FPS question!

[gilamonstre]

Any of you gamer nerds out there played an FPS called Nexuiz?

johnmoehrke's son wants to install it on the family PC and he's looking for pointers, warnings, or advice...

What's it like, for an open source FPS?

Comments

[el_diavalo]

How old is the kid?

[el_diavalo]

I also want to say that with pretty much any FPS, especially one that has a "deathmatch" mode, how much is too much?

That being said, I think most kids can differentiate between fps violence and real violence.

I'd check Valve/Steam. HL and HL2 are awesome - there's still a huge HL:Counter-Strike community. The games are pretty cheap now.

If you want to look for as much of a positive spin as you can, check out Left 4 Dead - a zombie apocalypse FPS. Since it's 4 vs. the world, there's no real way to finish the game on your own - it really drives the teamwork message home when you play with 3 other people (not just bots) - you talk with each other, help each other, and work together to get through levels.

Plus, zombie games are just super-fun.

[johnmoehrke]

12 and 15. Agree on the inability for that age to differentiate between real and virtual, we work with them on that front.

[el_diavalo]

It seems you may have misread me. I think they can tell the difference - based on your response it appears that they cannot tell the difference.

That aside, I know there are paintball mods for hl2.

Also, I don't know if you have an extra game-able system, but would you consider playing in game with them? I think that'd be almost killing a few birds with one stone. Not only could you monitor what they're exposed to, but how they react to it. Plus, you'd get to play ;)

[el_diavalo]

And frankly, I'd be more concerned about webcam access (or video/photo capable phone) at this point than video games.

But, a) not my kids, and b) I don't have any.

Hop on /b/ on 4-chan for five minutes, and if you weren't already concerned about web broadcasting, you will be.

[johnmoehrke]

I somewhat agree that they can differentiate. What I think gets categorized as 'can't differentiate' is that it is true some kids become more physically violent for a period of time after participating in virtual violence. It isn't the same level of violence. I do detect this... and this is what I work with them on.

I don't play video games simply because I suck at video games. I clearly have some kind of a video game handicap. I don't know what it is, but I simply can't get good enough at any game to have fun.

[el_diavalo]

Gotcha.

I ran into the "I suck too much to play with you guys" with a friend of mine on L4D.

We wanted him to play, but he thought he'd drag us down. We played anyways, and gave him tips and taught him as we went - he picked it up quicker than he normally would.

With L4D, there's an extended respawn if you die - i.e. you're stuck in a closet or room somewhere and you have to be rescued. The boys (I assume) might get a kick out of saying "lets go rescue dad!"

Anyways, you seem on top of it - just wanted to let you know you can play with them, without having to deal with all the gamers that will kick your ass so badly that you don't want to sit down and play. Set up your own "private room" and just play with them and/or friends.