Games for young children (advice and game suggestion thread)

[ragnar]

Well, my son is 6 years old (5 years, 10 months).  I have the cabinet up and running and he loves it.  The problem is, kids have a short attention span.  So my son has to like a game immediately or he just does not like it and will not retry it no matter what I say to him.  Some games he does like though.  So, what advice can you provide and what games do your young ones (6 years old or so) like?

ADVICE 01:
Some issues are .... too many games available.  So, if you haven't set things up yet, only give your kids 5 games at most to choose from.  Otherwise impatience can cause big problems with a child trying to find a game that he really really likes.  But with 5 games, he or she will try to play one game and get better at it in theory.

ADVICE 02:
I keep telling him to play pac-man but he doesn't understand the idea of beating a high score.  Kinda commonsensical I suppose but when scores like 100,000 can be made in various games, the scores are high enough that he has no concept of what the numbers mean.  So, while getting a high score is important to slightly older children, it is not important to the very young.

ADVICE 03:
Games with 2 or fewer buttons are best.  This is a generality but with small hands, young kids can't be 6 button button smashers yet.

GAMES THAT WORK:
So far, two games are very enjoyable to my son:
Super Mario 64 (For N64) ... he just likes running around.  An analog stick is needed though.
The Simpsons (Arcade) ... he hasn't played it on his own but he and I did play it all the way through!  With just punch and jump for buttons,

GAMES THAT KINDA WORK:
Bump and jump .... He likes it but refer to impatience comment above.  He will not play it for more than 1 minute before getting upset.

CONCLUSION:
Please add observations and game suggetions.

[CrazySwede]

Interesting topic as I have been suffering the same problem with my kiddos.  While I have yet to get all my favorites on my cocktail (I am still putting it together), I have only found a few games that my kids like.

My daughter (age 3.5) likes Frogger.
My son (age 5.5) likes Tetris and Marble Madness (w/ Joystick, not trackball).

Neither of my kids are any good at these games but they will play them for more than 3 minutes.

Like your kids, most of the other games just seem to bore them.  I am hoping, really really hoping, that time will solve this issue....

-Leif

[HanoiBoi]

I know there are plenty of other threads on this topic...give it a search.

Here are a few games to try that my kids have enjoyed: Trog, Bubble Bobble, Nightmare in the Dark, Diverboy, Joe Mac Returns, Boogie Wings, EDF (Earth Defense Force),TMNT and really just about anything that you can keep pumping credits into and smashing the buttons.

If you have a spinner, let 'em at Cameltry.

At that age, they aren't looking for challenging or beating high scores.  They want it to be fun to watch and easy to play.

[Hoopz]

I know there are plenty of other threads on this topic...give it a search.

Yep.   

Yup, did it last night.  Turns out my 6 year old is lacking some patience.  Every time he plays a game, he gets frusterated after about 2 minutes.  Of course, with coin based arcade games, the makers had to make it so you had to stuff a quarter in every 2 minutes in order to make it profitable.  Not good for my 6 year old.  Myabe a new thread for games for 6 year olds.

There have been a few threads over the past couple of years with games for younger children. 

http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=99162.0
http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php/topic,10806.0.html
http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php/topic,27379.0.html
http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php/topic,38192.0.html

Check out those links for a lot of choices.  I'll throw out Golden Tee or a bowling game if you have a trackball.  One of my daughters was playing Golden Tee at 3 fairly well.  Super Mario War is also good.  You can easily play with just one button per player too (3 buttons is normal for jump, speed, and power up).

[DeLuSioNal29]

My son absolutely LOVES a game called Hyperbowl.  It's a PC game that's no longer available, but you can find the demo (fully functional, but restarts after every game (which is a long time since bowling has 10 frames).

He's only 2 but since it's a trackball only game it's really easy for him.  He even cheers at gutter balls.  LOL.  He's playing the DEMO version in the video below.



DeLuSioNaL29

[WhereEaglesDare]

Caveman Ninjas!

[meany]

I came up with an easy text file you can use with a rom sort program.  See this thread.

http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=104408.0

[severdhed]

here are the games that my 3 year old son loves

world class bowling - super easy for small kids, but still fun
TMNT
TMNT Turtles in Time
Sunset Riders
Xmen
captain america and the avengers
simpsons

[sstralkowski]

here are the games that my 3 year old son loves

world class bowling - super easy for small kids, but still fun
TMNT
TMNT Turtles in Time
Sunset Riders
Xmen
captain america and the avengers
simpsons

Gotta second these type of games.  This list is exactly the list my kids like. 

[Malenko]

my niece like puzzle bobble (not as much as my GF though)

the boys love pretty much all the side scrolling beat em ups, like the ones mentioned and the Sengokus & the Metal Slugs

[javeryh]

My 6 year old daughter LOVES Ms. Pac-man, Galaga, Galaga 88, Frogger, Mr. Do!, Dig Dug, Circus Charlie, Donkey Kong, Jungle King, Burger Time and a bunch of others.  She is decent at them - she can get past the first or second level in most of these games.  My son (3) will play anything but only for a few minutes no matter what is going on.  He just likes selecting the games, trying them out and exiting to the front end.  He could do this for hours and never get bored even though he has no idea what is actually going on in the games (other than Pac-man and Donkey Kong which he is OK at).  He was actually playing KLAX the other day!

[Dervacumen]

For 3-4 year olds, Leprechaun or the pirate game whatever the name is.
6 year old girl loves Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon and other fighting games of that genre.  Anything that has a continue function and involves button mashing either head to head or team action will keep her playing for an hour.
Anything else - maybe 1 or 2 minutes.

[bratwurst]

My 5yo son is crazy into NBA Jam.

He's got a small hangup nerf type basketball hoop that is made to sit on a doorknob.  He's been playing with it for months, easily his favorite toy.  He does color commentary while he's playing like the announcers on tv.

So I finished my cab and he learned how to play NBA Jam with Dad.  Now he plays a lot by himself.  And when he is just playing with his real hoop, now his color commentary includes stuff like:  "BOOM SHAKALAKA!" and "Out of his range!" or "The monster jam!" and "He's on fire!"

Its pretty funny to listen to him.

He also likes:
2 on 2 NHL Open Ice
Cyberball (if I'm playing on same team.  he's no good at defense, but he's learning QB pretty quick)
Hat Trick

See a trend??  He's crazy into sports.

[DeLuSioNal29]

And when he is just playing with his real hoop, now his color commentary includes stuff like:  "BOOM SHAKALAKA!" and "Out of his range!" or "The monster jam!" and "He's on fire!"

Awesome.



D

[Useless Eater]

my son is close to that age and we have been playing fishin' frenzy a lot lately, its a 2 player joystick 1 button game, both players play at the same time, its simple yet fun even for adults

[severdhed]

i know i already posted, but my 3 year old son just found a new game he loves.....Primal Rage.  He is a huge fan of dinosaurs in general, and is learning all kinds of stuff about dinosaurs that i never knew.(causing me to do a lot of dino research lately).  He is constantly asking people what their favorite theropod is, or is people that quetzalcoatlus is the largest pterosaur, or explaining the differences between a parasaurolophus and a pachycephalosaurus....my point is, he loves dinosaurs. i was looking at Wii reviews the other day online and saw there was a dinosaur fighting game coming out soon and it reminded me of Primal Rage, so i added it to my favorites list on my mame cabinet and showed it to him yesterday.  we have played it for several hours over the last two days, he loves it. sure it is kinda stupid, and he just mashes buttons, but it has been a huge hit with him.

[DeLuSioNal29]

my son is close to that age and we have been playing fishin' frenzy a lot lately, its a 2 player joystick 1 button game, both players play at the same time, its simple yet fun even for adults

This is a great game.  Do you know if it's cabinet friendly though?

Edit:  Took a gamble and bought it from Popcap games.  50% off for the holidays!  So I gambled at $9.95 and won.  It works perfectly, my young nieces and nephews will love it.  However, I have two mouse buttons on my panel built in.  For those who don't have them it won't work correctly; as you CANNOT assign buttons in the options.

D

[vidmouse]

Great topic.

Games my 7 and 5 yr old like:
Bomberman World
Tumble Pop
Forgotten Worlds
GI Joe
Rampage (of course)
TMNT
Warriors of Fate
Knights of Valour (mainly my 7 yr old son)
Simpsons (mainly my 7 yr old and his friends)
Roadblasters
Most of the shmups... several we haven't tried yet though
Captain America and Avengers
Spider-Man
Shadow Force
Quartet
Gauntlet I, II
Magic Sword
Centipede
Galaga (the cocktail version I have)
pinball games

Console games:
Wii Acme Arsenal
Wii Soulcalibur Legends
SNES Legend of Zelda Link to Past
GBA Pokemon games
GBA YuGiOh games

[DeLuSioNal29]

Vidmouse:  If they like TMNT, surely they'll love X-men or the Simpsons.

[vidmouse]

Vidmouse:  If they like TMNT, surely they'll love X-men or the Simpsons.

Yeah I forgot about X-Men.  They like that one too.

My daughter recently got into Pac-Man after we put up our Christmas ornaments
this year and I kept on pushing the sound effects button on my Pac-Man ornament.
She goes crazy everytime she eats a power pill.

[ragnar]

My kid loves to play The Simpsons with me.  he also likes Joust.  Joust is nice because it is an easy one button game.

[Vigo]

+1 on the Trog suggestion, but I think my avatar shows that would be my pick. 

THe game is pretty much a colorful, cartoon style, multiplayer Pac-Man game. Also with Trog, you can set the dip switches down so easy that you can get tons of 1ups without even trying. You wont need to feed in credits constantly for the kids to continue playing.

[SuttumLikaPimp]

I have a 4 year old that just loves plants vs zombies

[boogieman]

I think it was ninja baseball batman or something like that, same style as simpsons/tmnt/etc. 

There is also a fishing game on mame, cant remember the name but you drop your hook line and it moves automatically to the top, really fun and simple, even a swamp/fish monster thing to cut your line sometimes.

Joust (cause its my favorite)

[knohbody]

If they like tmnt/xmen/simpsons/etc, then you should try Bucky O'Hare and Wild West Cowboys of Moo Mesa. They're based on early 90's cartoons, the graphics are bright and entertaining, only use 2 or 3 buttons, and are great multiplayer beatemups. Honestly, though, when I was a kid, any multiplayer beatemup was golden to me. Nothing like playing TMNT and Turtles in Time with 3 of your friends within hitting distance.