.

So in a virtual world where looking fabulous is a major part of the experience, only those who pay can possibly looks truly fabulous. And this in a virtual world which itself is part marketing exercise for a range of plastic toys.

Dissecting Club Penguin

I’m not the only one disconcerted by the extent to which childrens’ virtual worlds appear to be training grounds for tomorrow’s unthinking consumers. Via recent discussion at RezEd:

At Shaping Youth, the question is asked: Virtual Worlds Are Still Unwritten: Can We Move Beyond Consumption?

This is a good discursive post - and draws on a wide range of writing, reports and commentators to illustrate why marketers are stampeding towards the creation of virtual worlds for children - and why we need to be concerned.

At Feeding Change, Liam O’Donnel has similar concerns (some crossposting between the two), and Liam has gone so far as to create a second blog to host his studies into Club Penguin - to look at how Virtual Worlds are redefining literacy for children. Considering, for example, the literacy of status which seems to be a major force in the design/success of Club Penguin.

From all of which common themes emerge - children are engaging with new literacies of status and with messages that reinforce the idea that ‘you are what you own’. Something that educators and parents really should be more aware of.

Game Playing and Asperger’s

Should have blogged this last week…

Skewed coverage of academic report in the Dire Mail (sorry, Daily Mail) : Computer game addicts warned they could start behaving like autism sufferers. Of course the report warns no such thing, as discussed here at Spong: Daily Mail muddles cause and effect .

According to Spong, the original paper basically imagines a line ranging from ‘autistic’ to ‘not autistic’, and notes that game players (along with the likes of engineers!) are found closer to the autistic end of the line than non-gamers.