WOW players - need some odd help

[Lohman446]

.....

So, my seven year old child went to visit her mother this weekend, and during that time, along with other MAJOR issues, she was introduced to playing World of Warcarft - online.

Now correct me if I am wrong, but I am thinking A) this is pretty graphic and B) online play is not ideal, especially unsupervised.

Of course before I contact the court, again, I am going to hunt down ratings. What I am looking for is someone to tell me if I am wrong, or better yet graphic screen shots :P

My e-mail is [email protected], any help would be appreciated.

Thanks

[robnix]

.....

So, my seven year old child went to visit her mother this weekend, and during that time, along with other MAJOR issues, she was introduced to playing World of Warcarft - online.

Now correct me if I am wrong, but I am thinking A) this is pretty graphic and B) online play is not ideal, especially unsupervised.

Of course before I contact the court, again, I am going to hunt down ratings. What I am looking for is someone to tell me if I am wrong, or better yet graphic screen shots :P

My e-mail is [email protected], any help would be appreciated.

Thanks

WOW is rated T for Teen.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/feature.html/103-8754590-9726269?ie=UTF8&docId=71576

I'd check some of the fanboy sites for the game for the kind of screenshots you're looking for. I'm sure that there's plenty.

[Thordic]

WoW is very cartoony, and doesn't seem graphic to me at all. There isn't even any blood. When a character dies, you just see a cartoony looking body on the ground.

In-game chat is pretty tame as well. I've seen very few comments that would be objectionable.

You are always going to get a few idiots who go around causing problems but in general its a pretty safe game.

Now, as far as a 7 year old, I don't think I personally would have a problem with it. But when I play/played the game, I wasn't looking at it through a parents eye. So while I don't think it would be an issue, you should take a look for yourself.

The bottom line is that the game involves killing things. But as I said, its all very cartoony.

Here is a family-oriented review:

http://www.mediafamily.org/kidscore/games_world_of_warcraft.shtml

7 is a little young, but I know kids who were playing CounterStrike at that age, and that game is a lot more graphic than WoW.

[Pneumagger]

As long as your daughter is able to discern that the killing in the game is entirely non realistic, you shouldn't have a problem. It's all just spells, make believe, and magicy type of stuff. Bambi's mother dieing probably traumatized more children than WoW. I can think of a dozen southpark eposidoes off the top of my head I would rather kids not watch than play WoW - and that crap is on Cable TV. (And it's funny asheck too ) There will always be some nasty screenshots shoing a little of killing, but it is fairly cartoony.

I play WC3 (Warcraft 3) and don't find any aspect of the game unsuitable for any age - other than the interaction with other humans on the net. If you think people on paintball forums are douchebags - it's like the tip of the iceburg for pc gaming. That should be your primary concern for her. Were I you, I would monitor her chatting and keep her from some of the internat BS being flung around in those chatrooms... there's some sickos out there to keep an eye for. I wouldn't let my future kid (especially a young girl) play internet pc games like WoW for that reason, not so much the graphic and gamplay as that is all very harmless. If she's just playing alone or with friends she should be 100% ok though.

Bottom line: Your her parent and you have the best idea of what she can handle. I suggest you pick up an old copy of WC3 or WoW and play for yourself for an hour or two. That game is about as harmless as anything you can flip on the TV and watch. If you're going to let her play, have a talk with her about conversing with people in the game. Let her know even though they aren't there in person, they are still "strangers" and require your permision to interact with.

[Lohman446]

My problem is, is that it is 95% unsupervised when it is with her mother. Its the other players I am more concerned about that the violent imagery.

[Pneumagger]

Is there a way to restrict her to "younger" servers?

[StygShore]

wasted time....

I would worry about the countless hours your child will waste of her youth playing that game instead of interacting with people and learning real life.


I'm amazed at the number of people playing that game with a complete lack of social skills, vocabulary, or ability to interact outside of their computer world without talking about playing WOW. I have literally lost several friends to that game. All they do with their free time is WOW, they never hang out anymore, rarely sleep, they cant do anything but talk about that game, and everyone they now "hang out" with are players online.

The Southpark episode as funny as it was on WOW was soooooo correct is was almost scary.


Styg

[Thordic]

Styg, you are talking about the minority. It does happen but it isn't everyone. Any good video game has its "addicts", not just Warcraft or even MMOs. I know kids who failed out of college because of Starcraft and HalfLife.

Lohman, I would say 99% of the person-to-person interaction in WoW is harmless. Mostly its just stuff like "Hey I need someone to help me kill this bad guy" or "I need to go on this quest, does any healer want to join me?", things of that nature.

However, I don't think a 7-year old should be doing much of anything unsupervised online. Not that youd have to watch over their shoulder the entire time, but if you leave the kid alone for hours with WoW as her babysitter, eventually she might get into trouble. That has nothing to do with the game, thats just the nature of the internet. If you give a kid unsupervised access to large numbers of strangers on the internet, eventually you are probably asking for trouble.

[Pneumagger]

Bingo thordic - just what I was trying to say. Ah enviez ur eloquense.

[Lohman446]

Thats a main concern. I have 0 ability to supervise her while she is at her mothers, and she gets about zero supervision from anyone there.

[93civiccpe]

Yes, I've seen the counter-strikers too at a young age, and always banned them from the servers I had admin over. Just because they are playing it doesn't mean they are right to do that. I am a firm believer of sticking to the ratings because fore the most part I haven't had any objections to games being rated the way they are. CS is an adult game, and I don't think anyone that young should be able to see it.

As for WOW.. that game is not suitable for a child either in my opinion. I have seen college age kids get addicted and fail out of college because of this game. I hated it at the time but my dad made it clear that he was never going to buy us a game system, and that he was not going to let us buy one with our own money. Needless to say, we spent most of the days outside playing pickup games of football or at the local swimming pool. We were never out of shape as kids. Unfortunately for my dad we won a game system, which we were only allowed to play on weekends and only for a total of an hour. Needless to say, with the new trend of overweight kids I think a large part of that is due to excessive gameplaying and too little time spent outside. (Sorry.. I'll get off my soapbox now... I have a couple cousins who are terribly obese and you can't pay them to leave the darn television).

Anyways, as for WoW.. I have a brother who plays, and some of the stuff that is typed is not suitable for children. Even worse is that a lot of people who play together use a mic/headphones to communicate during in-game play. I was in the room for about 5 minutes when my brother played last and I couldn't believe the amount of profanity and stupid conversations held during that small amount of time. When I asked my brother how he could put up with that he said he just ignores it and only talks to those who he knows.

I won't even get into the whole topic of "online dating" that is going on in WoW. Needless to say, a child of mine would not be allowed anywhere near that.

[Phaelynar]

Yes, I've seen the counter-strikers too at a young age, and always banned them from the servers I had admin over. Just because they are playing it doesn't mean they are right to do that. I am a firm believer of sticking to the ratings because fore the most part I haven't had any objections to games being rated the way they are. CS is an adult game, and I don't think anyone that young should be able to see it.

As for WOW.. that game is not suitable for a child either in my opinion. I have seen college age kids get addicted and fail out of college because of this game. I hated it at the time but my dad made it clear that he was never going to buy us a game system, and that he was not going to let us buy one with our own money. Needless to say, we spent most of the days outside playing pickup games of football or at the local swimming pool. We were never out of shape as kids. Unfortunately for my dad we won a game system, which we were only allowed to play on weekends and only for a total of an hour. Needless to say, with the new trend of overweight kids I think a large part of that is due to excessive gameplaying and too little time spent outside. (Sorry.. I'll get off my soapbox now... I have a couple cousins who are terribly obese and you can't pay them to leave the darn television).

Anyways, as for WoW.. I have a brother who plays, and some of the stuff that is typed is not suitable for children. Even worse is that a lot of people who play together use a mic/headphones to communicate during in-game play. I was in the room for about 5 minutes when my brother played last and I couldn't believe the amount of profanity and stupid conversations held during that small amount of time. When I asked my brother how he could put up with that he said he just ignores it and only talks to those who he knows.

I won't even get into the whole topic of "online dating" that is going on in WoW. Needless to say, a child of mine would not be allowed anywhere near that.

1. WoW has a built in swear filter, if you don't want to see swears, click the stupid box, or get a brain.
2. He used headphones and a microphone... Dude, we're discussing a 7 year old kid. WoW does not have a built in microphone chat system, you need to download and install ventrillo, and join specific chat channels set up by your guild or friends to communicate, I doubt this kid is aware of how to do that.
3. There is no blood, it's all cartoon violence. The daily news is more graphic than WoW
4. If you don't want the kid playing it, block it on the computer. It takes all of 30 seconds to put an administrative password required to run certain programs, and once again, a 7 year old kid will not know how to bypass it.
5. Stop giving the 7 year old kid a credit card, and/or the ability to purchase gamecards from a store, as your 7 year old kid does not wander to EB/Target etc to go pick up items by herself.
6. The game is rated Teen, so they won't sell the 7 year old a gamecard or the game.
7. Just because a bunch of fat kids play videogames does not mean everyone who plays videogames is fat. I for one am 6'3, 180...that's pretty far from fat, and I play ****loads of videogames. My best friend is 6'2, 190, and 8% bodyfat, and he plays ****loads of videogames, he's definitely not fat either.
8. Now that I've covered everything, you profit.

[Lohman446]

4. If you don't want the kid playing it, block it on the computer. It takes all of 30 seconds to put an administrative password required to run certain programs, and once again, a 7 year old kid will not know how to bypass it.
5. Stop giving the 7 year old kid a credit card, and/or the ability to purchase gamecards from a store, as your 7 year old kid does not wander to EB/Target etc to go pick up items by herself.

Her mothers house... trust me, if I could simply not have my child go there, it would save me a lot of stress over worrying about it. This is not high on the list of problems I had this past weekend with her being there (the first time she has seen her in 6 months). The fact that she came back to me on Sunday in the same, unwashed clothes I sent her in on Thursday would likely be one of the top issues.

Yes, the court demands I allow her "parenting time".

[Thordic]

Just to backup what was said earlier, WoW has no built-in voice chat. Ventrilo and TeamSpeak servers are generally full of profanity and dirty jokes, but they are external programs that have nothing to do with WoW gameplay.

Lohman, if I were, I wouldn't base objections on WoW. I would base any objections/issues on unsupervised internet time. Regardless of how they are interfacing, kids should not be left on the internet unsupervised. There should be an adult around to check up on them, etc, and proper filters put in place.

[CaptaiN_JacK]

I would worry about the countless hours your child will waste of her youth playing that game instead of interacting with people and learning real life.

My thoughts exactly. Letting a 7yr old child play an addictive game like WoW at such a young age is just asking for problems down the road, imo.