I Make Video Games. I Won’t Let My Daughters Play Them

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/02/opinion/video-game-addiction.html

by jrochkind1 • 4 years ago

9 4 4 years ago

rrwo• 4 years ago

In other words, "I'm a pusher but I won't let my children use narcotics."

This seems to be about a specific type of games, mobile games with microtransactions. Banning all video games outright is strange as it means they are unable to differentiate or are simply unaware that different types exist. It's like banning all movie watching in a household because porn movies exist.

The solutions suggested are decent but only a stopgap; they kind of miss a root solution, which is to get the duopoly to crack down on harmful/addictive games. But the duopoly will not do so, and will instead point at their half-arsed solutions, once again putting the onus of control on a section of the population without control.

So the only way becomes through legislation. What the author along with the parents should be doing is pushing for legislation that forces tech companies to put controls in place and punish game companies if they transgress certain boundaries.

dtagames2• 4 years ago

https://web.archive.org/web/20221002132328/https://www.nytim...

dtagames2• 4 years ago

The author's daughters aren't old enough to be playing video games (under 5) and shouldn't be. People under 18 can have real money transactions turned off by an adult, so that's not the problem either.

This story also says that 90% of the gamers studied over 6 years had no negative impact from video games. Aren't those numbers in line with other dopamine-releasing products that lead some people to become addicted?

The South Park episode about this ("Freemium Isn't Free") is a great commentary. Yes, some people (even kids) become addicted to fun things that adults like. This is an unfortunate risk of being a person, and not all such risks can be eliminated or even mitigated. The kinds of fun that become addicting may change as technology and culture changes, but the psychology and biology that drive these behaviors probably cannot be changed, nor can its prevalence in society as a fraction of the whole.

I Make Video Games. I Won’t Let My Daughters Play Them

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