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I have a 7 year old. He's never played a video game outside of a DIY version of online chess against me.
I notice a lot of kids play Minecraft. I've never played it. This is a little odd since the entire reason I have a career is because I wanted to get into game development and learned to program C.
I would like to expose him to video games since I believe they have upside, but I'm pretty worried modern games are crack and educational benefits or whatever are oversold and not real.
He has an excellent attention span right now and we play a lot of card (MTG) and board games (Catan Jr) and I don't want to ruin that. Other families say once their kids play video games they stop caring about all of that other stuff and see their attention spans go to shit.
We homeschool him so he's not exactly surrounded by other kids trying to relate to him re: games but it's only a matter of time.
My daughter is about to turn 4, and her crack right now are sugar and any form of media consumption. For the latter, there are gradations of addictiveness ranging from oral storytelling to getting to watch children's TV shows. My appproach is simply the following - if I notice that she gets riled up about not being given something, and focuses on it to the exclusion of all else, and throws a tantrum when her alotment runs out, and is unusually dysregulated when she does get it, then she just plain doesn't get it anymore. Life is full of things to do, even for a 3-year-old. It doesn't have to be sugar and screens. The reverse side of this coin is, of course, that I need to be available for her all day long. If I tell her she can't get what she wants, I need to offer an alternative. I guess the historical approach would have been to just send her off to play with the neighbors' kids or her siblings, but alas, she's an only child in an atomized society. But in between hitting the playground, playing ball, riding her bike, visiting relatives, going swimming, doing chores together, reading books and playing the occasional infuriating board game, a day can be passed.
I play games myself; more than is good for me I suppose. I would say I have it in check - I only do so after the little one is in bed, and only briefly and up to a pre-set goal (e.g., play one match of Nebulous and take notes, finish that mission in Cyberpunk, concluce war preparations in a 4X game, make one run in a roguelike, etc.) or until a fixed time limit after which I retire to read and/or sleep. Still, not playing games at all would probably be better? I'd get more reading done, I guess, or sleep a little earlier. I doubt I'd use the time productively since I'm usually thoroughly tired by those times of day. But if I had to point at something that playing games does for me, I'd probably come up pretty blank. It's obviously an indulgence.
My wife is addicted to her phone and stares at it constantly. Her favorite parenting method is to switch on the TV or some other electronic media. Lately she's taken to playing PC games again, and does so whenever she thinks the kid is occupied (because I'm around, or the kid is on the toilet, or the kid and me are going outside), and simply continues when the kid is back again and is actually offended and angry when I tell her that this behavior is dumb. Screens are a hell of a drug. I expect this to be a phase on my wife's part, but I really don't see how to maintain any sort of screen discipline when this is what our daughter gets to observe. Oh hey, I'm wifeposting again. Let's stop here.
For video games, I have no plans for her. If she really wants to game at some point, I'lll run the same rules as for everything else - she may, in moderation and with clear limits, but if she throws tantrums about it then I'll put a stop to it again for a good long while before we try again. Is this good parenting? I have no idea.
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