Addictinggames.com

This is a site that is full of short, easy games that take your mind off boredom and at the same time keep you hooked for a long, loooong time. http://www.addictinggames.com/ In case you didn't want to spell it out yourself. They have a huge selection of games, categories the games fall under, and new games that get added to their list every single day. One of the funny things that happened was when my girlfriend was showing me the site, and helping me see how it would be great for this blog, she had a problem with getting off of it. The answers i was getting was "just one second" or "after this." That's what this site does to people! These games aren't long enough or technical enough to really present a problem but there are a large enough number that in order to play all the games you'd have to spend a long time playing. Just thought that was a very interesting site to include.

Manhunt 2

Manhunt 2 goes on sale Halloween and there are already people who are opposing it. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21535818/ The game is about players take on role of a man escaping from an insane asylum. There is torture and brutal killing in the game which warranted the original an Adult only rating and this new, modified sequal a Mature rating. The ratings speak for themselves, leaving the responsibility up to the adults. Game retailers like EB Games, McVan's Video Games, and GamStop all have an age restriction policy in which they do not sell rated M and Adult video games to minors without a present adult. Every time there is an outcry like this all i can think is "give me a break." If you are worried about your child playing the game don't buy it for the child. And if the child's friend has the game make sure the friend's parent knows you don't want the child playing the game. Simple common sense. But there are people who insist on being in groups that "advocate" for the safety of children when really they should be advocating in the education of parents not being stupid.

All in all, the original game was interesting, got boring after awhile though. Definitely not suitable for children therefore don't buy it for your 8 year old. period.

More addictions

http://www.aspeneducationgroup.com/gameaddiction/?gclid=COTdg7f2rI8CFQ6CPAodkWEyQQ

This site is an actual ad for an acutal video game detox program, or programs depending on what information you want from them. They talk about the addiction, what games are most addicting, and why your kid should be in their sessions. They also have other types of delinquents going to their sessions which brings up my question, why put people who have video game problems and heroin problems in the same place? That seems kind of inefficient to me.

The most addicting games they say are MMORPG's, Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games. This includes the Final Fantasy Online games, World of Warcraft, Guild Wars, and any other game that you can play online with other human players. http://www.aspeneducationgroup.com/gameaddiction/wow.asp That is their reasoning why World of Warcraft is the most addicting game. I think it's interesting they keep mentioning that all the effects are on teens when, in reality, there are more adults that play that game and others like it. Is there a detox center for them? Not really. The detox centers for adults are for more deadly things like drugs, alcohol, depression, eating disorders, etc. The video game detox centers are based around teens who play, not adults. Very interesting...

Obesity

This is a study over video games and obesity, this time it's a positive correlation. http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2005-04-02-obesity-video-game_x.htm It talks about a child who struggles to play sports and has a rough time in general. He changed his diet one week and lost 10 pounds, played an interactive video game called Dance Dance Revolution and lost another 10 pounds. The study is being done by a group called PEIA, Public Employees Insurance Agency. And on top of helping children become healthy, they are looking to install the video game package into many schools for use during physical education class and in the hopes the children will want their parents to get the game for them. It's an interesting concept, and though i'm skeptical i'm sure the game does do some good.

The funny part about this game is that it only sells for $60 including the dance pad. And along with the normal dance feature there is a cardio feature that will track how many calories the dancer has lost during the dance. How can Bowflex compete with this??

Surgeons helped by video games?

April 7, 2004 a study was reported on MSNBC.com, http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4685909/. The basic idea of this article is a study was done on the effects of video game play on a surgeon's ability to focus and not make medical errors. The study then shows that with three hours of game play a week the surgeons mistakes decreased by 37%. That's a funny study considering how many people are hardcore against the video game play. The biggest factor is probably the amount of time spent playing video games. this is suggesting that with three hours it decreases mistakes made, probably by helping them focus a little bit. The article even says that the surgeon completed the surgery 27% quicker than his counterpart who did not playing video games.

The type of surgery they are doing is called laparoscopic surgery. It's where the doctor uses a tiny camera and instruments controlled by joysticks outside the body on any part inside the body. Hand-eye coordination is very important so video games are definitely helpful in that situation.

On CBSnews.com I found a very interesting article about video game addictions. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/07/03/health/webmd/main1773956.shtml Apparently in Amsterdam there are already detox clinics for video game addicts. Addiction, as defined in the article, is characterized by two things: 1. The addict needs more of the substance or behavior to keep him/her going, 2. Without the substance or behavior he/she becomes irritable and miserable. It's a very interesting concept that makes sense by those two criteria. Video games seem to have silently taken us captive, luring us into the fantasy worlds of our favorite games.

A few warning signs given by CBSnews.com that someone is a compulsive gamer are:

Playing for increasing amounts of time
Thinking about gaming during other activities
Gaming to escape from real-life problems, anxiety, or depression
Lying to friends and family to conceal gaming
Feeling irritable when trying to cut down on gaming

And these can be transferred to any addiction, not just gaming. Think about this in your own life and see if there's an underlying addiction that you might have.

Children

There is a pretty large discussion that is almost always ongoing about younger kids playing video games. One side of the argument wants children to be playing outdoors, interacting with other kids like they did when they were young. Others say what's the harm in playing video games? The Kaiser Family Foundation http://www.kff.org/entmedia/3271-index.cfm has an interesting fact sheet about children and video games. One of these "facts" is that 92% of children ages 2-17 reported playing video games and more than 2/3 of children have a video games system in their room. I personally don't see a 3 year old kid having a Nintendo in his/her room.

Some of the impacts they say video games have on children are good and some are bad. A good impact is that there are researchers who believe video games are the first step in a child understanding and becoming computer literate. The video games improve spacial visualization and visual attention skills which they say can help reduce the differences in these skills between boys and girls. Another statistic they bring up is that 25% of children say video games interfere with their homework and/or school performance. They also bring up the violence issue, stating that video games possibly account for adolescents' bad behaviors and aggressiveness. I think that statement still needs to be researched more.