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

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

#241

Post by beaunative » Mon, Aug 30, 2021, 4:54 PM UTC

victor106 wrote: post #151

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…

The feelings you (I have the same feelings about his as you do) have about this are at an individual level. State mandating how much time someone should spend doing a particular activity is a totally different topic. Even though I agree with the overall intention of this rule/law I vehemently oppose a state imposing such restrictions.

Technically, the state doesn't place restrictions on the kids, which is legally impossible, they place restrictions on the digital entertainment business where they are required to allow entry for kid for no longer than said duration.

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

#242

Post by Jensson » Mon, Aug 30, 2021, 4:54 PM UTC

meristohm wrote: post #217

kiba wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lot of things improve reading skills, like reading novels. Arguably, writing video games and novels would seem to be more useful way to improve skills. That's how I got started in programming at all. However, video games just doesn't seem life changing at all compared to all the things you could do.

I agree. Games feel like chose-your-own-adventure books, which were novelties and not nearly as engaging as a well-written book to read and visualize and anticipate. A great way to help a child read throughout their life is to read to them every day, enjoy stories together and apart, and not to push too hard in any direction (they may enjoy different things, no problem). Asking open-ended questions helps, too, with t…

When playing various games you have to manage a budget, reason about logistics, get an intuition for basic physics, understand numbers and basic math formulas etc. There are so many skills you learn there that are seen as very important. How can passively reading a story book even compare to actively being forced to practice and learn these things?

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

#243

Post by MeinBlutIstBlau » Mon, Aug 30, 2021, 4:55 PM UTC

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…

Videogames are addicting as all hell and create NEETs. End of story. Parents who are lazy and just want their kids to stop bothering them just give them to their kids without realizing it can destroy their early socialization skills. I love videogames, but jesus I'd limit my kids use of it to either playing socially or with family. If it's alone, it had better be for short amounts of time.

Videogames should be social events. Not solitary escapes that cause people to become schizoids.

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

#244

Post by thekingofravens » Mon, Aug 30, 2021, 4:55 PM UTC

zetazzed wrote: post #166

When I was a kid, I learned a tremendous amount from playing complex games like SimCity, Civilization, and Ultima. I feel like they opened my horizons to feel empowered to do interesting and meaningful things in the world, and they basically substituted for time I would've spent with GI Joe. Now, as an adult, when I do game, it substitutes for time I would've spent exercising, working on coding/ML side projects, or h…

I couldn't agree more. In high school and grade school, nothing mattered really, so games were just fun. However, I noticed there came a time recently when myself and all my friends had to choose between video games and failing college (or not going to college). Almost everyone I knew well enough to keep tabs on post high school chose video games. A total of 9 people and only 2 (myself included) were able to get gaming under control enough to make it. The others had their ambition sucked away by video games, and are starting to seriously regret their lives now.

So while I think their approach is far too extreme, I can understand why they would be very concerned about video games.

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

#245

Post by lordnacho » Mon, Aug 30, 2021, 4:55 PM UTC

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 for you to invite corporations into your home to try to persuade you to sit and grind away at some game, forever. You can waste your whole life in the comfort of your own Skinner box. All your opportunities to go and socialize with real people, out in society, you can just skip. What to exercise? Meh. Want a nice meal with family? Meh. Want to look at nature? LOL no.

Anecdote:

A friend of mine was playing very heavily for some time, maybe a couple of times a week. He goes into a café, sits down next to another fellow, who'd been there far longer: "oh hey man, I've been here for two days. My boss will get pissed off if I don't show up to work tomorrow. But Everquest..."

My buddy comes in two nights later, guy is in the same seat playing EverQuest. "Shit man, I got fired. He called me and told me. Anyway I gotta level up." At that point my friend got quite scared of the power of this stuff. Me as well, nearly 20 years later.

To cap it off, the dude's job was to be the attendant at another computer café. Yes. He could have just sat his ass at work and gotten paid for it, but somehow he'd lost his job by sitting at a different café and not finding the motivation to stop.

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

#246

Post by floatboth » Mon, Aug 30, 2021, 4:55 PM UTC

overgard wrote: post #234

tgv wrote: post #8

Anyone want to argue why this would be bad, apart from restricting freedom? BTW, nothing in the article about limits on TikTok or YouTube or whathaveyougot. That's as much opium as gaming, IMO.

Because play is important for children, and video games provide play? There's a WIDE variety of what you can find in video games, not all of them are casino like skinner boxes, many of them can provide good and even educational entertainment. I know for myself, the reason I work in tech is because of my love for video games as a kid got me into computers. Being a programmer is a huge blessing economically, and I neve…

Since this is aimed at online, it's probably aimed at casino style ones.

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

#247

Post by lnyng » Mon, Aug 30, 2021, 4:55 PM UTC

mlillie wrote: post #153

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…

Is the original article not a major journalistic misstep then? Nowhere does it clarify that this only applies to online gaming.

I wonder if the journey article author didn’t think online game differs much with general games.

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

#248

Post by bradford » Mon, Aug 30, 2021, 4:56 PM UTC

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…

both online/offline games can skew your internal reward/reinforcement system, but online games have a kind of social pressure that I just don't see with offline.

Social circles are established around online gaming; my teenager feels like he's letting his friends down if he doesn't spend enough time with 'The Clan'. His 'membership' with the group is at risk if he doesn't contribute his time.

It's made life somewhat difficult as a parent, to say the least.

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

#249

Post by HenryKissinger » Mon, Aug 30, 2021, 4:56 PM UTC

arduinomancer wrote: post #139

Talk about a capacity planning pain for the game companies. Your entire Of course there are solutions like scheduled auto-scaling but still, I guarantee that's going to cause some outages at least in the beginning.

Imagine waiting a week for your weekly allocated one hour of gaming, only to have the servers crash for the whole time under the load.

Tfw.

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

#250

Post by reversengineer » Mon, Aug 30, 2021, 4:56 PM UTC

Look for exceptions to this rule in the near future as eSports continues its rise in popularity, and even becomes offered as an official school activity.