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[Vennt]

Ok, so Son of Vennt was asking for a new Xbox game, having recently spent enough on gaming for a bit (PSP + Games etc.) so I tell him no, and inform him there's plenty on the shelf he hasn't played yet so to find something there. He comes back and asks me if he can play "Star Wars", Odd, think I, we don't *have* any Star Wars games for the Xbox so tell him to show me what he's on about. He returns with an unopened, forgotten copy of SWG:TTE.

V: "No, you're too young" - I respond
SoV: "But it says 7+ on the box, I'm 8 in 2 months" (7+? Seriously SoE?)
V: "It's too expensive, you have pay by the month"
SoV: "More than my current pocket-money? I'll pay..."

At this point I'm starting to regret our "Never answer NO without a reason" policy, but it's stood us in good stead before, and damned if I'l resort to my own parents "Because I say so" response.

At this point, Fiancée of Vennt decides to butt in, "Why not? He can't do any harm can he?"

Fiancée of Vennt is wise, Fiancée of Vennt knows that the issue isn't the harm that can come to SoV, but rather the harm SoV can inflict, and I realsie they are right, there is nothing the MMoRPG crowd can suffer at the hands of SoV that they haven't already suffered, or better yet, deserve.

So, whilst installing the game for him I lay down the ground rules, I warn him about griefers, and warn him that becoming one may seem like fun, but takes the fun away from others, so abusive behaviour will lead to character & game deletion, this seems to make his eyes gloss over, I should have heeded this fact.

It doesn't take SoV long to get a handle on the game UI and concepts, in fact where I thought he'd run around doing nothing and looking at the scenery for a few hours before getting bored, it isn't long before SoV is totting a Carbine, shooting Nunas & Tuskens, and gasp, somehow manages to get trained *AND* get a ship into space... This I wasn't expecting, bloody smart ass kid, hell it's only been a few hours and when I check his inventory he's got close to 50k Cr.

Noticing that SoV is doing a whole heap'o'shit more than I expected I remind him about my warning about his treatment of other players.

"Other players???" says SoV innocently.

Uh-oh, the feeling of dread returns, yes say I, the OTHER players, the ones that are NOT NPC's.

"There's really other players?? - cool, which ones?, how do I find them?"

My gut drops below the floor at this point, no good can come from this, and I realise it's MY fault, when talking about griefers and polite behaviour ingame at no point did I mention that this was because the other people in game were real - oh boy! :lol

"They are the ones with blue names, instead of white, the ones with names like OmGwTfBbQ and G3M'H4D4R"

"Oh..." says SoV "Sorry..."

Sorry? What do you have to be sorry for, you haven't actually done anything yet, have you? HAVE YOU?

"Well, I asked them for credits" (Haha, Starport beggar! nice start!)

I wonder if this is all, and decide the best course of action is to check his chat log

[Sov] Give me money pls
[Sov] Give me money pls
[Sov] Give me money pls
[Sov] Give me money pls
[Gruder]"Shut up!
[SoV]Dork
...

This was close to the bottom of the log, further up was the recorded exploits of a newb killstealer at work, about a dozen cases of "Dork" and "Nerd" and "You Suck" and about 200 cases of chat-spamming

Oh my, oh no you di'nt! (He had)

I stop here and explain why calling other players "Dorks" etc. isn't such a good idea.

"But I didn't know they were other players, you didn't tell me" (Doh!)

Whoops, by this point I cannot for the life of me find anything other than sincere, honest-to-goodness humour in the proceedings, so Me and SoV have a chat to re-lay the groundrules, and I make a point to set chatlogging up so I can have something funny to read after work tonight

Now, where's that copy of WoW?

 

[axxxj]

LOL I can't believe you didn't tell him that they were real people. I can just imagine his confusion at you telling him not to abuse the NPC's.
Tho i do think you are a brave man letting a 8 year old onto a MMORPG knowing the sort of things he might encounter from the oddballs that inhabit these things.

 

[Ferrio]

Please do all gamers a favor and keep him away from MMORPGs

 

[Vennt]

LOL I can't believe you didn't tell him that they were real people. I can just imagine his confusion at you telling him not to abuse the NPC's.
Tho i do think you are a brave man letting a 8 year old onto a MMORPG knowing the sort of things he might encounter from the oddballs that inhabit these things.

We've never "baby-talked" him, nor treated like a baby, I'm monitoring his chatlogs and the censor filter stays ON (Out of *HIS* choice, I may add, he even admonishs me about my uncouth vocabulary) - I'm lucky that he's one smart cookie, but I'm wise enough to monitor his play anyway. Besides, at nearly 8 years old theres little I can imagine him being exposed to in an MMoRPG that he doesn't risk when in the playground at school, and the first person to be abusive to him will find his reaction is simple, he knows now how to /addignore a player and WOULD tell me if something upset him in game, this is one DAMN good reason for being open & honest with your children, you get openness & honesty back.

Please do all gamers a favor and keep him away from MMORPGs

Soooo, what MMoRPG are you playing at the moment Ferrio? Server? :lol

 

[Scrow]

Soooo, what MMoRPG are you playing at the moment Ferrio? Server? :lol

haha, DO IT!

Tho i do think you are a brave man letting a 8 year old onto a MMORPG knowing the sort of things he might encounter from the oddballs that inhabit these things.

hey...

 

[Minotauro]

Wait, so, who did he think he was conversing with? Did he think there was somehow AI routines advanced enough to respond in realtime to his queries?

I guess I just don't understand how he didn't grasp that he was interacting with other players...

 

[Slo]

Maybe because he's freakin' 8 years old.

 

[commish]

Maybe because he's freakin' 8 years old.

Can't argue with common sense.

 

[Vennt]

He's been playing games since he was 2 years old, AI response is all he's known unless he was beating my ass at VF4. So yes, he thought it was only natural that the 'players' were just that, Computer controlled.

Remember, the limitations in your imagination are a far far cry from the limitations in a 7 and 3/4 year old's imagination

 

[Minotauro]

Maybe because he's freakin' 8 years old.

Well, the dude did mention how smart he is twice...

Remember, the limitations in your imagination are a far far cry from the limitations in a 7 and 3/4 year old's imagination

I guess you're right. I don't have a lot of experience with children so it's something of a foreign concept to me.

 

[Vennt]

Well, the dude did mention how smart he is twice...


I guess you're right. I don't have a lot of experience with children so it's something of a foreign concept to me.

To be accurate I said he was a "smart cookie" once, and a "smart ass" once.

The smart ass bit was admittably redundant though, as that probably covers all kids of his age, as 7-8 is an age where they start believing they "know it all" and they have "yeah, yeah, heard it before"

And seriously, the depth of imagination kids have is something you really don't notice you're missing until you have day-to-day contact with one, including those of us who "refuse to grow up" and "are immature".

 

[Squirrel Killer]

V: "No, you're too young" - I respond
SoV: "But it says 7+ on the box, I'm 8 in 2 months"

If you really didn't want him to play, you could've ended the discussion here by saying "Even though the box says '7+' I've researched enough about the game to know that it is not appropriate for you." Valuable lesson there, just because something is allowed, doesn't make it appropriate.

 

[Vennt]

Except that in all honesty I couldn't see what *would* make it inappropriate, and I don't make it a habit to lie to my son.

In all seriousness I could simply have said "I'm not putting that shite on my machine" and that would have been the end of it.

(Well, except for the fact he'd probably have told me to watch my language )

 

[Diseased Yak]

This is hilarious, but also goes a long way to explaining why a 60 Priest camped my 33 Shaman alt in Shimmering Flats last night 4 times over before I got some friends over to rape him repeatedly (my main's on another server).

Someone needs to design a MMO that has computer controller players who actually play the game by killing mobs and questing and where the actual human controlled players do nothing but grief them....

Nate

 

[Vennt]

Yeah, before you retort a 'lamer' with the cliché "What are you? 12 years old?" it might be worth considering the compliment that could be to the player you're trying to insult, hell if SoV is playing, you've gotta know there's hundreds more like him. :lol

 

[Squirrel Killer]

Except that in all honesty I couldn't see what *would* make it inappropriate, and I don't make it a habit to lie to my son.

Then why did you say "No, you're too young."?

 

[Vennt]

I thought the game was rated a 12+ or 15+ on the box, and was surprised it was 7+.

I generally stick to the age ratings set for game for him, with one or two exceptions where *I've* decided the content is OK for him.

(i.e. He can't play GTA, But can play VF4 and PDO, his favourite games of this gen, damn Sega whore )

Sheesh, talk about sucking the life out of something, this was just a little amusing tale...

Squirrel Killer? Life-sucking Humour Vampire more like

 

[ManaByte]

Yeah, before you retort a 'lamer' with the cliché "What are you? 12 years old?" it might be worth considering the compliment that could be to the player you're trying to insult, hell if SoV is playing, you've gotta know there's hundreds more like him. :lol

Oh yea, and there are worse ones.

My favorite was this this Wookiee who had a cycling autoreply macro that would spam anyone who sends him a tell with racial slurs and more. I used to have a screenshot of him (LD) with a text bubble where the reply was sent to the GM who nuke/banned him. :lol

 

[bobjuice]

Vennt I think it's awesome that you treat your kid like a eight-year-old kid and not a piece of fine china that needs to be locked away, talked down to and overprotected. Your kid obviously had some fun, learned something, gave you a good story and did no harm in the process. Good parenting makes all the difference when it comes to allowing a kid to play a certain type of game, and your kid seems to have a good head on his shoulders. If some MMO douches are upset, maybe your son can provide them some words of wisdom about maturity. Bravo.

 

[slidewinder]

VF4 and PDO, his favourite games of this gen, damn Sega whore

Kid's got good taste.

 

[Vennt]

Kid's got good taste.

I know, unfortunately I haven't the heart to tell him that Sega are dead yet, He took the Santa thing quite well, but after seeing what happened to Dreamcaster and what can happen when a Sega fan hits the cold harsh reality of life, well, I just couldn't do that to the poor little blighter...


...maybe when he's older, after those "other" talks we have to go through

 

[shuri]

I actually cant believe that your leave your 8 years old to play a mmorpg game alone.

 

[Vennt]

I actually cant believe that your leave your 8 years old to play a mmorpg game alone.

Our PC is in the living room, he's never "left alone" on it, but neither do I stand over his shoulder and watch every minute of his play.

(To be fully accurate the Monitor & KB/Mouse are in the living room, the PC itself is hidden in a pantry due to the noise)

 

[Dr_Cogent]

Because I said so is gonna get used in my household. The 2 year old isn't old enough to ask why though. The kids don't need a reason. My saying what's gonna happen is gonna be plenty enough

 

[Crazy Harry]

That was fun!
What a great story Vennt.
My girlfriend asked me why I was laughing. I told her that the first time in my life I would like to have a son. You had to see her face!! (Until now I always said I never would have any kids).

 

[Mike]

Wait... I thought you were... uh... you know... uh...

 

[Squirrel Killer]

Squirrel Killer? Life-sucking Humour Vampire more like

Heh, sorry I was trying to make it obvious that I was just jokin around.

How about I relate the time I decided to try to teach my 18 month old how to play Super Mario Sunshine?

 

[Vennt]

Thanks Crazy Harry, exactly the motivation for posting this, to lighten up what has recently been a gruelling forum

Wait... I thought you were... uh... you know... uh...

Responsible? - Bwahahaha... No, hell I even let him on Xbox Live with the headset at a friends once just to hear the other players reaction to being trash-talked by a 7yr old. (Believe me, now that was funny, I've never heard so many "WTF's per second in ALL my life )

Thats what you were gonna say wasn't it? wasn't it huh?

BTW: It's all in good humour SK, please do

 

[IJoel]

:lol

Awesome read. SoV will obviously in the future own the biggest farming business in MMORPGs.

 

[Rocket Punch]

LOL. I found that to be the cutest thing I've read here in a while. Although I think my opinion might be slightly altered if I ever did play a game around someone like that. Kids will be kids... "Dork " :lol

 

[Kiriku]

Haha, that's funny Vennt...it may sound strange in this particular thread, but sometimes I wish I had a kid. :lol

 

[8bit]

I could reiterate that the initials of our beloved Waldo Dobbs' nickname do stand for something, but you do seem to be taking the most reasonable course of action by letting him find out for himself.

Right On, Commander!

 

[Vennt]

I could reiterate that the initials of our beloved Waldo Dobbs' nickname do stand for something, but you do seem to be taking the most reasonable course of action by letting him find out for himself.

Right On, Commander!

Indeed!

It's a good job my diminished responsibility is grounded and cancelled out by a Mother who knows when to say "No, WTF!" when she needs to, and being Scottish when she does I know about it

 

[hobbitx]

:lol That was a really good read Vennt, cracked me up and gave me a good idea of what it will be like when I have to show my own brats the ropes someday.

 

[Rorschach]

Hah I didn't see that coming.