What games did you play with your kids?

[God King Fudge]

My daughter turned 4 this year and she's expressed interest in trying to play some games with me. I have Gamepass, so I tried the Disney Adventure and Pixar games on there and she struggled with having a separate camera control and got frustrated. When I tried to help her by controlling the right stick, she got even more frustrated cause she's a teenager on the inside and doesn't want help.

Any of you folks that have played games with your kids have any suggestions for kid friendly games I could play with her that would be easier to control?

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[LarKing]

I’d recommend the LEGO games like LEGO Star Wars. Easy to control and learn.

 

[Warden of the North]

My daughter is also struggling with the exact same issues (camera independent of movement).

I feel maybe games are a little too complicated these days for children just starting out.

When I was a kid with NES I had either left, right, and jump or up down left right to worry about. As games went 3D I learned along with the games industry. Kids now arw jumping on a moving bus

 

[LarKing]

My daughter is also struggling with the exact same issues (camera independent of movement).

I feel maybe games are a little too complicated these days for children just starting out.

When I was a kid with NES I had either left, right, and jump or up down left right to worry about. As games went 3D I learned along with the games industry. Kids now arw jumping on a moving bus

I first started with Halo 1 and that has independent camera movement. It’s a bit of a tough learning curve but they’ll get it eventually.

 

[The Head Crusher]

My daughter is only 2 so i have a bit yet, but maybe if she is struggling with camera controls, the try a side scroller game?

 

[Warden of the North]

My daughter is only 2 so i have a bit yet, but maybe if she is struggling with camera controls, the try a side scroller game?

Its odd but most side scrollers really arent kid friendly (Nintendo excluded).

The OP mentions xbox, which is extremely limited in its small child oriented games.

 

[Jovavic]

I would try any of the Rayman games if it's on gamepass

 

[God King Fudge]

Its odd but most side scrollers really arent kid friendly (Nintendo excluded).

The OP mentions xbox, which is extremely limited in its small child oriented games.

I have everything, but I just saw those two on Gamepass and started there.

I may try something on the Switch. I know they have the LEGO Incredibles on there. She tried the Switch and struggled with the two joy cons, so I may get a little wired controller or something for her and get her that like someone mentioned.

 

[Hammettf2b]

My daughter is also struggling with the exact same issues (camera independent of movement).

I feel maybe games are a little too complicated these days for children just starting out.

When I was a kid with NES I had either left, right, and jump or up down left right to worry about. As games went 3D I learned along with the games industry. Kids now arw jumping on a moving bus

games were way harder back then imo. maybe its because I was a kid and it seemed hard at the time but I remember games like Battletoads, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Super Mario 2 ect... being very difficult compared to games these days

 

[PK Cronin]

games were way harder back then imo. maybe its because I was a kid and it seemed hard at the time but I remember games like Battletoads, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Super Mario 2 ect... being very difficult compared to games these days

They were challenging, but the controls were simple and easy to understand. Asking a four year old to move a camera around independently of the character, while also having a bunch of buttons to learn, seems like a tough ask.

My daughter is still too young for games, but I plan on starting her on older games and systems first.

 

[Hammettf2b]

They were challenging, but the controls were simple and easy to understand. Asking a four year old to move a camera around independently of the character, while also having a bunch of buttons to learn seems like a tough ask.

My daughter is still too young for games, but I plan on starting her on older games and systems first.

That makes sense. I guess it wouldn't matter how hard the game is at that age as long as the controls are simple.

 

[GlassesJacketShirt]

I would recommend Ori and the Blind Forest. Beautiful game.

Now, if I had a 4 year old kid, I'd be showing him/her Wolfenstein like my father did with me.......but alas, not for everyone :p

 

[PK Cronin]

That makes sense. I guess it wouldn't matter how hard the game is at that age as long as the controls are simple.

Definitely. It allows them to ease into a game and learn how it functions before getting frustrated by the difficulty (f*** you TMNT electric seaweed).

 

[Warden of the North]

They were challenging, but the controls were simple and easy to understand. Asking a four year old to move a camera around independently of the character, while also having a bunch of buttons to learn, seems like a tough ask.

My daughter is still too young for games, but I plan on starting her on older games and systems first.

This is what I mean. Movement along with a controller that has two sticks, 4 shoulder buttons, a dpad, and 6 other buttons is very confusing to learn on.

 

[MetalheadPenguinsFan]

games were way harder back then imo. maybe its because I was a kid and it seemed hard at the time but I remember games like Battletoads, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Super Mario 2 ect... being very difficult compared to games these days

Games were harder back in the day yes. Today’s kids just don’t have the patience or let’s face it....the smarts to figure hard games out. They want everything spoonfed to them, etc.

Hell just look at how many games now (both current stuff and retro games that have been remade and re-released) have that “Skip Level” or “Skip This Part” etc. feature that you can choose after you die a certain amount of times.

Plus what made gaming back in the day even more difficult was that we didn’t have YouTube or cheat code sites or even the internet back then for help. Back in my day you were lucky if you had...or maybe knew someone who had like a “Nintendo Power” magazine subscription or whatever.

 

[GlassesJacketShirt]

Games were harder back in the day yes. Today’s kids just don’t have the patience or let’s face it....the smarts to figure hard games out. They want everything spoonfed to them, etc.

Hell just look at how many games now (both current stuff and retro games that have been remade and re-released) have that “Skip Level” or “Skip This Part” etc. feature that you can choose after you die a certain amount of times.

Plus what made gaming back in the day even more difficult was that we didn’t have YouTube or cheat code sites or even the internet back then for help. Back in my day you were lucky if you had...or maybe knew someone who had like a “Nintendo Power” magazine subscription or whatever.

That's half of it. One element of gaming's history that also produced easier games was the shift to cinematic experiences in order to attract players who might have otherwise been unimpressed. This resulted in two further factors dumbing down the gameplay: a focus on visual fidelity, and removal of player control/expression. Pushing the limits of graphics on consoles usually requires some sacrifice, and that usually means making the AI less sophisticated/plentiful so the game can smoothly run all its systems at a decent framerate. Meanwhile, if the developer is trying to show how cinematic gaming can be, the last thing it wants is the player to be frustrated by failure; thus, the gameplay must be simple/restrictive enough to allow the player to progress with little challenge in order to achieve the desired effect, i.e. playing a Hollywood blockbuster.

Edit: This in turn helped cultivate this culture of making sure players of minimal skill level could finish every game they bought. Look at the controversy surrounding Cuphead as an example of unforgiving difficulty being dinged as a way to lock content for the unskilled.

 

[PK Cronin]

Games were harder back in the day yes. Today’s kids just don’t have the patience or let’s face it....the smarts to figure hard games out. They want everything spoonfed to them, etc.

Hell just look at how many games now (both current stuff and retro games that have been remade and re-released) have that “Skip Level” or “Skip This Part” etc. feature that you can choose after you die a certain amount of times.

Plus what made gaming back in the day even more difficult was that we didn’t have YouTube or cheat code sites or even the internet back then for help. Back in my day you were lucky if you had...or maybe knew someone who had like a “Nintendo Power” magazine subscription or whatever.

Games really have that? I haven't encountered it but don't doubt it's there. The YouTube thing is definitely true. Everything is really simple to look up these days that if someone doesn't have the patience they can get the answer in 5 seconds. Another part of why games were more challenging in the past was because of the lack of a save feature on many of them, or the use of lives. You couldn't save whenever you wanted or only had a set number of attempts before you had to start over again. I think the evolution of the save has been both a positive and negative thing. Games like Resident Evil had a pretty good balance on that front, where you could choose to save whenever you wanted but you had a limited number of saves so you had to use them carefully.

 

[SniperHF]

You might check out the game Child of Light. It's a side scroller with Co-op (you can help via slowing down enemies instead of taking away her controller). Mechanics might be too complicated for a 4 year old (leveling up and such) but if you're helping on that the controls are simple enough for her to handle directly probably, though not as simple as something like a Mario game. It's sort of turn based so it's slower paced and will be easier to handle.

She'd probably be into the story and visuals, might be aiming a little high on the gameplay front for 4. Maybe more like 6-7.

Games really have that?

Oh yeah , it's not super common but it's becoming more prevalent. More often I think what you'll see is a "story" mode where the game is stupid easy.
Also whatever was considered normal tends to be what easy used to be.

That said I support any feature that allows me to skip a dumb mini game or QTE thing. Thankfully that stuff is less common these days. Developers in the late 2000's / early 2010's were very stupid. It's one thing if the whole game is that kind of thing, Dragon's Lair, Telltale stuff, etc. But shoehorning it into games with actual gameplay, bleh.

Games like Resident Evil had a pretty good balance on that front, where you could choose to save whenever you wanted but you had a limited number of saves so you had to use them carefully.

You had to walk to the type writer though, often through a re-spawning zombie or two.

 

[PK Cronin]

You had to walk to the type writer though, often through a re-spawning zombie or two.

Absolutely, and I think that helped strike a good balance. As a parent now I'd say that having that type of saving structure could actually cause me to play less because it requires larger blocks of time to play within. I'm not too sure those older games were really ever marketed or geared towards adults in the same way games are today, or maybe we're just more accepting of it because we grew up with more of it.

 

[MayDay]

Games were harder back in the day yes. Today’s kids just don’t have the patience or let’s face it....the smarts to figure hard games out. They want everything spoonfed to them, etc.

Yes and no. Games were harder, but controls were also much simpler, which meant that games were more accessible even to young kids and new gamers.

The Atari control had one button and joystick. The NES controller had two buttons and a D-pad, and the Genesis three buttons.

Not too many people could beat a lot of those old games, but everyone could pick them up and play them. They were easy to figure out.

Nowadays, controllers have a dozen buttons and triggers located all around the controller, plus multiple analog sticks and maybe a D-pad too. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that that kind of set-up is much less accessible to new gamers such as small children, then the old school consoles we had when we were kids.

 

[MayDay]

As for the thread topic, I don’t really play video games with my 8 year old too often because he usually just winds up getting frustrated and it isn’t enjoyable. We do better with card and board games.

And when it comes to video games, he only wants to play Minecraft all the time anyway. He’s obsessed with it.

 

[Morbo]

I’d recommend the LEGO games like LEGO Star Wars. Easy to control and learn.

yeah these are quite good...played them with my son before we got into Warcraft/minecraft/other stuff

 

[MetalheadPenguinsFan]

Games really have that? I haven't encountered it but don't doubt it's there

Yup

 

[izzy]

minecraft
nhl (position lock)
peggle
any 2d platform

 

[H3ckt1k]

I was raised on Pokemon and that is how I will raise my children