2014-01-25, 22:05
I have this vague notion that xbmc can be used for gaming... assuming that's correct, is the experience similar enough to the real thing to satisfy children? Does anyone have kids that use it and enjoy it?
I'm a childless woman who's also disabled, so I wind up babysitting for my niece a lot. She's a single mother of 5 and money is tight so at home these kids do not have Internet or Cable or a computer. So naturally when they come to my house, they go tech-mad. Oddly enough, a 59yo and a 4yo do not have the same taste in PC games. I've tried coming up with options, but most free or cheap games use keyboard controls, which is a bad choice for the 4yo and 5yo who've never been taught basic computing (and don't want to be taught when they have time at the tech playground, ie, my house). Besides most of those games suck. Even I can see that.
So, I let them play online games at nick jr, thinking that'd be safe. Might have been if they'd stayed there... last week I spent 2 days cleaning malware from my pc's. Clearly, I need to find another option. And using xbmc to play my collected kids shows just winds up being background noise. With 5 of them in a small apartment, we don't need background noise - so if xbmc would be more useful as a game emulator... I'd love to know.
But I have never owned a game system and am completely clueless. If it's going to be worth the effort I'll do the research and give it a try, but I would really, really appreciate it if anyone with real-world experience could tell me if it's got a shot at satisfying kids used to Wii/PS3 games. And maybe some idea about the buy-in/cost?
Sorry for the length and the ramble... this morning the 4yo that [I thought] was playing a simple princess matching game on my android tablet somehow managed to launch an OS upgrade and then complained to me because the robot wasn't doing anything... I would SOOO much rather have done a backup before upgrading. Letting kids that can't read use non-dedicated tech is going to drive me crazy. And yet, they need to be exposed to it somewhere. Even in our small town, their peers are significantly more computer savvy.
Any comments or suggestions are welcome, and desperately needed. I usually don't post without researching first, but I don't think the documentation can tell me if it will satisfy Wii/PS3 kids. I hope one of you can.
I'm a childless woman who's also disabled, so I wind up babysitting for my niece a lot. She's a single mother of 5 and money is tight so at home these kids do not have Internet or Cable or a computer. So naturally when they come to my house, they go tech-mad. Oddly enough, a 59yo and a 4yo do not have the same taste in PC games. I've tried coming up with options, but most free or cheap games use keyboard controls, which is a bad choice for the 4yo and 5yo who've never been taught basic computing (and don't want to be taught when they have time at the tech playground, ie, my house). Besides most of those games suck. Even I can see that.
So, I let them play online games at nick jr, thinking that'd be safe. Might have been if they'd stayed there... last week I spent 2 days cleaning malware from my pc's. Clearly, I need to find another option. And using xbmc to play my collected kids shows just winds up being background noise. With 5 of them in a small apartment, we don't need background noise - so if xbmc would be more useful as a game emulator... I'd love to know.
But I have never owned a game system and am completely clueless. If it's going to be worth the effort I'll do the research and give it a try, but I would really, really appreciate it if anyone with real-world experience could tell me if it's got a shot at satisfying kids used to Wii/PS3 games. And maybe some idea about the buy-in/cost?
Sorry for the length and the ramble... this morning the 4yo that [I thought] was playing a simple princess matching game on my android tablet somehow managed to launch an OS upgrade and then complained to me because the robot wasn't doing anything... I would SOOO much rather have done a backup before upgrading. Letting kids that can't read use non-dedicated tech is going to drive me crazy. And yet, they need to be exposed to it somewhere. Even in our small town, their peers are significantly more computer savvy.
Any comments or suggestions are welcome, and desperately needed. I usually don't post without researching first, but I don't think the documentation can tell me if it will satisfy Wii/PS3 kids. I hope one of you can.
