Let me rephrase that. These are things some 6-10 year old boys who are into games and storytelling might want, based on what my kid wants. Your mileage WILL vary.
1. Super Mario Galaxy for the Wii
OK, assuming you have a Wii, you probably know all about Super Mario Galaxy
Mario Galaxy is a 3D game that takes Mario's adventures to space, where the hero is attempting to save Peach who has once again been abducted by Bowser. What does he expect to get from her anyway? Mario flies from planet to planet in search of our heroine, and on the way, you'll experience shifting perspectives and slew of new enemies.
I demoed this game last month and had a lot of fun playing it, but when my son tried it out at a friend's house it was a bit of a challenge. Things are little different, so it might take some time getting used to the new environment. When I demoed it, I got to try out the new collaborative mode where a second player can use a Wiimote to pin down enemies while the primary player ground pounds them. That's a welcome feature for younger players who are learning the ropes. I'm sure we'll have a ball after this one gets unwrapped.
2. Ugly Dolls
OK, you know what? Chuckanucka, that's what.
In case you haven't seen them, UglyDolls
Chuckanucka worries about pretty much everything under the sun: What if the phone rings when I go out? What if the mail man tries to deliver my Deluxe Ugly Earmuffs when I'm in the bathroom? Hey, I don't remember leaving the closet door open just a crack like that! What if I can't ever stop thinking about my name over and over? Chuckanucka has a pretty strange way of looking at life. Sometimes he wonders if this is all just a hologram, and on other days he wonders what's going to happen if they stop making CD players... How will I play my favorite CDs??? I have over nine of them!!! Poor Chuckanucka. Lucky Chuckanucka.
He worries a little much, obviously. Kids love to use stuffed animals and dolls to talk through all of the stuff that goes on in their heads, and having an array of characters who look as different as all of the emotions they may feel is more valuable than you can imagine. Gotta get some aggression out? Gotta talk about something scary? Don't worry, it's safe if you do it through the Babo. Oh, he's the one who loves cookies, by the way. They all love hugs.
There's a whole movement among craftsers around creating softies--alternative plush dolls that are not at all like the rag dolls you might have made or been given as a kid. Ugly Dolls are one very successfull example of a product line of softies being sold commercially in toy and comic book stores. The softie phenomenon picks up the momentum of edgy plush and vinyl characters imported from Japanese toys, anime and comics. But you don't have to buy them. If you're handy with a sewing machine or hand stitching, you might be interested in the book, Softies: Simple Instructions for 25 Plush Pals
3. Microbe Softies
What, you say? Those things are too babyish for my kid. Then maybe your kid wants something along the grosser side of the tracks. Then maybe the Microbe Plush Dolls at ThinkGeek are for your kid. Sure, when magnified 1,000,000 times, these things are pretty darned cute, but a Black Plague microbe might be just the thing you need to wipe out a colony of Ugly Dolls. So go ahead. Don't be afraid to give your kid head lice (seen at right). It may be just the thing they want this Christmas.
4. Lava lamps
Last year it was a rotating disco light that was added to the kid bedroom. This year, it's a lavalamp. There's going to be some dramatic lighting in that room this year.
What kid isn't fascinated by thick viscous lava-like wax gurgling and bubbling in a glass vessel? These things are timeless. I've always wanted one and this year, I get to live vicariously. We ordered ours while shopping for science toys at Edmunds Scientific, but you can get yours at Amazon
5. Drawn to life for the DS
The slightest innovation in a game can often make up for big difference in experience. Customization is one of those small things that make a game like Drawn to Life unique.
Drawn to Life
6. Flip Video Ultra
How times have changed. I always hated camcorders--the idea of lugging around a handheld video camcorder to capture every moment always makes me think of dads at parties or entire families walking through Times Square. Yuck. But the constraints of digital cameras' video modes have changed a lot of the movie capture we do. If you look at the vast majority of user generated content on YouTube, you see that the younger generations are more comfortable with short clips rather than long, expository videos.
This clip culture is completely embraced by the little hands who are eager to grab your digicam away from you to shoot 30 seconds of them making faces and strange sounds, or to document something they've created. What? You say you're 6 year old has become a camera hog? Maybe it's time to get them their own.
If you don't want to shell out the dough for a full-on digicam or camcorder, this little champ might do the trick. The Flip Video Ultra Series Camcorder
7. Lego Star Wars for the Wii
Lego Star Wars: The Complete Saga
The thing we love about this game is the cooperative game play. 2 players work together to accomplish goals here. This is like a little introduction to multiplayer game play, but in cooperative mode you share the screen so if one person wants to move in one direction, the other has to come along. Sounds tricky, but it's loads of fun to play this way, and this is the main reason I would recommend the Star Wars Lego games. Oh, that and there's lots of fun Star Wars humor to be enjoyed as you uncover the easter eggs along the way.
8. Markers for budding comic book artists
If you're in NYC, you make the trip to Pearl Paint or Kinokuniya for the finest ink and paper on which to imprint your masterpiece. But, really, any markers will do, even the Crayola kind. But if you can, find a Staples and spring for better non-permanent markers or to your arts and crafts store where you'll find a wider array of Prismacolor markers for every color imaginable, and Microns for finer ink lines.
We've got loads of markers gifted to us through the years that continue to last, but we like to buy a special color from Kinokuniya, the Japanese mega bookstore near Rock Center. We also get our A4 binders and drawing paper there to keep tje comic books we make.
Little tip for you parents out there.... when the colors start to fade, try a couple of drops of water on the point and let them sit overnight. That resurrects some markers when they dry out.
9. Pokemon, YuGiOh, Digimon
Depending on how your kid rolls, he may be interested in these card games. Pokemon play still happens around this house. Digimon is desirable apparently because it's a bit more rare.
10. Sonic and Mario at the Olympic Games
Mario and Sonic sharing the same screen!
To be fair, we already have this game. At first blush, this game seemed OK, but the more you play it, the more fun it gets. I'm at that point now where it's getting really hard to compete with my son. I don't throw games anymore because it's hard enough to win on my own merit! Anyway, we have a lot of fun playing these kinds of competitive individual sports games, learning about sportsmanship, and talking about the history of the Olympics and stuff. What, don't you do that kind of thing when you play video games?
Of course, this is no where near as fun as the real sports. It would have been nice if there were some winter events too. Since it's winter here, we've been really having a lot of fun skating lately, so would've been cool to have speed skating or hockey.
That's the kid's list for this Christmas. My list includes nothing involving consumer electronics, computers, or anything of the sort. I'll be happy with a quiet walk in the park on Christmas day.
Unbelievable DDR skills.
Steven Berlin Johnson writes an open letter to Hillary Clinton. The NY Senator is calling for a $90 million study on the effects of video games on children and in particular on sex and violence in light of the "Grand Theft Auto" series.
On to the issue of aggression, and what causes it in kids, especially teenage boys. Congress should be interested in the facts: The last 10 years have seen the release of many popular violent games, including "Quake" and "Grand Theft Auto"; that period has also seen the most dramatic drop in violent crime in recent memory. According to Duke University's Child Well-Being Index, today's kids are less violent than kids have been at any time since the study began in 1975. Perhaps, Sen. Clinton, your investigation should explore the theory that violent games function as a safety valve, letting children explore their natural aggression without acting it out in the real world.
Really.
Watch the movie. (QuickTime, 1.1 MB)
This is a movie my son wanted to make of the winning sequence for the T-Mobile Sidekick game "Bob". I won the last level after about two months of on and off play at level 9. Lorenzo won after several weeks on level 9. He wanted to keep winning until he did it 100 times. At 64 or something he stopped counting. We've moved on to Super Mario Bros on the DS.
Gaming excerpt from Stevin Berlin Johnson's book "Everything Bad Is Good for You".
Think you like video games? Check out this guy's game room.
Storyboarding and games
My son, has been asking us to tell stories about various characters he likes from TV or from video games. In recent months he's also been making up his own stories, so I've been helping him to record them in story board form. This story board is the latest evolution of a story he's telling about a character from a game on my T-Mobile Sidekick phone called Bob. Bob is a ball that bounces around from world to world trying to avoid sharp things that can pop him. His goal is to find his little girl friend.
It's a lot of fun for me to do this because it helps him visualize the stories he creates with his imagination. In the beginning he was asking us to tell him stories, but it's really nice to hear his stories, especially for the games. They're often very different, but simple worlds that would be fun to play if they were ever realized. He still does ask us to tell him stories, but somehow I find his to be much more exciting.
Story telling, game playing and literacy
We did a variation of this kind of story recording a few months ago where he would make up sentences and I would type them on my Mac. Then we would have the Mac speak the sentences for us. We mostly got to laugh at the way the computer spoke, but he also got to type letters. He's actually been able to type his name for a few months now. It's funny that the first time I saw him write a word was to type it rather than to write it. He does write letters on his Magnadoodle, but since games are his thing, it's not surprising that he learned to memorize words while playing a game.
Banner ads are good for something
Another interesting technology-related story has to do with how L is starting to recognize letter forms. Last summer he was picking out the word "pizza", I think because of the occurrence of the double z in the middle of the word. We had been playing a game by Living Books called "Arthur's Reading Race" and pizza comes up there often. But he had read it in another context, so I could only guess that he remembered it from that game.
Another funny example happened last week when we were in my home office. I had this screen up on my Mac because I was browsing Moviefone for movie listings in the neighborhood.
When he was playing he was looking at the screen and said, "That says, 'No'". I looked up to see the big word No in the banner ad on the right. I guess banner ads are good for something. I think that one is easy to recognize because on games you are presented with a dialog window asking you to answer yes or no.
The article e
Last funny tech-related reading bit is that inexplicably, L started substituting the letter E for the words A and The. So he'll say something like "here's e toy for you". Hearing "e" after all of the words, I feel like he would have been a good person to go to during those .com days, because he's come up with some interesting e words. Though, it seems nowadays, the only "e" brand that sticks in my mind is eBay. Anyway, that's enough for now.
Two articles with opposing opinions about video games: Dr. Sears, Video Violence is Coming to a Screen Near You and David Deutsch interview, Video Games: Harmfully Addictive or a Unique Educational Environment?.