Wimp

"You see, you have to jump on their heads, then they just sort of roll over and die."

Few things are as frustrating as sitting next to someone playing a video game badly. The game in question is New Super Mario Brothers for the Nintendo DS. He's spent the last five minutes attempting to get to the halfway mark of World 1-1.

"It's hard though," he observes, the corners of his eyes drawing thin and tight.

He closes the DS. Expertly, he pops out the cart. Looking me directly in the eye, he hands it to me. "You can play this daddy, I'll play Lego Star Wars."

This is Peter, my 5 year old son. Video game wimp.

I am surrounded by a parenting coven millions strong which expects me to laud every scribble on the preschool art pad, to deliver flowers to the most ridiculous dance performance, and cheer the most hamhanded attempt at a baseball throw. I understand this desire. As a child of the 70s, I was indoctrinated into a world of Episcopalian judgment, standardized tests and failures to make the varsity that left me wounded. The desire to react against this upbringing and coddle my children is deep and irresistible. And indeed, I get it. Praising effort, instead of just praising achievement, has had positive results in my own kids' academic development.

In fact, my daughter had so much difficulty with the standard lecture/homework/test pedagogy when learning to read, we became members of the Cult of the Pink Tower -- Montessori -- a system of education diametrically opposed to all the competitive structural systems most of us grew up with. The key premise of Montessori is to follow the child -- let them learn the way they learn, at their own pace, using a lot of hands-on work and long, intense work sessions instead of rapid-fire classes. There are no tests, there are no grades, there is no homework, and the first and fourth graders are all working together. And it's one of the best things that ever happened to our family. Both kids are thriving academically, and I know it's because we just lucked out -- it was right for them.

But it's also why my kids suck at video games, and this concerns me.

If you want to imagine what a Montessori video game looks like, you need look no further than Will Wright. All of his games, but Spore in particular, are designed explicitly as Montessori materials, places and systems where the student learns and experiences a system on their own, hopefully leading to mastery. And that's great and cool and wonderful and I'm really glad Wright has made these toys. My kids loved Spore Creature Creator. I loved it, briefly. It blended beautifully into this parenting cult that worships every effort and attempt.

But there is a voice in my head -- a constant, nagging voice -- that lives in rebellion to these principles. I see my kids thriving without homework and grades. They are growing emotionally and intellectually in all the ways I could ever want. But I worry they're soft.

There, I said it. I worry my kids are wimps.

The first reaction to this was to sign them both up for karate. Ironically, the modern dojo turns out to be a very Montessori place -- kids learn at their own pace, they progress when they're capable, they work hard in long sessions within a group of multiple ages and ranks. They took to it instantly, although their focus is very much on the experience of each class, not the difficulty or the challenge.

Which brings me back to Mario.

NSMB, to be fair, is not an easy game for a 5-year-old. I myself suck at platformers for the most part, although I grind my way through them time and time again. I find the vector analysis and timing often hard to master, and will throw myself against tricky levels dozens of times to get through them. In other words, I suck. But I'm fine with that. And I'm fine if my kids end up sucking too. We can be like some circus family of asstacular video game players. "Come see the world record attempt for most retries at World 3-4 in a single afternoon!"

But being bad isn't the same as being challenge-phobic. Right now, my kids' world is surrounded by experiences that are above all else avoidable. As a doting, guilt-ridden parent, I want to give them everything, and so I give them choices. And while hardly living in the lap of luxury, those choices naturally extend to the primary entertainment vectors in our household: books and games. I suspect the reason Peter has no interest in spending 10 minutes honing his goomba-jump is because he simply has no need to. He has a dozen other little Chiclets of plastic he can put into his hand-me-down DS which will require less effort. What possible incentive does he have to beat his head against a wall of challenge, when he could slip into the warm blanket of never-die Legoland?

But let's be honest: Who am I to judge? I, who in my 40's have resorted more and more to iPhone distractions and simple console games, and strayed further and further from my keyboard-overlay, all-day PC-strategy gaming roots. Perhaps the apple is just falling close to the tree. The old, tired, play-it-on-easy tree.

Comments

Hey Rabbit, great article! I have something to share on the similar experience with my cousin. When I was growing up my little cousin I would often let him play my Zelda Orcania of time. At the time he was only 8 and a game like that can be challenging for his age. He would often ask me to do the hard parts for him. I would do them, then I felt like I was doing a disservice for him and holding his hand to much. He needed to figure it out on his own. I would often get into trouble with my parents because I would never help him, but I decided to stand my ground.

It came to great relief at age 19 that he thank me for not hand holding with him all the time. He recently had a little brother he was doing the same to him then it finally click to him why I try to not help him. All my doubts of me being too hard on him was cleared.

Also another video game trend I been noticing on a similar note is MMORPGs. I remember "back in the day" with Asheron's Call on the Darktide server (the only PVP server) it was a free for all. Everybody, even if you were in the same guild, can kill each other. There was also NO npcs to save you. There was no trade system. If you wanted to trade items you had to lie it on the ground and do some kind of stand off.

PvP was not only the hard part about it. Even the PvE part of it was way hard. I remember being killed by a rabbit at level 1. A RABBIT. In WoW PvE is way easier (i cant speak for raids though, never done them) Also I remember fletching my own arrows together. Trying to find the right combination to discover a new spell. NPCs giving you quests but never telling you how to get there. Nothing on the map to tell you where to go. It was the wild west of video games.

Today I hear people complain about this zombie attack how it hinder on their loot findings and I think that they are major wimps. I don't want to judge because they should play however they want to play. But man, if they only knew how fun it was to be in the wild west of pvping. Each patch WoW has a section called the wimp section. Making mounts swim, no more arrows, making it easier to heal... etc etc... I'm worried that World Of Warcraft is making MMORPG wimps.

But of course, I play my wimp games. I think the key is to have a balance. Play your WoW on the days you need to relax, than play unforgiving counter strike when you have the competitive edge.

Right now it seems like Plants Vs Zombies is my wimp game while Demigod on vent is my manly game.

play NSMB 1v1 on 2 DS's and let him win a few.

Most kids like to win. And they have shorter attention spans. It's pretty natural for them not to want to play a game that kicks their ass for very long.

If a 5 yr old is too good at videogames I might question the parenting going on. LIke maybe the parents are letting him play too many games.

inspiringsn wrote:
*Legion* wrote:

I'll be breeding pwners, but someone has to breed the pwned.

What if the 'pwnee's won't play? What good does that do us?

Don't worry because I'll be breeding gamers who play for fun, and don't mid getting pwnd 6:1. That one time revenge is oh so sweet, even though it took 6 humiliating deaths to get it.

Rob Zacny wrote:

Sorry, Rabbit, but I think you're just going to have to reproduce again and get things started off right with some pre-K Megaman and Squad Leader.

Does he have to fully restart? Can't he just go back to a save or get a patch?

Wordsmythe wrote:

You weren't in the room, but I had a good conversation at RabbitCon talking about how to raise a child into table-top strategy games, which are not only difficult but adversarial. Certainly the complexity of a game is important, but what about getting the kid interested, coaching, throwing games, etc?

First off, this is written from a board game not a video game perspective. We play adversarial board games in my house and we tend toward cooperative mutliplayer video games or single player video games of any type.

At this point I never throw a game and rarely take it easy on my two kids (son 7, daughter 9). The only exception is when they are learning a game where I ease up. When we are learning I point out options that they can take until they get the basic mechanics, then it is mano a mano. When my daughter was younger I used to take it easy on her and let her win. That lasted for a very short time because she is competitive and will give me a hard time if she even thinks I am letting her win. Now, I do not take it easy so much as on occasion I adjust the game rules (scoring complexities) to slightly ease her difficulty level while keeping the intent close to the same. This works well and when she is up to speed, then we play it out with no gimmies and only the occasional, "can I redo that". She dislikes losing but is a good sport as well as a humble winner.

My son on the other hand hates to lose. He gets incredibly worked up and angry, not at his opponents, but at himself for missing something. He will even blame himself for bad luck. In his case I have gone down the path of pointing things out after he plays and giving him an option to rethink his move. He takes me up on the option about 1/3 of the time. I often give him options when the original play was correct so that he learns to think through and not always take one of my options. This has worked out well and he is less likely to get angry when he is done.

So overall I would say, don't throw games. In the end they (at least my kids) do not appreciate it. Also, if you play hard, they will play hard and they will in turn really savor the wins.

At least that is what I am doing and so far it seems to be working.

wordsmythe wrote:
Rob Zacny wrote:

Sorry, Rabbit, but I think you're just going to have to reproduce again and get things started off right with some pre-K Megaman and Squad Leader.

Does he have to fully restart? Can't he just go back to a save or get a patch?

If you look at Rabbit's description of the problem he's encountered, you'll see that he downloaded the Montessori virus into his family, which corrupted the installation. Nothing for it but a clean install. Fortunately, he's not that far along and he won't have to replay much.

Your fears are unfounded, Julian. I've played games against your son. You don't have to worry about him not having a competitive streak--if anything, you have to worry about his propensity for cheating the heck out of n00bs.

cmitts wrote:
Wordsmythe wrote:

You weren't in the room, but I had a good conversation at RabbitCon talking about how to raise a child into table-top strategy games, which are not only difficult but adversarial. Certainly the complexity of a game is important, but what about getting the kid interested, coaching, throwing games, etc?

First off, this is written from a board game not a video game perspective. We play adversarial board games in my house and we tend toward cooperative mutliplayer video games or single player video games of any type.

Yeah, our conversation was more about how to have children able to handle Advanced Squad Leader (and win) by the time they could drive.

rabbit, you know what has to be done. It's time for Peter to face the bear in your backyard.

cmitts wrote:

At this point I never throw a game and rarely take it easy on my two kids (son 7, daughter 9). The only exception is when they are learning a game where I ease up.

I'd ask that you treat me the same as your kids, but I'm not ready to lose that badly.

Frankly, there's already enough punk kids out there in internetland who can hand my ass to me on a plate. I applaud Rabbit for raising some fodder that even I, in my advancing years, might be able to beat.

This is a great article, and I'm not just saying that to avoid bruising your ego. My daughter's not old enough to even like video games yet, but I'm already worried that

a) she won't like them at all, or games of any kind, play, imagination, other worlds, etc. Some people are like that.
b) she won't ever play a hard puzzle/adventure game without looking up the answers on Gamefaqs
c) I'll condescend to her someday by just giving her the answers, or denying her assistance "to build character"

I guess I'll figure it out eventually. I just want her to be happy, smart, and good, all the time. So far, she's been able to pull it off, but that's because she's only a year old. What happens when she's old enough to hold a controller, or throw one in anger, or access the easy mode?

As the father of two boys (14 and 11), I think a lot of this really depends on the personality and temperament of the kid. Both have been playing video games since they were little. The older one gets frustrated easily and will walk away if things get too challenging, and if he thinks something will be too hard, he won't even try. The younger one is far more determined and will play a difficult level over and over and over well past the point of frustration (including primal yells at each further defeat) until he gets past it. He's also the "completionist" when it comes to collecting all the items, seeing all the endings, etc. It's just the way they are at their core, and we joke that their initials are AM and PM because they're like night and day.

I never thought of it that way. Then again, I'm not a parent.

To me, people give up on things simply because they're not fun. I like the fact that you let your children try to do things at their own pace. I think the only problem here is that they mature too quickly--they know what they like by the time they're 10 years old. While other kids would sit here, butting their heads against the wall until they gain the recognition for what they're doing (often in form of acceptance for their friends), your kid feels no pressure to do things against his will and turn games into work.
It also take strength of character to walk away from a losing battle and avoid the fallacy of modern MMORPG players.. "I hate this game, it sucks, but I'll play it anyway"--you see it all over the forums.

Maybe he will one day grow up to like platformers.. but that's the future. As of right now, he knows he likes Lego games more, and that's all anyone should care about.

Well, that felt great. To read that your kids are wimp made my day in a non-douchebaggy way

NSMB, i pretty much hated that game. It is not for someone wanting a 'casual' experience. I found it not to hard, but far to punishing. screw ups, eg falling down holes, losing a power needed to access something, or just finding the path to the alternate world was frustrating. I would take the gameboy super mario any day over it (the first or second).

on kids and games, I was playing wii fit at my cousins house with there children and that thing provided some very insightful situations. leaving them alone to play with it (3 of them ages 9-13) was intriguing as they first taught themselves and then tried to teach each other. they are very much in the mind set of doing the action in the game rather than the physicality of motions required to affect the right answer on screen.

I'm not too worried about my kids being video game wimps. Games are meant to be fun, and when you've played a game for 20 minutes and it's not been fun, well, "toodle pip unfun" game I say. I reckon the only reason we're willing to put up with brutal games, or games that require the acquisition of specific skills before they become fun is that we come From A Time when all games were like that, before the kind of distillation of pure fun that crystallised into the Lego games. If a game is still fun whilst you're learning the ropes, if it's designed to ease people in slowly (as most modern games are) then the kids will take the time to learn them. If not, then they won't. I imagine they'll be an interesting market for developers in 10 years' time.

It is a shame that the British school system has taken up the kind of modular coursework kind of ethos, since I was always good at exams. I suck, comparatively, at coursework and do better than I really deserve to at exams, and I suspect my 5yo son Thomas is the same. He had homework on his very first day of school, and has been having spelling tests every week since the start of his 3rd ever term at school. So, his primary school is pretty hardcore. And he's responding extremely well so far. Maybe my daughter won't be like that and will require this touchy feely thing. we'll see.

Although I will never be a parent, I follow my niece's progress with interest. Watching her playing Battlefield at the age of five, I was staggered. She was driving tanks around with a glee I remember of my first games. Now 11 years old, she has moved on to other things. Far from sticking with FPS's, she has become the sort of gamer that will keep the likes of Popcap in money for quite some time.

I've tried to avoid impressing anything on my relatives or friends' children - that is the parents' function, naturally. Although I confess to introducing some of them to DDR, how could I forsee the impact of such an action?

DudleySmith wrote:

It is a shame that the British school system has taken up the kind of modular coursework kind of ethos, since I was always good at exams.

I experienced the GCSE implementation in its first year. The emphasis on coursework was dropped in rather suddenly; up until that point I had been chewing through books, revising and expecting exams. My niece, however, seems to be coping with modern school systems incredibly well.

McChuck wrote:

I'd ask that you treat me the same as your kids, but I'm not ready to lose that badly.

Well, I will take it easy on you then. The thing to see though is my son playing a game with his sister coaching him on how to decimate the opponent. I watched it as they took down an extended family member a couple of notches. Its not me you should fear but my daughter.

To sum up.

IMAGE(http://www.userfriendly.org/cartoons/archives/01nov/uf003637.gif)

I didn't start playing video games until I was in my late 20's - and I started out a lot like a 5 year old in my thinking.

I'd watch Kepheus play something and think "Geez, that looks simple enough - I can do that." Then I'd try and totally spaz out and die, or keep running into walls over and over, or run the wrong way or any number of other things that made it more frustrating than fun.

I discovered that the reason I felt frustrated was that Kepheus was watching me screw it up and I could tell by his body language and the look on his face that it was killing him a little that I was so terrible at a game he finds so easy.

The thing is - he's been playing video games since he was eight, I started playing video games when I was 27. He's used to controllers, to pushing the stick right so the characters will go left and jumping up onto platforms and lots of other basic game control things that I am very clumsy at.

The solution: I play video games on my own for the most part. I don't need to now, but I still prefer it. I don't mind screwing up or trying the same thing 20 times on my own. I even laugh at myself for being such a spaz - but when Kepheus is watching and I know that watching me make a total mess of it is a little painful for him, I screw up more and feel frustrated.

At that point I want to do what Peter did - hand the game over and say, "Here, you play. I'm going to do a search a word on my DS."

Maybe the trick is letting him play badly on his own. It's not painful to watch because you're not there and he won't feel any need to impress (assuming he does now that is).

I think that there are definitely certain kids that need the Montessori approach to schooling. If that's how you want to raise your kids, then by all means do so. Just don't become a helicopter parent.

I hold a different opinion and luckily my fiance does too. We get married June 20th so I'm sure we will be having kids in the coming years. Our opinion is that kids really need to learn what failure is and not be praised for every little thing they do. What happens is that they will get to the corporate world and get eaten alive. Life is not fair and the sooner they learn that the better. Your boss will not praise you for coming to work every day, he will praise you for doing your job well. It's pretty much assured that you will have some crap job in life that you will have to put up with. Just quitting because it's hard is a cop out and it's the reason why our divorce rate is so high.

Kids need to try hard to succeed and I feel that needs to be distilled in them early in life. I'm not talking about making them do things like be fantastic at sports or I won't love you, but kids shouldn't be over coddled. These days you can't even write on a kids test in red ink anymore because it's negative. They don't fail kids anymore either which is absurd. This new age self esteem crap needs to stop. I really think I'd be doing my kids a disservice if I didn't prepare them for the real world.

Although I am not yet a father, I have thought a fair bit about this kind of thing. I am constantly amazed by how difficult parenting seems to be (from my point of view), while being impressed by how well so many people do it.

The sheer number and variety of questions people must ask themselves is daunting (and judging by post at GWJ, they do ask). Coupled with the self-induced pressure to raise children to be productive, well-balanced and most of all happy seems more than enough to dissuade anyone from having children. Yet I still want to.

I would just like to express my admiration for all those that have offspring and are doing their best to raise them.

sshuber wrote:

I think that there are definitely certain kids that need the Montessori approach to schooling. If that's how you want to raise your kids, then by all means do so. Just don't become a helicopter parent.

I think we're actually more generally in the benign neglect school of parenting, which is part of why we live in the boonies -- so they can run all over the place and cut their knees without the paranoia.

I'm not a father but I personally feel pride. Two years ago at PAX (back with Gaald was demoing Eye of Judgement) one of my daughters and I went over there to meet him in person and to try out the game. Neither one of us had played it before.

What was supposed to be a little sample turned into an epic duel that took nearly two hours. She finally got me. I was proud enough to take it with reasonable grace (only a couple jokes about letting the Wookie win), and then I wrote an article bragging about it for Gamerdad.

As far as the root post, yeah, I think it's something to consider but only when he's a bit older. He's five. Even the most perfect of kids that age have got the attention span of a plastic goldfish, and not a lot of manual dexterity. When he's eight or nine he'll have a lot better luck. It also has a lot to do with personality and it varies with every kid. My daughters are identical twins and they're still completely different people with totally different gamestyles. One is a fighting game queen, the other is an RPG fanatic. My sons are also totally different from one another.

I had enough problems with the issues in the article with my kids in public school. I can't imagine how it must be in the Montessori. One of my favorite stories on the topic is my son's friend in the Navy, who was so proud of himself when he discovered that he could actually do things he didn't like. Even if they're hard. Before he got there, he'd always managed to weasel his way out of stuff between his mother and the school's poor excuses for structure and discipline. There isn't much weasel-room in BASIC. He was really proud of finding this out about himself. I was so sad he had to be 20 before he did.

This is the start of a really long conversation, though. And my daughters are graduating from high school today. If anyone's interested, I'll try again tomorrow.

rabbit wrote:
sshuber wrote:

I think that there are definitely certain kids that need the Montessori approach to schooling. If that's how you want to raise your kids, then by all means do so. Just don't become a helicopter parent.

I think we're actually more generally in the benign neglect school of parenting, which is part of why we live in the boonies -- so they can run all over the place and cut their knees without the paranoia.

And that's what kids should be doing! No need to wrap them in bubble wrap.

I actually have a co-worker with a son that has Asperger's Syndrome and a Montessori school was a blessing for him he claims.

I have a question for you parents out there

When you genuinely get your ass handed to you by your kid at a game, do you feel pride or shame?

sshuber wrote:

They don't fail kids anymore either which is absurd. This new age self esteem crap needs to stop.

The lack of failure is not a new age self esteem thing. It's more of a make yourself look good as an educator thing.

sshuber wrote:

I actually have a co-worker with a son that has Asperger's Syndrome and a Montessori school was a blessing for him he claims.

Unfortunately, I think it comes down to simple math: public schools have X amount of money to teach Y amount of kids. They have to come up with a system that will work well for as many of those kids as possible.

Most Montessori schools are private, and built almost ideally for kids who don't learn and work the same way as all those Y kids. We have GREAT local public schools, and I wish they were a good fit for my daughter (I'd have a lot more money every month!) But we tried, and BOY weren't they.

Waaaaaaaaaaay before I became a parent (now currently girl 16 and boy 18) I came across the best parenting advice in the book "Time Enough for Love" by Robert A. Heinlein. Specifically in the two intermission sections titled The Notebooks of Lazurus Long.

I summarize.....

Lazurus Long wrote:

Do not handicap your children by making their lives easy.

Lazurus Long wrote:

Touch is the most fundamental sense. A baby experiences it, all over, before he is born and long before he learns to use sight, hearing, or taste, and no human ever ceases to need it. Keep your children short on pocket money--but long on hugs.

Lazurus Long wrote:

Delusions are often functional. A mother’s opinions about her children’s beauty, intelligence, goodness, et cetera ad nauseam, keep her from drowning them at birth.

Lazurus Long wrote:

Little girls, like butterflies, need no excuse.

..and my personal favorite saying about the benefits of education

Lazurus Long wrote:

You live and learn or you don’t live long.

I am sure my children will have lots of "issues" to work out in therapy. Despite my best efforts I can't get any of my kids to play games with me for more than 10 minutes (mostly Rockband).

PS Forgot this one....

Lazurus Long wrote:

Never crowd youngsters about their private affairs--sex especially. When they are growing up they are nerve ends all over, and resent (quite properly) any invasions of their privacy. Oh sure, they’ll make mistakes--but that’s their business, not yours. (You made your own mistakes, did you not?)

Heinlein as parenting advice? Sounds awesome! Where do I sign up for the spiritualist orgies?