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China has forbidden under-18s from playing games for more than three hours/week

reuters.com

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Re: China has forbidden under-18s from playing games for more than three hours/week

#461

Post by beaunative »

hjek wrote: post #199
lnyng wrote: post #110

Original notice from the government: https://web.archive.org/web/20210830120201/http://www.nppa.g... Google translation of the first entry: > Strictly limit the time for providing online game services to minors. Since the implementation of this notice, all online game companies can only provide minors with one-hour online game services from 20 to 21:00 on Friday, Saturday, Sunday and legal holidays. At other times, i…

So it's not just 3 hours per week, it's three specific hours a week , but also only for online games services. It's interesting that the law covers the service , not the client . Now, I wonder what qualifies as an online game service . If I play correspondence chess over email, would the email host be running an online game service? If someone modifies the Battle of Wesnoth network code to run over IRC messages, woul…

The regulation, technically not a law, is meant for companies in the video game industry. If you went length to circumvent the online game definition, no one cares, but if a corporate does that, it would sure trigger investigation.

* Hell, you don't even need to circumvent the defintion if you can get around it technically.

Re: China has forbidden under-18s from playing games for more than three hours/week

#462

Post by A4ET8a8uTh0 »

lordnacho wrote: post #245
namelessoracle wrote: post #7

I have mixed feelings about this. Younger me learned a lot of problem solving skills and most importantly spent a lot of time learning how to read by playing RPGs and games that required lots of reading. My reading skills would not have been as advanced if i wasn't playing text heavy games that had a lot of plot like Square Enix games and the CRPGs of the time. Modern games though are clearly designed to get you as a…

I've mentioned this view a few times: computers are the modern double-edged sword. On one hand you can learn pretty much anything academic just by sitting in front of one. Quantum physics, history of Rome, food chemistry, and so on. Use it right, and you can really have access to a huge amount of knowledge that I never could as a child. On the other hand, it is the biggest addiction danger in the house. It's legal fo…

Personal anecdote. For a couple of years, I was deeply addicted to early version of Final Fantasy 11. Thing was hard, punishing and effectively required dedicated player base. I have some great memories, but there was a moment, when I started calling in sick to camp a monster. Fortunately, I eventually managed to stop on my own, but I still get occasional pangs ( but thankfully today's FFXI is a shell of itself for a variety of reasons ).

I was lucky. I am certain there are people way more obsessive than me.

Re: China has forbidden under-18s from playing games for more than three hours/week

#463

Post by sudosysgen »

fallmonkey wrote: post #452
javajosh wrote: post #168

The restriction is specifically "online games". Not offline games. Which is interesting because it implies that offline games are somehow less addictive - but in my experience, offline games can be very engaging, too. But perhaps it's in a more wholesome, problem-solving way? It's kinda impressive that the CCP can make decisions that affect 1B+ humans like this, overnight. I hope it's the right thing to do, for the k…

Yet you might be surprised to know that, in China, all those "offline games" are categorized as online games because they all can be distributed online, when it comes to import reviews. No game is safe from this, really.

No, that's incorrect. The service of hosting a game for people to download is an online games service. The game itself if it has no access to any network is not.

Re: China has forbidden under-18s from playing games for more than three hours/week

#464

Post by pdimitar »

namelessoracle wrote: post #7

I have mixed feelings about this. Younger me learned a lot of problem solving skills and most importantly spent a lot of time learning how to read by playing RPGs and games that required lots of reading. My reading skills would not have been as advanced if i wasn't playing text heavy games that had a lot of plot like Square Enix games and the CRPGs of the time. Modern games though are clearly designed to get you as a…

> To the point where when a game comes along like Dark Souls that asks you to learn the game systems to beat it, gamers go gah gah over "how hard" it is.

Please, PLEASE, please let's not derail this thread to "Dark Souls players are the REAL skilled players and the rest of you all are crybabies" or something? I get PTSD reading any DS player's "opinion" these days.

DS doesn't require skill. DS is brutal and semi-random on purpose so you sink the maximum amount of time to beat it. Not much skill is required there. You have to invest the time to learn the moves and their patterns. After that happens beating the boss in question just requires you to be in non-vegetative state.

--

On topic: I too am with mixed feelings over this news but if this is going to stop the hyper-predatory mobile game companies from almost literally turning young people into zombies then I support the decision.

I worry what happens when inevitably they start saying "but CS:GO, Quake Champions and Deep Rock Galactic are addictive as well and we will prohibit them too!" but... we can't have it all at the same time, I suppose. :|

Really can't find a good balanced solution out of this jam. Can you?

Re: China has forbidden under-18s from playing games for more than three hours/week

#465

Post by maerF0x0 »

keerthiko wrote: post #371
maerF0x0 wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> a glass of wine with every meal There's an apt outcome of the analogy too. It's likely the grapejuice is better for you before fermenting it, oh and the grapes themselves are better for you than removing all the fiber and the physical bulk that can help satiety. I feel the same way about games. They may have positive effects over a null control (like sitting and staring at the paint on the wall), but reading a phys…

This assumes the participant is equally motivated and emotionally positive about both paths, and has similar flow state through both paths. Flow state increases retention and positive benefit, and flow state is often a function of motivation (fun), and more importantly, level of challenge. The benefit games have over nearly every other medium of experiencing a concept, is that the level of challenge is highly persona…

> This assumes the participant is equally motivated and emotionally positive about both paths, and has similar flow state through both paths.

Also worth adding to this thread that motivation is a feedback loop mechanism. If you're super stimulated by these slot machine like games, you're not going to find the long rewards of completing a book a week/month a very "motivating" option. So it's also worth looking at the motivational damage these things do to a person and how it's eliminating the motivational possibility of doing something of higher value. Cue the "dopamine detox" part of the internet.

> is that the level of challenge is highly personalized.

I agree and this is a good observation, which maybe can be had IRL, but i agree that it can be easier implemented and more granular in the digital realm.

Re: China has forbidden under-18s from playing games for more than three hours/week

#466

Post by t-3 »

lhorie wrote: post #331
andrepew wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree that playing a game might not improve a class of skills in general like coordination or problem solving, but I don’t think it requires much study to determine improvement of skills directly used. For example, to improve your reading skills you need to practice reading. If a game is providing reading material and motivation to read, it will improve reading skills. Games can also drive motivation in other areas…

> If a game is providing reading material and motivation to read, it will improve reading skills. Eh. No, that's not quite how that works. If you look at north american elementary school level reading, you may notice that books are often categorized by levels. Some of this has to do with complexity of sentence construction, some has to do with vocabulary, and some has to do with subject matter. The gist of the educat…

Grammar/spelling/usage is almost all about memorizing and copying others, so engaging in tasks that use those skills will definitely get you further faster than a step-by-step progression. I was reading and writing at a level far beyond my peers in elementary school, not because I was smarter, but because I actively read books for fun.

Re: China has forbidden under-18s from playing games for more than three hours/week

#467

Post by nybble41 »

teawrecks wrote: post #328
godelski wrote: post #311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except the people aren't our enemy. We're worried about an authoritarian government harming our friends.

The CCP is the one making the mistake, not the people. No one said it was the people.

The people are harmed by the mistake, even if they aren't the ones making it.

Re: China has forbidden under-18s from playing games for more than three hours/week

#468

Post by appletrotter »

lhorie wrote: post #331
andrepew wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree that playing a game might not improve a class of skills in general like coordination or problem solving, but I don’t think it requires much study to determine improvement of skills directly used. For example, to improve your reading skills you need to practice reading. If a game is providing reading material and motivation to read, it will improve reading skills. Games can also drive motivation in other areas…

> If a game is providing reading material and motivation to read, it will improve reading skills. Eh. No, that's not quite how that works. If you look at north american elementary school level reading, you may notice that books are often categorized by levels. Some of this has to do with complexity of sentence construction, some has to do with vocabulary, and some has to do with subject matter. The gist of the educat…

So what I think is a really strong counterpoint to your argument is the simple fact that watching movies in a language is generally considered a great way to learn said language. That's passive learning in a similar manner to what you would get out of reading in a video game.

It fails to train you in actually synthesizing speech though. So you need a structured approach as well, similar to what you describe, to fill out the many other facets of learning.

But it's still insanely valuable to do so.

reading things likely makes you better at reading things

Re: China has forbidden under-18s from playing games for more than three hours/week

#469

Post by powerapple »

maerF0x0 wrote: post #264
lordnacho wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Half the time I spent gaming was spent figuring out how to get the computer to do what I wanted which lead to a life long interest in technology. I remember the old days of "extended memory" which meant you needed slightly different configuration files for each game. That meant if you wanted to play a bunch of games, it made sense to learn how to write a bat script to config according to what you wanted to play. Yo…

My first computer was a 486 33mhz w/ about 250MB HD . I could only keep a couple games installed at a time, meaning i was always installing and uninstalling. Then I had to play with the autoexec.bat and cmd.com files . Then I broke it. Then i had to fix it cause my mom was still making payments on the computer (like it was a refrigerator with a 10yr lifespan) ... This is how I got into computing. Come to think if of…

1/6 of my friends (we all own 286, 386 and play computer games) got into programming and became a software engineer. The policy is against online games. I am actually looking to setup a computer without internet for my 8 year old. I want him to learn about computers, but internet is definitely not something I want him to explore now.

Re: China has forbidden under-18s from playing games for more than three hours/week

#470

Post by [deleted] »

sbarre wrote: post #445
luckylion wrote: post #406

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legal_drinking_age I mean, yes, "other countries" don't have age limits, but it's pretty rare and it's overwhelmingly not what you'd call successful or stable countries.

You don't consider Europe stable or successful?

[deleted]
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