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Lessons learnt from gaming with the over 50’s
The 12 days of christmas

On the 12th day of Christmas we played upon the Wii

12 Rounds of frizbee
11 Birds eye Bulls eye
10 Downhill slaloms
9 Sky diving
8 Segway circuits
7 Tilt city
6 Step aerobics
5 Fitness tests
4 Kung Fu
3 Rounds of golf
2 Dog fights
And an hour creating Mii’s

The snow has melted, the presents opened and the last of the turkey has been roasted, stir-fried, and finally curried. The festive season may be drawing to a close so why you may ask do I find myself still very much in the Christmas spirit? Why, have you forgotten? Gaming bounty of course! With all of that Christmas cheer over and done all that is left is to put your feet up, eat what is left of Christmas and relax with whatever new titles your own personal family Santas have bestowed upon you this year. However before we return to the norm (and I promise, new articles soon!) I feel it appropriate not only to give thanks to all of those who have added to my game library this year, but also to look back upon what the time spent with my nearest and dearest has taught me about family, Christmas spirit and most importantly, gaming this year. So it is with added Christmas cheer that I bring you my own, hard earned lessons learnt from gaming with the over 50’s.

N.B. Some context. My father, the lucky soul got a Wii this Christmas along with Wii Fit plus, and extra controller and Wii sports resort. Now we have a ‘traditionl’ family Christmas, meaning that everyone has to play nicely together. This combined with everyone’s enthusiasm for the new toy meant that that not only my father (50‘s) but my mother older brother and Fiancée (mid 20‘s) and myself (Not telling!) all took part in breaking in the Wii together this Christmas. I am sure a few of you have had similar experiences of gaming with your entire family at some point, but just for giggles here is what I have learnt.

1. It doesn’t matter how much thought you put in, how many hours you spent trawling the shops finding it, or how much you spent. Your golf mad father WILL put aside the new pro golf game you bought him and proceed to spend three hours flying around in a virtual chicken suit come Christmas day. Lets face it, the new games on Wii fit plus are just too tempting. You just have to bite your tongue, deal with it, film it and put it on you-tube. Job done.

2. If you have a large family, everyone insists upon playing and you are getting tired of waiting for your go, try challenging them to generation or boys V girls matches. This works really well on games such as Wii resort frizbee and archery, which proved to be by far the most popular across the generation gap this Christmas. Everyone got the hang of these games really quickly, and with team members switching every round games were short and sweet. True, its hard to measure individual scores when playing this way, but with my brothers financee on my team (Who by the way owns the only other Wii in my family) I was not complaining.

3. Do NOT challenge your older brother to fitness/reaction games. Even if you win the first time (which is very unlikely) He will insist upon spending all hours of the day practicing until he had proven his worth by slaughtering you the next time. Even if you are his little sister…

4. When throwing your virtual frizbee to your virtual dog (Wii sports resort) Try not to aim so low that you hit it up the….Well you know where I mean. This will lead to hours of heckling from the whole family about how you throw like a girl and one very unhappy yelping Labrador…Though I must admit, it was perhaps worth it for the dogs expression…Go on…Try it and see what I mean…

5.You can beg, barter and plead all you like. Your mother will NOT take the Wii fit fitness test whilst ANY member of your family is in the room. Its no use telling her that EVERYONE puts on a little Christmas weight, nor that having 2 children would take its tole on anyone’s physique, she just wont do it. No, the only way to get her to register is to INSIST the rest of the family accompany you on a Christmas walk, leave the Wii on, Put the volume up to full and come back an hour later. I guarantee when you get back she will have registered, if only out of pure curiosity. Try it, it works.

6. When playing archery (Wii sports resort) try to pull back the arrow with as much gusto as possible. Sure, It wont help your score one bit, but it will damn sure look impressive and is somehow strangely satisfying… I find pretending I’m an extra in Lord of the rings helps, just watch out for people walking behind you…

7. A lesson on revenge from Birds eye Bulls eye on the Wii fit plus. This game requires you flap your arms wildly to propel your chicken suit clad Mii through the air, whilst leaning your weight from left to right using the balance board to steer towards targets for points. Now for the fun part. Try to convince a family member (preferably mum or dad) that if you flap only one arm your character will turn. I must mention at this point that ONLY leaning on the balance board will in fact turn the character. Meaning that if they take your advice their frantic one armed flapping will be doing about as much use as the obscenities they are sure to be shouting at the Tv. The longer you can keep them convinced the funnier it is, so bonus points for combining one armed flapping with a tactical lean on your own turn to keep up the pretence. Its so mean, but its worth it.

8. If you get lucky on the first round of frizbee golf leave it at that. If I have learnt anything this Christmas is that the Wii thought more accurate than ever, is still a cruel mistress. In fact, if you can throw one lucky round and then escape you will ever be referred to as the ‘Frizbee King’ However this nickname will soon revert back too ‘Edward Spazhands’ if you fail miserably in round two. Think about it.

9. DON’T play family members who have played before on the same difficulty level, especially in the balance and fitness games. I don’t care what they say, 8 hours practice at the hula hoop does make a difference, and no making me laugh when I’m trying to balance my penguin is NOT funny. Anyone with a Wii will know what I mean, anyone without, you’ll find out one day…

10. If taking the Wii fit fitness test for the first time DON’T go first. Make a more enthusiastic family member go first so that you, the more cunning (Or should I say intelligent) individual can see where they fail, and correct for your own attempt. It pays to be polite, so go on, ladies first!

11. Buy an extra Motion Plus. It really does make a big difference to the gaming experience and will save hours of family arguments started by disgruntled family members insisting they only lost because their controller was ‘the Naff one’. Spend the extra cash, level the playing field, and beat them fair and square.

12. And finally, Remember, its Christmas, so just enjoy it. It doesn’t matter if you have practiced for hours and your mum gets lucky beats you on her first go, these things just happen. We found these games were more luck than judgement, and in fact sometimes the harder we tried the worse our attempts got. Sure endless practice would lead to some level of improvement, but what’s the fun in that? So my final advice, and the biggest lesson learnt is simply to put as much energy in as possible. Sure you may end up failing miserably, and perhaps even falling over taking the Tv with you but hey, the Wii has always been, and Will always be about family entertainment, and after all nothing says family entertainment like watching your virtual self careering down a ski slope on your face.