The Game Recommendation For Your Kids thread

Jonman wrote:
shoptroll wrote:
Jonman wrote:

Each level can be cleared with 1-3 stars. That's basically your difficulty level right there. 1-starring is fairly easy, 3 requires you to on your game.

Unfortunately, the game requires you to start performing better than 1 star on each level if you want to keep unlocking new levels. I don't think it's even possible to get to World 2 or 3 if you don't get 2 or 3 stars on most levels.

Oh yeah, that's a good point. It's been awhile since I fired it up. Pretty sure that by world 3, the wife and I couldn't even manage 1 star either.

Good to know, wonder if there is a cheat to unlock all levels? Havent found anything from a quick google except from the steam forum:

Or you can just edit the ini text file to give yourself 3 stars in everything if you are truly stuck.

Sound plausible?

I highly recommend Yonder, The Cloud Catcher Chronicles, very pretty exploration game with no combat or any real failure state, great game to teach kids 3d movement. My 6 year old girl loves it.

Awesome Fastmav, my 4.5 y/o is playing through the Teddy Floppy ears a second time around, completely solo now so I'm keen to find some other titles for her to try.
Not sure how 3D movement will go this early, but we can try.

I think the point and click genre is ideal for this age, so I'm going to have to see what other games in the genre I can find that are kid friendly.

Yeah +1 Yonder, the boy played and enjoyed but I think I ended up being the one to play more of it. Really good game for some chill time, I should get back to it at some point.

Bubblefuzz wrote:

Yeah +1 Yonder, the boy played and enjoyed but I think I ended up being the one to play more of it. Really good game for some chill time, I should get back to it at some point.

Oh yea, I totally played it till the end when she wasnt looking

Has anyone tried Labo with your kids yet?

Yup. Our 4 year old is too young for much of the folding, but she loves to "push the button" to advance the instructions on the screen, and is all about popping the pieces out of the cardboard sheets.

We've made the house and the fishing rod so far, and she looooves the house.

We built the RC Car with my 6 year old. Not sure if it is the cardboard, the way we made it, or some differences in the rumbles of our Joycons, but when it moves "forward" it really moves at a 45 degree angle forward and to the right. Makes the auto-follow mode not work, and it really frustrated him.

However he LOVED building it, and more importantly, he enjoyed building it with my mother, who's a teacher and has always been very anti-video game.

She wants to come back over and build more with him, and he's been pleading with me to build more. Just had a crazy week. Hoping for more time this weekend.

troubleshot wrote:

I think the point and click genre is ideal for this age, so I'm going to have to see what other games in the genre I can find that are kid friendly.

Botanicula and Chuchel are both by one of the teams at Amanita Design and fall into the "just click stuff on the screen" puzzle-box sub-genre (Windosill also falls into this category but that's someone else).

You can also look into the Humongous Entertainment games from way back when which was Ron Gilbert's post-LucasArts company that made adventure games aimed at kids. Night Dive got the rights to them and re-published the whole catalog on Steam and Humble (maybe GOG too).

troubleshot wrote:

But last night my 4.5yo ended up with an Xbox controller in her hands when out for dinner and something in me screamed that I needed to get her competent with twin stick controls (we've managed to develop a bit of mouse competency already which has been great).
Anybody have game recommendations to get young kids comfortable on twin sticks?

I've been rewarding my 7yo with Nine Parchments occasionally, and he really enjoys it. It's definitely an age appropriate game, but a little frustrating because I'm not good enough to carry him.

PS - I'm still not sure he really understands how to twin stick in a real time situation.

By twin stick you mean 3d movement and camera? If so Yonder The Cloud Catcher Chronicles is a great games for kids to learn that.

Fastmav347 wrote:

By twin stick you mean 3d movement and camera? If so Yonder The Cloud Catcher Chronicles is a great games for kids to learn that.

Regarding Nine Parchments, "twin stick" means "twin-stick-shooter", same kind of control scheme as Robotron or Geometry Wars.

But Yonder is a good call for twin-stick 3D controls.

Tried Wii Sports with my five year old - didn't go over very well. Feel it may still be a little complex for him, but he really enjoys Mario Maker on the Wii U. I think Pads are just easier for very young kids.

Jonman wrote:
Fastmav347 wrote:

By twin stick you mean 3d movement and camera? If so Yonder The Cloud Catcher Chronicles is a great games for kids to learn that.

Regarding Nine Parchments, "twin stick" means "twin-stick-shooter", same kind of control scheme as Robotron or Geometry Wars.

But Yonder is a good call for twin-stick 3D controls.

Whoops! I've never heard of any other control scheme besides the robotron/smash tv/geometry wars/magicka one called "twin stick" before

We just beat Nine Parchments on easy a week or so ago, but it was tough going at the end, and the wife ended up jumping in for the last couple of levels. He keeps asking to play through on normal difficulty, but I think I might try to nudge him towards a new game for selfish reasons.

Yonder added to wishlist for next steam sale, and Overcooked! just purchased on sale due to this thread.

Anyone try Overcooked 2 yet?

captainchaos wrote:

Anyone try Overcooked 2 yet?

It's out in August, and my Delorean is in the shop, so no.

Just bought Overcooked (the first one) on sale and will try it out with my soon to be 5 year old sometime soon. Not sure she'll be ready, it will be her first game with a controller, not expecting a lot, just a bit of silly fun.

troubleshot wrote:

Just bought Overcooked (the first one) on sale and will try it out with my soon to be 5 year old sometime soon. Not sure she'll be ready, it will be her first game with a controller, not expecting a lot, just a bit of silly fun.

It'll be silly fun for the first half dozen levels. It'll be at about that point you'll catch yourself screaming at her to "cut the flipping onions! Quicker, Quicker!"... It's not pretty. Uninstall.

Anyone know much about 8BitDo?

Considering buying one of these but not sure if the button colours etc map in game to tool tips UI stuff? Obviously my Xbox360 controller has in game prompts that show the colour and letter for each button, given id have my child using the controller I could see the colours/letter not matching up being a pain (and colour/letter mapping to in game prompts being a key thing I would want in a controller for my kids)

IMAGE(http://www.8bitdo.com/images/sn30pro-sf30pro/sn30pro-spec.png)

Anyone know about such things?

Seems many on the podcast love them. My friend got one for his raspberry pi setup. Smaller than I thought it would be but that could be because as a kid the super Nintendo controller felt big.

troubleshot wrote:

Anyone know much about 8BitDo?

Considering buying one of these but not sure if the button colours etc map in game to tool tips UI stuff? Obviously my Xbox360 controller has in game prompts that show the colour and letter for each button, given id have my child using the controller I could see the colours/letter not matching up being a pain (and colour/letter mapping to in game prompts being a key thing I would want in a controller for my kids)

IMAGE(http://www.8bitdo.com/images/sn30pro-sf30pro/sn30pro-spec.png)

Anyone know about such things?

Hey Troubleshot,

I can't speak to your specific question about prompts etc. but I do have this controller so could talk more generally if that's useful at all? I use it with my Switch and based on that I'd definitely recommend it. I had to do a quick firmware update using my laptop when I got it but apart from that it was very easy to start using. It's light and compact so good for little hands. This model uses a USB-C cable to charge but there's one provided in the box. The battery seems to last forever!

The update I mentioned was to improve the Rumble. I think it was a bit strong without the update but with it it feels great. Not HD like the Switch Joy-Con but still really good.

Like I said, I use it for Switch but there are simple instructions on the back telling you how to change the mode you're using. It's just a matter of pressing the right combination of buttons.

This was my second 8Bitdo controller and I'm happy with the quality of both of them. It's worth pointing out too that they just announced some new products at E3 so there might be even more options to consider now.

Edit: I find this is also a great controller to give my toddler so they can "join in" if my wife and I are playing Mario Kart or something like that.

Thanks for the info Stev

Here are my recommendations for PC gaming with kids. I'm always trying to find split-screen games so that we can all play at the same time on the couch. I added age recommendations in parentheses.

Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime (3+)
Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed (3+)
Rocket League (3+)
Lego Marvel Super Heroes (3+)
Lego Batman 2 (3+)
Burnout Paradise (3+)
Minecraft (5+)
Jamestown (5+)
Steamworld Dig 2 (6+)
Portal 1/2 (9+)
Arcade/MAME beat-em-ups: X-Men, TMNT, Sunset Riders, etc. (3+)

you guys must have super gaming kids, I can't even picture my 4 year old playing a game, my two girls 6 and 8 are finally getting the hang of some of the simple games now.

Fastmav347 wrote:

you guys must have super gaming kids, I can't even picture my 4 year old playing a game, my two girls 6 and 8 are finally getting the hang of some of the simple games now.

No, I'm with you on this one Mav. I "play" some games with my 4 year old. The idea that she can manage a game with a relatively complex moveset like Lego is baffling.

That said, she's definitely showing interest, and is fine with simpler games, either touchscreen interface or simple point'n'click mouse controls.

I think Switch Minecraft is going to be the next thing I try. Probably with me using the controller, at least to start with.

The 3 games that my 6 and 8 year old girls are kinda ok at playing, Peggle 2 (they are actually pretty decent at this) The Crew (They like just roaming around in a monster truck, not actual racing anyone) and Yonder the Cloud Catcher Chronicles (this also they just enjoy wondering around and chopping trees/rocks)
Both in recent months started to show more interest in trying different things so I might try out some of the easier coop games.

Kids are people
People are different.

Picking up Yonder on sale as it could be something my 4 almost 5 year old could enjoy, might be a way for them to learn to use a controller, the short attempts at Overcooked have proven a little too tricky thus far.

This might not be very helpful as you're looking for PC games. If you do own a PS3 or PS4. Hohokum might be what you're looking for in terms of just letting your kids muck about getting used to controllers.

It was a ps+ game a few years ago. Great for the boy at 4/5 if I remember rightly and was one of those games that even hooked my tother half in.

Fastmav347 wrote:

you guys must have super gaming kids, I can't even picture my 4 year old playing a game, my two girls 6 and 8 are finally getting the hang of some of the simple games now.

It just comes down to expectations. Most games, the 3yo simply holds down the "A" button. He's just starting to realize when we hand him a controller with no batteries and he's not actually doing anything. I do get a kick out of helping them through difficult platforming parts. =) Like jrralls said, kids are all different. Some games they might not like at all. The most fun we have is when we can all play at the same time. Doesn't matter if it's co-op or versus.

Small tangent: Before they play any first-person pc game, I ALWAYS remap WASD to ESDF. I want them to have proper human typing skills. They don't even know that WASD exists. =)