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Classic Games (Games) Games

Dad Makes His Kid Play Through All Video Game History In Chronological Order 222

An anonymous reader writes Andy Baio, aka @waxpancake, indy video game enthusiast and founder of the XOXO conference and other cool stuff, conducted a weird/cool experiment on his four-year-old. Andy taught him about gaming by making him play and master all of the old video games and gaming systems in the exact order they were actually released. In other words, this 21st century kid learned gaming the same way the generation that grew up in the 1970s and 1980s experienced them, but in compressed time. From the article: "This approach to widely surveying classic games clearly had an impact on him, and influenced the games that he likes now. Like seemingly every kid his age, he loves Minecraft. No surprises there. But he also loves brutally difficult games that challenge gamers 2–3 times his age, and he’s frighteningly good at them. His favorites usually borrow characteristics from roguelikes: procedurally-generated levels, permanent death, no save points."
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Dad Makes His Kid Play Through All Video Game History In Chronological Order

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  • Oh, really? (Score:5, Funny)

    by __aaclcg7560 ( 824291 ) on Wednesday December 10, 2014 @07:13PM (#48568517)
    Took me five years as a teenager to master the Sargon II chess game for the Commodore 64 on the hardest difficulty level. I'll like to see a four-year-old do that in less time.
    • Took me five years as a teenager to master the Sargon II chess game for the Commodore 64 on the hardest difficulty level. I'll like to see a four-year-old do that in less time.

      I haven't played it myself; but they say that Robot Odyssey [wikipedia.org] will either break your pitiful hominid brain like reject before The Monolith, turn you into a hardcore programmer geek for life, or turn you against any computer game that isn't Medal of Halo Gears of Assault 3.

      • Re:Oh, really? (Score:5, Interesting)

        by djrobxx ( 1095215 ) on Wednesday December 10, 2014 @08:20PM (#48568997)

        I haven't played it myself; but they say that Robot Odyssey [wikipedia.org] will either break your pitiful hominid brain like reject before The Monolith, turn you into a hardcore programmer geek for life, or turn you against any computer game that isn't Medal of Halo Gears of Assault 3.

        I played and beat Robot Odyssey when I was in 6th grade. It was in the bargain bin at Radio Shack. Mom thought it might be fun. The box said it was from The Learning Company, which was an instant turn off, but I gave it a shot anyway and am glad I did!

        Crappy graphics but it was easily the best game I've ever played, and may ever play. The way the game let you "walk into" and wire up robots with logic gates was pure genius. There were some really tough problems, solving them was so rewarding. The Learning Company actually sent me a plaque for having completed it, I wish I had kept it.

    • Yup. The headline should read "A Man Whose Life Is Over Desires Attention From Schmucks On The Internet And Gets It.".

    • by Calydor ( 739835 )

      Where does it say the kid is made to master every single game ever made?

      How about just TRYING a good bunch of the established classics as a kind of fast-forward through gaming history?

      I just hope he's spared Superman 64 ...

  • by neoritter ( 3021561 ) on Wednesday December 10, 2014 @07:20PM (#48568591)

    N64 was not the beginning of the "3D era on consoles." That would be Sega 32x, Sega CD, or at the very least Playstation.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      Brrrrzzzt wrong. The N64 brought analog control and independent camera movement to the console race. Those are two critical ingredients for the '3D era'. If you'd like to point to the PC, however, you may be able to regain footing with the point you're trying to make.

      • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 ) *

        The N64 was a significant step forward but it wasn't the "beginning". As with most things it was a gradual process with various milestones along the way. Custom 3D chips in 16 bit consoles for games like Virtua Racing and Starfox were probably the first big 3D console games. Before that there were some pretty good home ports of games like Hard Drivin'.

    • Anyone else here play Castle Master? I had it on the C64 myself, but here it is in full 3D on the Amiga https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]

    • anyone, anyone, Bueller?

  • Making him? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by aardvarkjoe ( 156801 ) on Wednesday December 10, 2014 @07:24PM (#48568617)

    Andy taught him about gaming by making him play and master all of the old video games and gaming systems in the exact order they were actually released.

    So he's forcing his kid to play these games? I wonder if he ever has to tell his son that he has to beat Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles before he's allowed to do his homework...

    • Re:Making him? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by PRMan ( 959735 ) on Wednesday December 10, 2014 @08:15PM (#48568963)
      I did this with my daughter. I didn't force her to play games, but I have the book High Score and we played through all the games highlighted (we mostly tried them, didn't beat them all). Some were still great, others are completely horrible and boring (the same ones I didn't really play then...hmmm). Now, her favorite movie is Wreck-It-Ralph, but she's sad that most of her generation can't appreciate its brilliance. She also is playing the Zelda remake on her 3DS and also downloaded a GameBoy emulator on her phone to play Pokemon (with a group of friends at school that do the same). She does play modern games as well, but my daughters definitely prefer a Wii to Xbox or PS.
    • by rtb61 ( 674572 )

      The way to 'force' a child to play the limited examples of games of the era in the order they came out is logically only offer the games to play in that order. The child carrying the genetics of the parent and as is the norm in humanity, will want to play the games and as a matter of historical record, children of early computer gaming eras did in fact enjoy playing the games. The big difference between earlier computer games and current computer games is the shift in focus from game play to graphics. So t

    • by cdrudge ( 68377 )

      Andy taught him about gaming by making him play and master all of the old video games and gaming systems in the exact order they were actually released.

      So he's forcing his kid to play these games?

      Would you question his actions as much if instead of "forcing his kid to play these games", he "forced his kid to read these [age appropriate] books" in the order they were published?

      I read it as the order which the games and systems were presented were enforced to follow a specific order of introduction, not that

  • by Mashiki ( 184564 ) <mashiki&gmail,com> on Wednesday December 10, 2014 @07:25PM (#48568625) Homepage

    The same conference that tells people to "listen and believe" and suggests that people should use block lists to create their own social isolation circle?

  • Maybe with more of a PC bent, but I'm not sure how I'd pull that off without a big stash of old hardware. Probably worth it for Doom and Quake, but the real gem will be text adventure games. Sitting on my dad's lap while he played them was a big part of how I learned to read.

    • by wiggles ( 30088 )

      The problem is Doom and Quake were really intended for 14 year olds and older. They were rated 18+ if I recall. I don't think I'd have my 4 year old playing those.

      • by xvan ( 2935999 )
        I know 6 year olds that love playing GTA, so I think that Bloodless Doom won't be an issue.
  • this was probably the hardest game I played in the old days - it took me a month to figure out all it's secrets and figure out how to get the Ark of the Covenant - (the final tricky point was snagging a parachute on a branch that dragged you into the mesa the Ark was buried in) -

    but man when I beat it - holy crap - also the first Atari game I recall where you needed to play it with both joysticks - one to select items and one to move the guy

    RB

    • I remember it as one of the few Atari 2600 games you could actually BEAT instead of just being an endless game with a goal to get a high score.

    • Gotta love those tsetse flies and humming the snake charming tune...like you will be now that I mentioned it.

    • by Quirkz ( 1206400 )

      I tried playing that one without the benefit of a manual. I didn't even know what I was looking at, to know what things would kill you or were safe - I remember reloading and just walking around waiting to see if/when/how I died. I'm pretty sure I didn't know I needed to use a second joystick, so that may have made things much worse. In my memory it's the most frustrating Atari game I ever played, and this is coming from a guy who beat and replayed E.T.

  • At the top of the article, it shows an Atari 2600 in front of a TV. Displayed on the TV is Pac Man. But it isn't the 2600 version. It looks like the 800 version, or possibly the 5600 version (which was only slightly different).

    Mixing up the graphics like that is just wrong.

    Especially when the 2600 version of Pac Man was notorious for being so horribly bad. If only it had looked like that.

    • If you want good Pac-Man on an Atari 2600, try Hack 'Em and Hangly-Man [youtube.com].
    • by gl4ss ( 559668 )

      i think he used a plug-n-play console.

      all the games are pretty kid friendly.

      and definitely not ALL of videogame history. it's just kid action games. not even a big bunch of them.

      the title is faulty and frankly stupid in context of the original article. kids don't mind NES graphics and for 4 year old playing COD would be confusing anyways. none of the games mentioned take a significant time to finish.

  • Questionable? (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward

    He is teaching his kid skills which have some but limited value in actual life. Perhaps reaction times, maybe some cognitive development yes, but it's not life. He's channeling his little boy down a narrow funnel of gameland when the whole world is still full of wonder. At that age, he could be absorbing human languages. He could be playing with lego. He could be learning any number of things, but even better - he could be playing with other little kids and developing essential social skills - OUTSIDE!

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Languages are the most important thing that one could learn at that age. It will never be easier to learn them, and monoglots have absolutely no idea what they are missing.

    • He is teaching his kid skills which have some but limited value in actual life.

      Not to mention that they end up talking about ethics in game journalism and "SJWs" and then you have to drown them.

    • Re:Questionable? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by hey! ( 33014 ) on Thursday December 11, 2014 @03:26AM (#48570541) Homepage Journal

      We didn't let our son play video games at home until he was in second grade -- of course it's nearly impossible to avoid them at other people's houses without moving to a remote village without electricity. Consequently gaming became an obsession with him. When we visited relatives he'd spend all his time talking with his older cousins about games pretty much from the time he could talk. In kindergarten he started taking books out of the library on beating video games. By the time he was in first grade he was the neighborhood gaming consultant: kids would ask their moms to invite him over because they were stuck. But he couldn't play games at home.

      Finally I realized that forbidding games was just making him more obsessed (it's a family trait he gets from both parents). We bought a console and it was the best Christmas EVER. He quickly settled down to a pattern where he gets a new game, plays it relentlessly for a few days until he figures out all the interesting ways to beat it, then sets it aside. Now he's a teenager, and gaming is just another thing he does. It's *important* to him, but if you average out his playing time it adds up to maybe four hours a week. The time he plays the most is when his older sister comes back from college. They'll play through a stack of old games, like it's their way of reconnecting.

      People worry too much about parenting issues like this. You have to be prepared to be tough if an actual problem arises, but most of the time you're better off relaxing and seeing what happens. Think of it as "agile parenting". You don't have to foresee everything, you just have to be on top of what actually happens.

  • by Opportunist ( 166417 ) on Wednesday December 10, 2014 @07:39PM (#48568731)

    "DAAAAAAD, can I please do my homework? Just an hour?"
    "Not before you're done with Donkey Kong!"

  • Baseball parents (Score:5, Insightful)

    by scourfish ( 573542 ) <scourfish@@@yahoo...com> on Wednesday December 10, 2014 @07:40PM (#48568733)
    You know those crazy parents that make their kids go to baseball camps, practice several hours a week, and try to talk over the teams coach. Yeah, this guy is that kind of parent.
    • I was thinking he sounds more like the kind of parent who forces his kid to do _________, so the parent can relive their glory years and bask in the reflected glory. Baseball, beauty pageants, dance, piano, football, video games... it the act that matters, not the activity.

    • by hey! ( 33014 )

      Well, some kids actually like that -- maybe not talking over the coach, but the practice and camp and such. I had one of each, one who hated organized activities and another who liked them.

      And we *did* force both our kids to stick with some things they didn't want to do. In some case it was about commitment -- you asked to join the soccer team, you can't quit just because the team is losing. In other cases it was parental judgment about what's best -- I know you don't like swim lessons but you're going to s

  • by grub ( 11606 ) <slashdot@grub.net> on Wednesday December 10, 2014 @07:47PM (#48568789) Homepage Journal

    I'd like to know how the kid fared on E.T. for the Atari 2600.
    • That would constitute child abuse of the first order. No one should be forced to endure what we did in the 80's. No one.

    • by Nyder ( 754090 )

      I'd like to know how the kid fared on E.T. for the Atari 2600.

      He was quoted as saying, "This game belong is a trash pit"

    • I'd like to know how the kid fared on E.T. for the Atari 2600.

      It sounds like the Atari 2600 got mostly glossed over, which I think was an error on the Dad's part in the way he conducted his experiment. He started the kid off with "real" arcade games then tried to graduate to the 2600. While that's chronologically correct, it doesn't match the actual experience we had as kids. We only got to enjoy arcade games on a limited basis (when going out to arcades/pizza parlors). Arcade game plays were limited by quarters. The 2600 had woefully inferior versions of ga

      • While that's chronologically correct

        Actually, it's not. the oldest arcade game he used was was from 1979, the newest arcade game from 1983. The 2600 was released in 1977. So that would be like starting out with PS2 games and then moving to PS1 games.

    • by dmomo ( 256005 )

      I had E.T. when I was around 6. I actually liked it a lot, especially the AMAZING splash screen. I was able to complete it, too.

    • Depends on whether it's the original version of E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial or the service pack [neocomputer.org].
  • Not quite... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Daetrin ( 576516 ) on Wednesday December 10, 2014 @08:13PM (#48568949)

    Andy taught him about gaming by making him play and master all of the old video games and gaming systems in the exact order they were actually released.

    Part of that sentence is definitely wrong and part of it is definitely misleading. Because he skipped straight from the Atari 2600 to the NES, and then to the Super NES, and then to the N64. No Coleco, no Genesis, etc. So not all the consoles, and from what i can tell not even all the games for each console. And i can't see any indication that they're being played strictly in order either.

    So it's a heavily curated list of games, which is a good thing because the full list would be impossible to do, and it seems to be in strict chronological order in terms of consoles but only vague order within each generation.

    • If you recall, the nintendo offerings were the most popular. Far more popular than turbo grafix and sega genesis. Well i guess some neighbourhoods were genesis neighbourhoods but you wouldn't want to spend a lot of time there.

      Till the playstation, nintendo was where it was at so I am not surprised. Its a grandiose claim, "all video game history" so I would expect he would not be on a sega saturn or dreamcast (god rest its soul)

      • Still, going from the Atari 2600 straight to the NES is like going from a PC XT straight to a Pentium. The guy skipped too many systems and too many games. He could have limited the list to the best 3~5 games per system.

  • I never understood the appeal of a game where you can be continually blasted with machine gun fire for a period of time before actually dying; and then that death is not a restart from the beginning, but a continuation from that point with a new life. Where is the skill in that? One bullet == death requires developing mad skills and makes a game much more realistic. The way most games are programmed these days is akin to playing online no limit hold-em with fake money; people take chances they would neve
  • Father's a liar, kid's prolly gonna grow up to be one, too.

  • by Charliemopps ( 1157495 ) on Wednesday December 10, 2014 @08:36PM (#48569059)

    He has a 4yr old playing these games?
    His 4yr old plays mine craft?!?!
    His 4yr old can handle WASD input?

    I keep hearing about kids loving minecraft, but every time I ask if they have actually played the game I find out they are simply watching Youtube videos of funny British guys narrating their games. It seems the narrators are the real stars and the games incidental. I've got a 7yr old and he, nor anyone in his class can actually play the game.

    • I'll answer my own question... in typical fassion the summary is completely wrong:

      My son Eliot was born in 2004

      ...maths...
      He's 10 or 11

    • I find out they are simply watching Youtube videos of funny British guys narrating their games.

      And harassing women on Twitter, which appears to have become the current primary activity of people who grew up in this millennium playing video games. Because ethics.

    • The neighbor kid next door is, maybe 7?, He plays minecraft all the time. I have actually seen him play it.

      Granted, he plays the android tablet version and not the PC version, but he still plays it.

    • You mean something like this [wikipedia.org]?

    • My four year old loves and plays Minecraft - its the PS3 version mostly but he has also played the PC version and had no real problem with WASD. He isn't bothered about any survival elements, just loves to build houses, railways, and muck around.

      My 8 year old has also been playing it since he was 7 - on the PC and the PS3 - and never had any issues. As far as I'm aware most of his class plays it as well (although its been superseded by Terraria). He does watch a lot of these funny British guys but being Bri

    • He has a 4yr old playing these games?
      His 4yr old plays mine craft?!?!
      His 4yr old can handle WASD input?

      I keep hearing about kids loving minecraft, but every time I ask if they have actually played the game I find out they are simply watching Youtube videos of funny British guys narrating their games. It seems the narrators are the real stars and the games incidental. I've got a 7yr old and he, nor anyone in his class can actually play the game.

      Whoah...so that SouthPark episode is a real thing?

  • My 10-year-old now only likes easy console shooters and shies away from any real gaming challenge. And he keeps begging me to get him Rated M games, because the rating is the only thing he cares about. Ugh.

  • Dad Makes His Kid...

    It sounds like another overbearing parent trying to relive his youth through his kid.

    I know parents who are trying to force their kids to listen to the music they listened to, or play the sports they played, or go into the professional field they failed at. There's one kid who got pushed into pee-wee hockey at a very young age and ended up hating the sport (and his father, a little bit).

    What is so hard about understanding that your children are actually individual human beings and not c

  • I have seven kids all homeschooled and we love to fire up Mame, and I've kept my Atari 2600 although they haven't gotten to play it yet and I need to bring it out of storage. And I love to have them go through interesting pieces of twentieth century history in chronological order - right now we're watching through old Disney and Warner Brothers cartoons together on Saturday mornings, in order. Next year they are going to watch all six Star Wars films in the order they were released, before we see Episode

    • by jdavidb ( 449077 )

      Oh, man, this guy and I were cut from the same OCD cloth. I know it just looking at his pictures of Atari 2600 game boxes all sorted first by box style and then alphabetized. I used to do that when I was a kid and when I finally get the thing out of storage I'll bet a bunch of the games are alphabetized.

  • by cstec ( 521534 ) on Thursday December 11, 2014 @01:20AM (#48570141)

    Been there, still doing that that.

    Waste of time on a 4 year old. I have bright 11+ yr olds who are only beginning to really get it. Even while they have stuff in the TF2 workshop. It's both sad and hard to see that they, too, are distracted by the 3D shiny instead of the gameplay diamond. But they're getting there.

  • by sad_ ( 7868 ) on Thursday December 11, 2014 @07:12AM (#48571235) Homepage

    I don't really agree with this approach, it is like forcing somebody to watch all great sci-fi movies before he can go watch Interstellar. I do think they should watch all those great movies in good time and because they are great, they will still be fun/good to watch today.

    The same with games, i've seen it with my own kids. The real gems from the 8bit NES / C64 era still stand their own. I never forced them on these, but the questions come anyway, if you know kids, they are always full of questions.
    After playing mario galaxy, the question came if there are other mario games, at that point it is easy to introduce them to the past. I showed/played them through the whole history of Mario, starting with donkey kong (and showing donkey kong jr on my original savoured game&watch), going to mario bros (no, not 'super mario bros'), etc. Did they like all of them, no and i don't blame them, because some of them are not that great anymore. But the real good ones were still enjoyed and played (by them, by choice afterwards).

    Games are part of our culture now, like art, books, music and movies. It would be cruel not to let them know the classics, but it is just as cruel to force-feed them.

  • Come on that was really big back in the 80's, 90's and now is big again.

  • I'll bet he didn't make his kid play Spacewar! on a PDP-1.

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