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DEL.ICIO.USKids offered more multiplayer games online, but are they safe?
‘FusionFall’ is the latest Massively Multiplayer Online game, but what should you know before your kids play online games with others?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
The next time your child logs on to Cartoon Network, Nickelodeon or the Disney Channel to play a few games, he may not be playing alone.
There is a new push to create “online playgrounds” where kids play together online - just like adults have done for years. The games are called Massively Multiplayer Online games or MMO’s for short, and whether parents like it or not that is the direction many commercial online sites for kids are heading.
Adults have played community computer games like “World of Warcraft” and console multiplayer games like “Halo” for years. But children are not as well prepared to communicate online, and they might not know how to protect themselves as adults do. So the challenge for these sites is to create community game that is fun, but also keeps kids safe.
Disney offers several MMOs. You may have seen your children decorating Penguin igloos on “Club Penguin” or creating Pixies in “Pixie Hollow.” Nickelodeon offers “Avatar: The Last Airbender.” Launched officially Jan. 14 by Cartoon Network, “FusionFall” is the latest MMO added by a major Web site for kids. It is aimed at children 8 to 12, although my 5-year-old wants to play.
I knew my husband had set my son up to play this “FusionFall” a few weeks ago but I didn’t realize he was playing with other people. I walked by one afternoon and saw Id’s from other players with chat windows popping up on his screen. I freaked out and told him he couldn’t play the game anymore until I investigated it more. (Michael says he knew it was an MMO but wasn’t worried about it.)
Earlier this week, I talked with Chris Waldron, the executive producer of FusionFall, about online gaming and what Cartoon Network is doing to protect kids in this virtual world.
A longtime gamer but also a dad to a 4-year-old son, Waldron understood my concerns and did a good job allaying many of my fears.
Waldron explained they have built in layers of protection to the play. Parents will set up a master account where they control the settings for their kids. Kids who are playing for free (there are about eight hours of game play on the free level at this point) can ONLY use pre-scripted chat from a menu forming basic questions or giving praise. That means the children can only choose from a small selection of conversation starters, such as “This mission is hard.” or “Let’s get another buddy.”
Parents can choose to pay a monthly fee of $5.95, which will allow their child to access more parts of the game and also access to chat live without using scripts.
An account marked to chat live cannot chat with a non-live chat person.
Waldron says all of the game play and interaction is being constantly monitored by filtering computers and live people. Cartoon Network has hired a company in England whose only job is to monitor and look for potential threats to the kids.
The computer filters for curse words and searches for phrases that could be an adult trying to “groom” a child. If anything is questionable it alerts live employees to intervene. Live employees are also monitoring independently of the computer.
Waldron says so far they’ve only had false alarms with the phrase “What are you wearing?” The online characters can wear different crazy masks, shoes and costumes, and the players are asking their friends about their uniforms, but the computer thinks it could be an adult coming on to them.
I asked Waldron why game makers feel kids should even be playing together online.
Waldron explains it’s like going to Six Flags or a movie theater. You can have fun by yourself, but it’s more fun as a shared experience with everyone else.
“It’s to make the game world feel like more than just a game. It’s a virtual world for you as a kids to show off your accomplishments,” says Waldron. The kids collect clothes and characters, and the best players show up (just their online name) on a leaderboard.
Waldron also pointed out that the game is designed to be played in 30-minute sessions. The game begins to reduce targets and make it less fun for the kids if they stay on longer.
Waldron says they built the game hoping families would play together. Mom or Dad can log on from work or business trips and play a quick session with their kids.
I guess MMOs are not inherently bad, but I think they require a lot more investigating before allowing a child under 16 or 17 to play. Picking a MMO for your child to play is like picking a restaurant for sushi, you have to choose very carefully!
Since my son has started playing this game, I have been holding him in my lap reading him what pre-scripted things people are saying (He can read but it pops up fast and in small print.), and helping him figure out what he’s doing. It’s something he’s really excited to share with me, and he’s working on reading faster. I’ll let him play in short bursts, but I don’t think we’ll be paying the extra monthly fee.
What do you think: With these types of protective measures in place is it safe for kids to play online with other people? Would you let your child play this game or the Disney games like it?
Here are Web sites to help you evaluate and understand Massively Multiplayer Online video games.
You can email Theresa at ajcmomania@gmail.com. Ideas and comments are welcome.
Permalink | Comments (21) | Post your comment | Categories: Ethics of rearing kids today
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Comments
By Belle
February 2, 2009 9:51 AM | Link to this
I see no problem with it. As with any thing else in moderation and with supervision it can be a fun and even educational game. Some people try to make you fear anything that they don’t understand or participate in. Try it and if it works for you then play, if not then don’t.
By Cammi317
February 2, 2009 10:55 AM | Link to this
My 11 y/o daughter has been playing on Yahooligans which is Yahoo for kids for the past couple of years. I like it because they play against other children, but are only allowed to use pre-named Avatars and there is no chat box for them to communicate. Webkins is another of her favorites. She goes on Disney and the other sites as well. I try to watch closely as to what is going on because there are far too many outside links on these child sites. One thing happened that made me really upset when she was eight: She thought she typed in www.disneychannel.com, but instead typed in www.disneychannle.com and it was a pornographic site. She came and told me that something was wrong immediately, but it was very upsetting. Those types of sites should not be allowed to have names so close to a child’s site.
By new mom
February 2, 2009 12:34 PM | Link to this
Dang, Theresa, so much research and work in this topic and only two comments! I had to post, even though I have never heard of MMOs or anything!
Cammi, I am so paranoid about accidently typing a website incorrectly and stumbling onto something nasty…I NEVER just type one in. I either google it, even if I’m sure I know what the site is, or I go to a bookmark I’ve created after making sure I have the right one. There has to be a way to create bookmarks and only allow your kids access to the bookmarks when they are online, so they don’t have any other options other than what you’ve set up for them. I have no idea how to set that up, my husband could tell you but he’s at work! But I think something like that would help give parents a little more peace of mind, when it comes to letting their kids online.
By Theresa
February 2, 2009 1:05 PM | Link to this
People I worked so hard on this — I’m sooo sad — interviews, web resources, stats —- you guys are bumming me out!!
New Mom - thanks for taking the time to write — At least the embryo controversy blog did well this weekend!!
By Tig
February 2, 2009 1:09 PM | Link to this
My daughter’s only 4, so she’s got a while to go before she would be playing any kind of game on the computer that involves dialogue between characters like the game you’re talking about has.
That being said, however, I play MMOs myself, and if she was old enough to play one, I would be willing to let her play one as long as it was one that I knew was kid-friendly and had safeguards like the one you’re talking about seems to.
By Chris
February 2, 2009 1:16 PM | Link to this
Theresa,
I’m 38 and have been playing online games of various types since 1991…back when they were called “MUDs”. (Multi User Dungeons).
I’m also the father of two little girls, 5 and 2, one of which has discovered Pixie Hollow.
Right now, she just likes to create new fairies and dress them. But I know how HYPER addictive MMO games can become…so I don’t advocate her playing the game very much at all.
I’ve designed, created, administrated, and played MMOs for years…and I can guarantee you that I will work very actively to avoid my daughters falling into the same addictive trap that myself and others have fallen into over the years.
I don’t think that any kids, under the age of 18, should be playing MMOs…much less have MMOs targeted at them.
This past weekend, while the sun was out and it was warm, we spent an hour at the neighborhood playground. I think she had alot more fun running and playing in the sandbox than she would have logged into an MMO…
By Becky
February 2, 2009 1:22 PM | Link to this
Thersa, I don’t play games, so this is something that I’ll just read what others say..
By Chris
February 2, 2009 1:23 PM | Link to this
To follow up my earlier post…I neglected to mention that I cancelled and removed Warcraft from my machines back in June and am game free for the first time in years. It was my kids and the time investment in MMOs that finally came into conflict with each other and revealed to me the level of my addiction.
By EK
February 2, 2009 1:25 PM | Link to this
I play and have played MMOs for years. In general, they are absolutely not safe for children, even supervised. Adult discussion and comments just cannot be filtered adequately by an algorithm.
However, I like what these companies are doing with the children’s MMOs. Interaction over computers is a skill every child will need as an adult, and it’s awesome that you are sitting with your child and playing along with them. A safe MMO environment is a great idea.
I am in the computer industry, and completely understand the technology, and the trips and traps in this (MMO) industry. I think Theresa did a great job on the research and explained everything very well. The problem is that too many people don’t understand even the basics of this concept, and will thus not comprehend this article. It’s a shame, since their kids will be exposed to it, whether the parent is present to guide them or not.
By Tig
February 2, 2009 1:40 PM | Link to this
Very cool, Chris.
Theresa - one thing that you mentioned up above that sounds like a great idea is the imposed time limit (assuming it’s forced and not just ‘suggested’) for an MMO for kids. Limiting them to x-amount of time max per day as a restriction of the software/website sounds like a good way to let kids take part in something like those if they want to, but not have mom/dad bad the badguy who has to pull them away.
By Michelle
February 2, 2009 1:40 PM | Link to this
Well, I don’t really like to play video games, unfortunately all of my kids and my husband do. My husband plays on-line games on x-box live and I HATE it. He plays every night for hours at a time. He is setting a horrible example for all of the kids.
As for on-line gaming for kids, personally, I’m against it. I think a hand-held is bad enough. I don’t mind advocating one if it actually serves some type of intellectual purpose (Leap frog).
I have recently let my 5 year old start playing on the computer, but only games that he can play alone. I don’t care for the way he behaves when he has sat in front of the TV or computer all day long. It’s just down right annoying.
I think if these kids are going to be playing these kinds of games, then the parents should still be paying very close attention to what their kids are ACTUALLY doing. They should not just allow the kids to get on there totally unsupervised!
I think this is a great topic, however, I don’t usually let my kids on-line without knowing. The teens (who are 18 and almost 17) pretty much only go to MySpace (which I monitor). I will look at their comments and posts to see if anything inappropriate is being said, either by or to them. I let them know I don’t approve of the profanity. I don’t care how old they are, I don’t appreciate seeing it.
Just because they are on a computer, they may feel a false sense of “anonymity”, but it is FALSE. People are easily tracked down through cyberspace!
By Zoe's Mom
February 2, 2009 2:23 PM | Link to this
I love Fusion Fall and I’m 38. I play sometimes to help my kid out with points when she isn’t able to play (we regulate her online time). So far most kids aren’t interested in chatting, just getting points. I also was big into online gaming but am more a RealArcarde or BigFishGames girl now. I want to the whole game to play with.
By West Cobb Dad
February 2, 2009 3:16 PM | Link to this
Interesting topic. I got into the MMO thing about 5 years ago. Quickly realized that I actually had a life and canceled my membership after about a month of on and off playing. My son has a Xbox 360 and unfortunately the best games require online play to fully enjoy it. They are making the actual game play shorter and pushing their online options. This can be fun (as when both of my brothers who live in different states) and myself played Tiger Woods together. Unfortunately, I have gone online and have heard things out of the mouths of 12 year olds that would have had me eating the proverbial LifeBoy for a week. Kids get a “you can’t do anything to me” attitude on there. Just like the chatrooms use to be on AOL and Yahoo. Most of the kids and adults are respectful, but I would estimate 5-10% are not. Yes there settings, etc… But as the kids get older, they get smarter and find ways around things. Just like we did when we were growing up. My advice…keep the youngins under close supervision as much as possible. Do not give in to their “privacy” whining. Remember, until they are 18 and out of the house, they have no privacy. I lost that battle due to the fact the wife and I were not on an united front. I would recommend a key stroke program on the computer. You will be amazed at what your 12 year old types and sees.
By MO
February 2, 2009 3:27 PM | Link to this
I’m sorry but I think it’s just rediculous for parents to advocate more online games for kids. They should be playing tag, kick the can or anything to get them outside getting excercise. Kids today don’t have a clue what fun is and the sad part is parents are behind it and causing their children to be unsociable and fat.
By Michelle
February 2, 2009 3:44 PM | Link to this
What is a keystroke program? How do you get it?
By JJ
February 3, 2009 12:24 PM | Link to this
Becky I’m with you, we don’t play computer games at my house. Matter of fact, if not for my daughter, we wouldn’t even have a computer. It’s a dust magnet in my house. I’m going to get her a lap top for graduation and ditch my home computer. I can always add internet access to my Blackberry. My daughter already did to her’s but I’m keeping the computer until she leaves in the fall.
I use my computer at work, and VERY rarely use the one at home…….
By catlady
February 3, 2009 1:10 PM | Link to this
Just say No. There are a thousand things a 5 year old should be doing, and computer games are NOT one of them.
As a teacher, I can tell which of my kids spend daily computer time. It ain’t pretty.
Children should be playing outside, or playing board games with their parents/siblings, taking family walks, doing art projects, etc.
This is from the prospective of a 36 year teacher and 32 year mother.
By Christine Wheeler
February 4, 2009 5:48 PM | Link to this
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March 11, 2009 9:28 PM | Link to this
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