Weekend Reading: An interview with a father

DMV: So, what do you have in your home?
Mike: I’m predominantly a PC gamer, but also love handheld gaming. My family had Pong in the mid 70’s and some sort of early Atari system, but I was too busy with everything else in life to get into that. So now I own several high end laptops for gaming (Mac & PC), DS Lite, PSP and GBA. My kids have GBA’s and DS (Phat), as well as having a GameCube and Wii.

Games (including computer based things like ‘Club Penguin’ or ‘Webkins World) are a ‘by permission’ thing in our house.  The boys need to ask permission to play, and may or may not get permission based on what else is happening.  When there is time they get ~30 minutes each per day.  However, it is usually more like a couple of hours a week in one or two sessions.

As for game ratings, We use the game ratings as a broad guideline, but look beyond just a single letter.  That is largely what brought me to GamerDad – I had two little kids and wanted to introduce them to video games.  I let them watch the intro movie to Jedi Knight and one thought it was great and the other was terrified … I knew I lacked perspective – and my wife is a non-gamer bordering on anti-gamer (though she does try, I must say).  Since I’m very involved with the gaming world I have a better feel for what content is in games.

Another thing I do in terms of games for my kids is limit by genre – for now first-person shooters in general are a ‘no’.  As I put it – when you’ve run out of all of the other games in your collection let me know and we’ll discuss Metroid again…

I have loads of M rated games for the PC, PSP and even the DS. I do keep them stored away – the PC is easy since we have all of the computers in the house password locked with tons of security features. The PSP is also pretty easy since it is always with me, and the boys are very good about asking to play stuff. My older son is more curious, but my younger son gets freaked out and is quite happy with the DS collection. As of now I don’t have anything M rated for the
‘Cube or Wii since I really don’t play it – and anything we play as a family is stuff like Wii Sports or Mario Party.

 

DMV: Being a father, you’ve got additional responsibilities with your children. What’s your time management like for handling both kids and gaming?
Mike: Time management is a nightmare – I work a ~50 or so hour week with a 45-minute commute each way. Fortunately I’m a morning person – I get up at 4AM and run 5 miles, then do a couple of chores around the house before getting to work at around 6AM. I try to leave by 4PM or so, which allows for us to have dinner as a family every night. I also am leader / manager for a number of activities for them … it makes for a crazy life! There are activities pretty much every night, and my wife and I work hard to make sure there is ‘us’ time in there as well.

So where does gaming fit in that mess? That is a reason I’m almost entirely a single player gamer (aside from preferring those game types)! I like handheld games because I can squeeze in a quick round of something while the car warms up in the morning or while I’m waiting for an oil change or whatever.  But PC gaming is my primary love, which tends to mean late nights and little sleep.  That is something I have always just dealt with, but I really enjoy the hobby and my wife has always been accepting of that.

Mike: I love playing games of all sorts with my kids – whether it is basketball, tennis, Heroscape or other board games, or video games. The stuff we tend to share is either DS or GameCube / Wii – things like Mario Kart, Super Smash Bros, Mario Party, Cooking Mama, Wii Sports, Star Wars Rebel Strike and anything that lets us team up and/or go against each other.