We’re a week into the school summer holidays here in England, and I wonder how many parents who started out determined to keep their children completely away from screens are now beginning to feel the strain. When my sons were much younger, I often had these idyllic images in my head of day trips to the seaside, back garden treasure hunts, paddling in the river, visiting relatives … an endless series of character forming experiences which I imagined in grainy Kodachrome colours. Then I’d be faced with the reality of having a job, and also the, let’s say, limited attention span of my sons. Those boys could rocket through a host of formative activities in a few hours leaving a trail of muddy boots, half-finished crafting projects and tired grandparents in their wake. Sheepishly, we’d end up allowing some Fortnite time to catch our breath.
There is so much pressure and guilt around children and gaming, especially during long school breaks, and I think we need to seriously redress our outlook as a society. I harbour many lovely memories of gaming with my sons during hot August days; drowsily loafing about building ridiculous mansions in Minecraft or laughing ourselves stupid in Goat Simulator. We would always take the Switch on holiday with us, so that in the evenings, when we went out for meals, there would be an hour or so where my wife and I could linger over a glass of wine, while the boys silently played Super Mario together. We still managed to build sand castles, go swimming and explore unfamiliar towns, but games provided a way to wind down and enjoy something familiar.
When they stayed with their grandparents during holidays, they took games along too. My mum had a Nintendo Wii, which she claimed was exclusively for entertaining her grandchildren when she got tired; it was nice to watch my sons sit and patiently explain Kirby’s Epic Yarn to her. I expect it reminds her of when I was young, playing Commodore 64 games on our computer desk in the kitchen – trying to recruit my dad into sessions of footie game Kick Off or the golf sim Leaderboard while he was supposed to be cooking a chicken. It’s good for children to be able to share their expertise and enthusiasm, whether that’s about playing a guitar (which my kids did, after learning about the instrument via Rock Band and Guitar Hero) or capturing a Jigglypuff in Pokémon Go.
It’s a cliche to say “all things in moderation”, but it also happens to be true. There is too much talk of screen time as some sort of all-pervading, homogeneous evil, when really we should be thinking about the quality of that screen time. When children grow up playing video games and they’re comfortable in that world, over the summer is a good time to think about what they’re playing, what they get out of it and who they’re playing with. Is it bad that they spend an hour or two every night in Fortnite? Or are they meeting friends, having a laugh and even building stuff in the Creative mode? Games are also wonderfully adaptable to different situations. You might not want them playing video games on the beach, but in those interstitial moments – a long journey, a rainy afternoon – they can be invaluable – and parents shouldn’t feel bad about that. For a lot of gen Z and gen alpha, games are a part of the texture of their lives now – they fit in, like reading a comic or listening to an album on a Walkman did when I was their age.
Earlier this week, I took one of my sons, now 17, to London. I met a friend while he went off and explored the city by himself. On the coach on the way home to Somerset, we were a bit too knackered to chat, but instead we played Mario Kart World together. We stood the console on the little seat tray in front of me, but it kept juddering and moving as the coach drove along, usually to my advantage. It was funny; we laughed and compared tactics and occasionally looked up as the evening sun made the fields outside glow. I think I will remember that hour and a half I spent with him on the bus longer than anything else I did that day. There may have been a screen between us, but we were together.
What to play
Car battle games were wildly popular in the mid-1990s when titles such as Twisted Metal, Carmageddon and Destruction Derby encouraged players to smash their cars into other cars, repeatedly, often while also firing rocket launchers.
Newcomer Fumes is looking to bring those heady days back – it’s an open-world single-player vehicle blast-’em-up where you explore a vast Mad Max landscape in an upgradeable muscle car destroying enemies. The slightly retro visuals and wailing guitar music hark back to the original PlayStation era and the arcade-style handling is loose and reckless. It’s in early access on Steam with a free demo available.
Available on: PC
Estimated playtime: 10 hours-plus
What to read
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As reported in IGN as well as other sources, Sony is suing the Chinese game publisher Tencent for copyright and trademark infringement. The allegation is that Tencent’s forthcoming game Light of Motiram, in which a young girl battles giant robot dinosaurs in a vast open world, bears more than a passing resemblance to Sony’s hugely successful Horizon series, in which a young girl battles giant robot dinosaurs in a vast open world. Tencent has not yet commented on the allegations.
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Variety has revealed that a Wolfenstein TV series is in development at Amazon MGM Studios. Patrick Somerville (known for Station Eleven and Maniac) is set to write, while Jerk Gustafsson from game developer MachineGames will be an executive producer. The Nazi-slaughtering shooter is the latest video game, following the likes of The Last of Us and Fallout, to catch the interest of streaming TV platforms and film studios, looking to capture the attention of younger audiences who are tired of superheroes.
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Developers at Falmouth University are working with local teenagers to create a video game that helps young people deal with adverse childhood experiences. Entitled Ace of Hearts, it deals with subjects such as bereavement and poverty, and is designed to get players to talk about their experiences. Read more on the BBC news site.
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What to click
Question Block
An evergreen question from Andy via email:
“In Sir Gareth Southgate’s Richard Dimbleby lecture, he said he fears that young men are spending too much time gaming, gambling and watching pornography. I feel he is oversimplifying gaming. Time spent on “good gaming” can be a good thing. I think about this a lot, and I’m very interested in how you think gaming might actually be helping young people find and cultivate a healthy pride, identity and culture for themselves?”
Although there are huge problems with toxic communities within gaming, thankfully there is also a multitude of positive examples. I’ve experienced a lot of kindness and acceptance in communities focused on particular games, especially space exploration sims Deep Rock Galactic and No Man’s Sky, and in creative games such as Minecraft, where players praise each other’s construction skills. Minecraft has also fostered strong accessibility communities – for example the wonderful Autcraft, which runs servers for neurodivergent players, allowing players to build friendships in a way that wouldn’t otherwise have been possible. Plenty of Twitch and YouTube streamers such as Aimsey, SpringSims and xChocoBars also create communities that give fans a sense of identity and belonging. And I love that certain games foster communities in which creativity and inclusivity expand beyond the games themselves – whether it’s League of Legends cosplay gatherings or Life Is Strange fan-fiction groups. Video games, like music and movies, provide channels though which fandoms are able to express themselves and explore their identities. For many young people, I genuinely think the modern world would be almost impossible to navigate without these spaces.
If you’ve got a question for Question Block – or anything else to say about the newsletter – hit reply or email us on pushingbuttons@theguardian.com.