There was a young kid in pokerstars the other night. Was talking to his buddy in the same room and they kept discussing his cards and strategy. His mom kept yelling at him from the other room lol.
Surprisingly he was really good at poker, probably works better when you don't openly tell everyone your hand though.
It's not just selling information, it's just collecting information in general afaik. And a lot of game companies rely on player data to gain insight on their demographic and improve their games. What a concept-
Ok. But that’s why the cutoff is 13 everywhere. It doesn’t necessarily mean the thing is inappropriate for 12 year olds. It’s that they don’t want a fine for breaking the law.
Every damn 3 year old nowadays has a phone which is enough and parents can't really stop anything, and if a kid doesn't have a smartphone in damn kindergarden they're bullied because kids are brutal.
A few years ago I was at Big Splash/Safari Joe's and there was this man and his baby riding in a golf cart and the baby had an actual phone, not one of the fake toy ones
My child is in middle school doesn't have a phone and he's doing okay. I told him he can have one when he gets a job and can pay for it himself. I do see children that are 7 years old with a phone at school. Makes no sense to me .
I don’t object to kids having a phone for safety but why do they need the newest iPhone? Like when I finally got a phone it was a very cheap touchscreen that could barely run angry birds. And I had to bend over backwards for that
My son's first phone was a cheap $100 thing. We upgraded every couple of years, but always in the same price range.
I now have a better job, and am able to afford nicer things. I *could* go out and buy him a flagship phone. He's 14 now, so I felt it was probably time for a better phone. Instead of buying him a flagship phone, I bought him a $400 phone, because why the fuck would you buy a teenager a $2000 phone?
I don’t object to it either, but kids didn’t have phones for nearly all of human history, and I don’t think that they are in significantly less danger now than they were in, say, the 90’s. I think most people can’t imagine being comfortable without a constant tether to their children these days, which is understandable but sort of sad in a way. They use to just be like pet cats. You just hoped they showed back up in the evening, and if they didn’t then you mourned for a spell and then you just got/made a new one.
People downvoting you must be too young to know those days, but yeah, in general childhood in the 1950s (my era) wasn't that far off from what you describe. My wife was one of six kids, and they all shot out of the house in the morning and returned again in the evening just in time for supper. Their parents had no idea where they were or what they were doing, and that was perfectly normal for the time.
I grew up in the days where my parents had no clue where we were and the street lights coming on meant it was time to ride home. Hell I'm 42 now and am typing this on a POS pay as you go phone that basically sits on a shelf when I'm at home.
The good old days where don't talk to strangers was the only guideline for not showing up on a milk carton lol. In all fairness that really hasn't changed, parents have just become crazy and lazy at the same time.
Just make sure he gets one before high school as it's a *peak* bully target pretext, even if he's good in every other way. Also in modern times teachers expect everyone to have a phone with data because they set up kahoot quizzes and whatnot, or ask to do some assignment online during the lesson, and not having one is not only awkward but can be detrimental to grades.
I know from experience it's not fun, at least I had a dumb phone for most of that time and it was also quite a while ago while smartphones were JUST becoming completely mainstream so it wasn't all that out of the ordinary to not have one, just meant your family was poor, but it was understandable.
But yes the stories I hear from parents of kindergarden aged kids all just chilling in their own corner/group all with smartphones are horrifying.
This is highly dependent on the people at the school. I had a basic phone at the beginning of high school that only cost a few cents (Literally) and I wasn't bullied for it, no one cared. Of course there will be schools/people who will bully you for it (Or literally anything else) but it's not guaranteed at all.
Teachers expecting you to have a phone, I'd agree with that as they did when I was in hs. However, you don't necessarily have to have a phone as you can still do everything without it. A phone isn't a hard requirement, but it will be handy to have
Well I mostly have issue with his stance of "he can earn money for a phone once he gets a job", when to get a job you need a phone along with a number and multitude of other socials nowadays.
You're 💯
This is a ham fisted approach with no real thought behind it- just huge boomer do what I say energy
SMH
This kid just went through lockdowns with no way to communicate with his peers ??
Gross
High school? I graduated 4 years ago, so smartphones were already a thing and a lot of students had them. A lot of people had them in middle school too, just not elementary
To be fair, when I was a kid I could call friends on our landline. No one has landlines anymore though. I think it makes sense that kids are getting cell phones earlier than we did.
This is singly the only parenting response on here that people need to read. Good on you for being an actual responsible parent.
The same rule should go for VR or any other expensive purchase.
It's so ridiculous. I agree. Our kids are in 4th grade. They are 10. Only a few kids in their class don't have phones. It's become such an issue at school they had to send home a message advising parents they need to talk to their kids because the phones are causing a disruption in class and causing kids not to learn. They are too busy trying to text and play around instead of learning. My kids aren't getting a phone until at least 8th grade. If people want to make fun of them who gives a shit. I would rather teach my kids how to stand up to bullies than give in to societal pressure. Besides, why does a 10 yr old need a phone? The excuse I hear is because if there's an active shooter I want my kids to be able to let me know. Wtf? Why? What are you going to do about I. Other than cause more problems to an already chaotic situation. The last thing the cops need is people like them driving to the school thinking they are gonna be a hero.
I assume you're american but as an european it's absolutely heart breaking hearing that every single day you're walking to school and having that thought in the back of your head that you might not be coming home after school. I'm just so sorry
Yeah it’s unfortunate. The school I went to was already pretty violent with just fistfights and stuff so I honestly thought I would die by the end of highschool. Aside from a couple threats there was never a shooting.
I’ve always been one to worry unnecessarily so who knows if there was ever any danger. But I know some nearby schools weren’t so lucky.
Worry unnecessarily? Are you kidding? If there was a shooting the next town over I'd be stressed the entire month. Are people in the states ''just used to it''?
Or tech savvy kids without tech savvy parents.
I've gone so far as finding exploits in windows 8 family protections and privilege rights to get extra screen time, some of the shit I managed to do to that OS without admin rights was insane and thinking back on it Microsoft would've probably paid me good money had I reported that shit to them, it was borderline a security risk, but 12 y/o me didn't care.
Thankfully I didn't get any phone limits because I just didn't use it that much outside school.
Its my opinion that in a lot of cases, the parents who say things like "no excuses. just bad parents" typically just have easier kids or have instilled fear into them... the amount of judgement I see online by parents who haven't deal with the shit I have yet think I'm the problem is disheartening to say the least... there are just so many factors at play and I'll be the first to admit that I don't think my wife and I have done -every- single thing right (I mean, who has?) , but we're doing our best... But I guess the oculus quest subreddit probably isn't the place to be discussing parenting styles.. lol
My goto place is Soft sea and Soft space. But in general, you should avoid worlds marked as 'trending'.
Theres also this 18+ only group that frequently hosts events.
https://discord.gg/ancientsofvrchat
It's difficult to say, really. When you're first getting into vrc if you don't have a group to hang with then you're stuck in the wild west of Great Pugs and Black Cats. I was a big fan of hopping the Community Labs worlds when I first started playing vrc since they're newly uploaded and you'll usually run into the creator/their friends/randoms doing the same thing.
There are also groups, like I think the Ancients is one, which are more adult oriented and can give a foothold.
/r/BONELAB has been taken over by them, as far as I can tell. I saw someone post an in-depth tutorial on how to create NPCs recently, and it got downvoted then died in new.
Some kid posts a video titled "rAtE mY KiLL" with them just killing the enemies, and it shoots to the top. Top post over there right now is just someone stabbing an NPC like 50 times.
Yeah all kids see something cool and go try to do the same themselves.
Also i hate how many streamers/youtubers start as being super enjoyble to adult viewer, then as they gain viewers/subscribers they start to target more kids. E.g. stop swearing, change their whole personality. After few years you see the chat/comments average age being 12 and the channel being the same as all the others.
blade and sorcery subreddits are like that too.
it's either hyper edited videos that make you motionsick, edgy kids talking about all the different ways they want to torture virtual enemies, or just someone spinning around and stabbing someone 20 times lol.
Ugh, BoneLab early on was rough. It seems the entirety of that subreddit just kept saying "gimme a furry NPC to murder" until it happened, and then for a couple months it was just people killing furries on that sub. Saying all the weird stuff they wanted like the NSFW Avatars and NPCs...
It's just so... Unsettling to see the craving for violence. It's one thing to play the games, whatever, but to demand an audience and discuss the killing and rate peoples' kills is weird.
I think for a lot of kids the idea of death is too abstract to understand, and violence is complicated because they likely only have experience through video games or media where no one actually gets hurt. But it’s also transgressive when they bring it up to adults, so it can become “cool.”
Which is one of many reasons I want to play with adults and not children in multiplayer games.
I felt that in my soul
Used to play Halo reach with my dad and bro when I was like 10, and I replayed recently now that I'm a grown up and man
Those deaths hit you hard once you know what death is, if that makes any sense
Meta said they'd be cracking down on enforcing the 13+ policy recently. It's a double and edged sword.
I like that kids are getting into VR ( at the appropriate age) because it will help the future VR market space. But, the amount of squeekers in some games has stopped me from being able to actually enjoy the game.
Same, I got a Quest 2 shortly after my birthday in 2021. I loved multiplayer until Christmas. Then, I just stopped playing multiplayer games almost entirely
For most of the games I play online, I'll now just play with a party of friends or some games have a discord where it's easy to find people to group up with
I’m sure they’ll be rushing to keep parents from dropping thousands of dollars on equipment and apps… It’s a stupid policy. They just need to design systems to properly handle different ages participating together. A lot of functionality doesn’t even need to be tied to age - features such as an option to automatically decrease the volume of chat from players you don’t interact with and areas unlocked based on skill level.
To be honest this is the same reason I mostly play PC and console games singleplayer or couch coop too, or only with a few people I actually know, rather than multiplayer online.
Yep, I love Fortnite (42 m), but I only play solo or with my friends. I tried a rando squad a couple of times a few months ago, and I either got people that went off on their own, or incredibly toxic players.
I'd rather just do solo. Same in VR.
I just stick to the games, flatscreen or not that I know have servers where kids and tweens are bullied out of the server cause nobody wants them there
Me and my friend meet up online maybe once a week.
Some games like VR chat are straight up uncomfortable to play. It was filled with what sounded like 7 year olds.
They really need to find a way to create separate servers for adults and kids. You can't lump adults and children together.
I wouldn't even attempt Among Us.
It's actually a really hard problem.
Kids often want to use adult accounts, and pedophiles are always trying to use kids accounts, and it's hard to figure out:
a) how do you verify that a video game account is really an adult/kid? Require a photo of their passport/birth-certificate and check each one? (Expensive, easy to fake, every country has a different one, most kids don't even have a passport...).
AND
b) Once you have a rock-solid verified account, how do you stop people from just using their dad's, or their kid's, verified account? (Strong passwords and 2FA every single time they want to play a game? What if the parent doesn't care? What if the pedo parent just makes their kid/nephew give them the password? What about hackers?)
Nintendo isn't just restricting their online interactions so much because they can't figure out how do text/voice chat. It's because that's the only practical way to make relatively safe online play for kids.
I feel like the best solution would be to not ban kids, but have a server option where people get to select which age group they want to play with. It won't completely solve the problem, but I think most kids would just go to the kids server. You have a lot less mixing
I think about 90% of the kids would choose the grownups server, assuming it will be better somehow.
You could have tools identifying voice pitch, and allowing people to flag kids, and work out: *FrequentlyHighVoice + 10 flags = send to kids server*.
But then what about women?
What if a bunch of kids talk in deep voices, and flag each other as adults? Then flag adults they don't like as kids? They have more time to game the system than adult players have to counter them.
It's much harder than it seems.
What about a reporting option? Something like where a certain number of people report someone as a kid (maybe like 20+?) then they get stuck in a younger server.
Could keep the pedo problem to a minimum as well, if the kids servers could have a reverse filter.
I really like this, but any reporting system faces the chance of being abused.
What happens when a group of kids brigade an adult area and report the adults?
That's fair! It could potentially send some recent voice clips to someone to be sure, and they could approve/deny.
And/or if you made it a longer-term thing, like someone needs 20+ unique reports from different people in X amount of game time, that could cut down on abuse since people very probably wouldn't see instant results.
Let's just do a math option. Factor (7x - 5)(15x + 2).
Most kids won't even try. And it will help the adults remember completely pointless lessons they learned in middle school (I have never used factoring in my career. ever).
Good idea. That'll keep most of the under 8's out.
Though as a father of an eleven-year-old discord gamer kid, I suspect most of the real griefers will be tweens, old (and smart) enough to learn middle or high school math, if it allows them to get around some rules.
Nowadays those skills are a 2 minute youtube video away. Perhaps if we could use all kinds of math problems, we'd trick these wannabe hax0rs into learning something 😂
A) just make people pay for verification, e.g. a $10 one-time fee to cover the expense of checking the ID
B) this is only a small portion of the whole issue, you can probably get like 90% of the way there without even needing to address this
Much better compared to the current approach of doing nothing and not even trying to fix this.
I would like it if we were able to create or activate a Kids profile similar to Netflix or any other streaming service with parental controls. That way game developers can restrict certain access to those profiles and even split children from adults in rooms.
Walkabout Mini Golf has an amazing community, I only join games from the discord and I've had maybe 3 people ragequit and one or two that were a little bit annoying
So far tens of hours of great fun with great people, and I usually really don't like socializing online.
honestly all multiplayer games are a bit off with defult settings not having microphones as Push To Talk.
Its absurdly dumb to have the microphone be LIVE by default when these people all have noisy fucking living rooms and are too dumb to adjust basic settings.
Yea I was trying to play and kids were targeting me because I wasn’t wearing the right skin. They had a cult where everyone(The little Timmys) would were the same skin. If you didn’t then they’d shoot you. Got targeted for 10 minutes then left.
I've tried playing pavlov a few times but I just can't enjoy it at all due to the amount of kids who don't sound like they could be more than 9 years old. Literally any server I joined was full of them screaming about random crap and making the game unenjoyable.
I was in their seat at one point with games like cod and halo, but the difference is, I pretty much never interacted with anyone. I had a turtle beach headset with a mic, but I knew better than to talk.
I just block them immediately- I feel bad for these kids because they clearly have no parental supervision and have been left with a digital babysitter in lieu of human interaction and parental attention
Their behavior with the screaming n word and f word bombs all over bigscreen, poker and similar cements what I am saying
These are neglected kids with absolute shit parents, and their futures are bleak filled with accidental pregnancies drug addictions, jail - you name it - these kids are headed there
Just block and send them good vibes to overcome the odds stacked against them
The 13+ requirement isn’t only for social features, some studies have shown that regular use of VR on those under the age of 13 can impact their motor skills significantly.
I enjoy fucking with children, best you can do is just ignore them, absolutely drives them up a wall if you dont block and occasionally acknowledge they exist but mostly ignore them.
Dont take those first few words out of context
There was some kid on his dad's quest playing pokerstars. Everyone at the table convinced him to go all in and loose all his money. He actually thought he lost $10000 of his dad's money. I have never heard a kid cry so much before.
This is a double edged sword. Going back in time, Gen X kids became video game and computer natives growing up in the 1980's, Millennials and Gen Z were digital internet and smart phone native kids, it should not be underestimated that this group of kids are going to grow up as VR natives. This is a good thing as it ensures the long term prospects of VR as an industry (even though many are claiming its death).
The other edge of the sword is that many are too young and the impact of VR on them at such an early age is unknown.
It might be more like alcohol or weed.
Some people need to completely abstain.
Maybe some people can indulge if they limit it to appropriate locations and times of the day/week.
most of what ive seen seems to say not that its bad specifically, but just that they really dont know the impact of young kids and VR with their development so the safe route is to just avoid it for kids under 13+ in case there are. Havent looked into it a ton though, so maybe there has been a bit more info or studies since ive head that, if ya have any info?
A 12 year old child died in the country I live (Argentina) after following one of those stupid TikTok challenges, where they are literally told to hold their breath until they pass out then "say what they saw". It's a mix of terrible parenting, a social network designed to make this shit go viral, a malicious asshole who gets kicks out of seeing kids harm themselves, and the stupidity of people doing things to be seen by people they don't know and don't care about
Especially in Pavlov shack. It's rated R-18+ for goodness sake! And yet the amount of people who sound between the ages of 6-10 never ceases to amaze me.
Games should introduce live, virtual staff in public lobbies asking an ever-changing list of 20th century popular culture and general knowledge questions, like a modern-day version of the [Age Verification Quiz](http://www.classicgaming.cc/pc/leisure-suit-larry/age-quiz) from the *Leisure Suit Larry* games. Set like a 15-second time limit so they have no opportunity to look it up online; you either know it or not.
I did. This kid was screaming because the other one wanted to know his name. (He thought that if he had his name he could track his house and kill him)
Yeah, I'm not a big fan of all the children on VR. I only realized how bad it really was, when I jumped on vrchat and found lobbies filled with children. I've spent what felt like hours blocking the stupid little runts that are Vr children who seem to think they're hot shit because they can cuss at me or yell obscenities at the top of their lungs. Saying shit that would have got me beaten as a child.
I was playing rec room the other day, and some kid invited me to a train museum, called himself a “Tour Guide” I mean he reads fine but he couldn’t pronounce some words like “service”, “locomotive, “edinburgh”, “productive”.
Having tons of kids growing up with your product is infinitely more preferable than a bunch of fickle 30 year old males who bitch about video games as much or more than they actually play them.
It’s uncomfortable to play Echo VR at times even though I think it’s a great game - it literally feels like I’m at a futuristic recess of some elementary school in the year 3005.
Feedback is feedback and fact is those bitchy 30 yr olds are the ones paying for shit or ultimately decide not to keep paying for shit. Fuck. Them. Kids.
I’m not that bothered by kids using VR and playing games and stuff, after all I can just mute or block them as I often do.
That said, my main concern is their safeguarding.
I report them (assuming the game has I report feature). And I tell them I'm reporting them before they're muted/blocked. If everyone did this perhaps word would get around that there are consequences to horrible behavior.
A conversation i had with a 13 year old trans in vrchat public world
Me: "Sorry, i didnt know you were 13. Shouldnt have been talking about adult stuff near you"
Them: "Dont worry, Ive already been into adult websites a long time ago"
Me: "You really wanted to get rid of your innocence fast huh?"
Them: "Innocence is overrated. Besides, Ive been groomed like 3 times before"
Ooof
Yeah, I can handle loud kids sometimes but VR social apps will be a breeding ground for this terrible stuff. I don’t know what the solution is but something needs to be done
I played gorilla tag and this is what I hear as soon as I got it. Hey (not gonna say it cause I’m white) bitch. You live with your parents (not gonna say it cause I’m white). Your trash! (This was a 8 year old)
I made a outfit on Rec Room to mock a variant of a character I love, and unfortunately, since they character does possess cat/fox ears, every server I went to I had kids calling me “a fucking furry bitch.” I gave up trying to explain and I haven’t played since then because Rec Room in general isn’t that great.
fr, i play poker and we are all chilling being calm having a good time and a 10 year old comes in and starts screaming at everyone and we all just leave. like if you are a child, atleast act like an adult on a adult game so it isn’t obvious damn
Yeah, i cant play vr multiplayer games because of this. The games are fun, but id like to play with people that have learned how to be decent human beings
I just got a headset a few weeks ago, when I first started playing I was thrown into lobbies with yelling kids everywhere, super overwhelming and annoying.
I only play one player games, all these little kids creep me out.
I’m 16 been playing VR since I was 12 or 13 I believe could be wrong, yes kids can be annoying as fuck but for me I just stuck to single player games like boneworks, Half Life Alyx, H3VR
Difference is that most (video) games in earlier generations were either singleplayer only or had local offline coop/splitscreen/multiplayer so you only bothered your family and friends with bad social behavior. Online gaming and especially in VR with extended capabilities for communication like body language, gestures, spatial audio, ... is a whole nother story.
i'm less concerned about the annoying factor and more about the fact that several studies have now indicated that extensive VR use when you're young and still developing motor skills can cause a permanent detriment to things like balance/spatial awareness/etc
Exactly. I’m all for children exploring and seeing cool thing but when it effects their motor skill development that’s where I draw the line. Games like job simulator and beat saber are perfect for kids because they are single player (mostly) and don’t involve walking.
Oculus should offer bounties. Video game companies in general. If you can get video proof of someone admitting they are under the age requirements they give you a 20$ credit or some shit. Then they go after the people who violated the T&C
More, "If these kids had parents who actually supervised them and cared about their poor reading skills and comprehension..."
Virtual reality and the technology that helps create and bring it to the masses is mind-blowing and awesome. Unfortunately, parents use it to occupy their children's time versus spending time with them and providing an upbringing. 🫣
We just gotta come together peacefully… by bullying the shit out the annoying little kids so they never play again and we can be free of those annoying little rugrats
There was a young kid in pokerstars the other night. Was talking to his buddy in the same room and they kept discussing his cards and strategy. His mom kept yelling at him from the other room lol. Surprisingly he was really good at poker, probably works better when you don't openly tell everyone your hand though.
that's actually kind of funny
To be fair social media/the damn internet including reddit is also 13+. Doesn't stop them though, and it sure as hell didn't stop me 10 years back.
That’s because it’s illegal in the US to collect and sell information about users under 13
Then maybe don't collect and sell information?? Whoa what a concept!
It's not just selling information, it's just collecting information in general afaik. And a lot of game companies rely on player data to gain insight on their demographic and improve their games. What a concept-
>game companies rely on player data to gain insight on their demographic and ~~improve their games~~ maximize cash shop sales ftfy
[удалено]
Ok. But that’s why the cutoff is 13 everywhere. It doesn’t necessarily mean the thing is inappropriate for 12 year olds. It’s that they don’t want a fine for breaking the law.
Actually your parent(s) or gaurdian(s) didnt stop you, as its not a childs descision to make.
Every damn 3 year old nowadays has a phone which is enough and parents can't really stop anything, and if a kid doesn't have a smartphone in damn kindergarden they're bullied because kids are brutal.
A few years ago I was at Big Splash/Safari Joe's and there was this man and his baby riding in a golf cart and the baby had an actual phone, not one of the fake toy ones
The baby probably needed it to call their stockbroker to buy and sell
Giggling = buy Crying = sell
Pooping self = short everything to the floor
Babies love to panic sell everything at night i guess
He was the IRL Boss Baby
My relatives are like this. Their 3 year old was able to navigate to open and use the YouTube app, and they couldn't even read yet. Bizarre as hell.
My child is in middle school doesn't have a phone and he's doing okay. I told him he can have one when he gets a job and can pay for it himself. I do see children that are 7 years old with a phone at school. Makes no sense to me .
I don’t object to kids having a phone for safety but why do they need the newest iPhone? Like when I finally got a phone it was a very cheap touchscreen that could barely run angry birds. And I had to bend over backwards for that
Lol my first was a flip obama phone
I assume it survived everything the world threw at it
Idk but it didn't survive my snap after i got a new phone lol. Was in basically perfect condition for like a yesr or 2 though
My son's first phone was a cheap $100 thing. We upgraded every couple of years, but always in the same price range. I now have a better job, and am able to afford nicer things. I *could* go out and buy him a flagship phone. He's 14 now, so I felt it was probably time for a better phone. Instead of buying him a flagship phone, I bought him a $400 phone, because why the fuck would you buy a teenager a $2000 phone?
I don’t object to it either, but kids didn’t have phones for nearly all of human history, and I don’t think that they are in significantly less danger now than they were in, say, the 90’s. I think most people can’t imagine being comfortable without a constant tether to their children these days, which is understandable but sort of sad in a way. They use to just be like pet cats. You just hoped they showed back up in the evening, and if they didn’t then you mourned for a spell and then you just got/made a new one.
People downvoting you must be too young to know those days, but yeah, in general childhood in the 1950s (my era) wasn't that far off from what you describe. My wife was one of six kids, and they all shot out of the house in the morning and returned again in the evening just in time for supper. Their parents had no idea where they were or what they were doing, and that was perfectly normal for the time.
I grew up in the days where my parents had no clue where we were and the street lights coming on meant it was time to ride home. Hell I'm 42 now and am typing this on a POS pay as you go phone that basically sits on a shelf when I'm at home. The good old days where don't talk to strangers was the only guideline for not showing up on a milk carton lol. In all fairness that really hasn't changed, parents have just become crazy and lazy at the same time.
Just make sure he gets one before high school as it's a *peak* bully target pretext, even if he's good in every other way. Also in modern times teachers expect everyone to have a phone with data because they set up kahoot quizzes and whatnot, or ask to do some assignment online during the lesson, and not having one is not only awkward but can be detrimental to grades. I know from experience it's not fun, at least I had a dumb phone for most of that time and it was also quite a while ago while smartphones were JUST becoming completely mainstream so it wasn't all that out of the ordinary to not have one, just meant your family was poor, but it was understandable. But yes the stories I hear from parents of kindergarden aged kids all just chilling in their own corner/group all with smartphones are horrifying.
This is highly dependent on the people at the school. I had a basic phone at the beginning of high school that only cost a few cents (Literally) and I wasn't bullied for it, no one cared. Of course there will be schools/people who will bully you for it (Or literally anything else) but it's not guaranteed at all. Teachers expecting you to have a phone, I'd agree with that as they did when I was in hs. However, you don't necessarily have to have a phone as you can still do everything without it. A phone isn't a hard requirement, but it will be handy to have
Well I mostly have issue with his stance of "he can earn money for a phone once he gets a job", when to get a job you need a phone along with a number and multitude of other socials nowadays.
You're 💯 This is a ham fisted approach with no real thought behind it- just huge boomer do what I say energy SMH This kid just went through lockdowns with no way to communicate with his peers ?? Gross
How long ago were you in school?
High school? I graduated 4 years ago, so smartphones were already a thing and a lot of students had them. A lot of people had them in middle school too, just not elementary
To be fair, when I was a kid I could call friends on our landline. No one has landlines anymore though. I think it makes sense that kids are getting cell phones earlier than we did.
This is singly the only parenting response on here that people need to read. Good on you for being an actual responsible parent. The same rule should go for VR or any other expensive purchase.
It's so ridiculous. I agree. Our kids are in 4th grade. They are 10. Only a few kids in their class don't have phones. It's become such an issue at school they had to send home a message advising parents they need to talk to their kids because the phones are causing a disruption in class and causing kids not to learn. They are too busy trying to text and play around instead of learning. My kids aren't getting a phone until at least 8th grade. If people want to make fun of them who gives a shit. I would rather teach my kids how to stand up to bullies than give in to societal pressure. Besides, why does a 10 yr old need a phone? The excuse I hear is because if there's an active shooter I want my kids to be able to let me know. Wtf? Why? What are you going to do about I. Other than cause more problems to an already chaotic situation. The last thing the cops need is people like them driving to the school thinking they are gonna be a hero.
The only reason I wanted a phone in school was so I could text my mom goodbye if there was ever a shooting.
Jesus Christ
Ay man it’s a reasonable fear these days.
I assume you're american but as an european it's absolutely heart breaking hearing that every single day you're walking to school and having that thought in the back of your head that you might not be coming home after school. I'm just so sorry
Yeah it’s unfortunate. The school I went to was already pretty violent with just fistfights and stuff so I honestly thought I would die by the end of highschool. Aside from a couple threats there was never a shooting. I’ve always been one to worry unnecessarily so who knows if there was ever any danger. But I know some nearby schools weren’t so lucky.
Worry unnecessarily? Are you kidding? If there was a shooting the next town over I'd be stressed the entire month. Are people in the states ''just used to it''?
It's really not... highly unlikely to happen to you.
That's ridiculous... you're overreacting.
Phones can lock all that shit out. No excuses. Just bad parents
Or tech savvy kids without tech savvy parents. I've gone so far as finding exploits in windows 8 family protections and privilege rights to get extra screen time, some of the shit I managed to do to that OS without admin rights was insane and thinking back on it Microsoft would've probably paid me good money had I reported that shit to them, it was borderline a security risk, but 12 y/o me didn't care. Thankfully I didn't get any phone limits because I just didn't use it that much outside school.
Its my opinion that in a lot of cases, the parents who say things like "no excuses. just bad parents" typically just have easier kids or have instilled fear into them... the amount of judgement I see online by parents who haven't deal with the shit I have yet think I'm the problem is disheartening to say the least... there are just so many factors at play and I'll be the first to admit that I don't think my wife and I have done -every- single thing right (I mean, who has?) , but we're doing our best... But I guess the oculus quest subreddit probably isn't the place to be discussing parenting styles.. lol
Yesterday I used VRchat for the first time and met like 5 kids. Felt like an adult in kindergarten.
Get used to it. Vr is full of coco melon fans
That’s rad, because most social VR looks like Cocomelon.
Maybe dont go to a public black cat
Where should I go then? I'm legit asking, I keep trying to enjoy VR chat but can never find any decent place with level headed people in it
My goto place is Soft sea and Soft space. But in general, you should avoid worlds marked as 'trending'. Theres also this 18+ only group that frequently hosts events. https://discord.gg/ancientsofvrchat
It's difficult to say, really. When you're first getting into vrc if you don't have a group to hang with then you're stuck in the wild west of Great Pugs and Black Cats. I was a big fan of hopping the Community Labs worlds when I first started playing vrc since they're newly uploaded and you'll usually run into the creator/their friends/randoms doing the same thing. There are also groups, like I think the Ancients is one, which are more adult oriented and can give a foothold.
/r/BONELAB has been taken over by them, as far as I can tell. I saw someone post an in-depth tutorial on how to create NPCs recently, and it got downvoted then died in new. Some kid posts a video titled "rAtE mY KiLL" with them just killing the enemies, and it shoots to the top. Top post over there right now is just someone stabbing an NPC like 50 times.
Wow. That sounds absolutely stupid.
Blame all of the youtube accounts having super heroes and cartoon characters and live streaming the game to ~10 year olds
Yeah all kids see something cool and go try to do the same themselves. Also i hate how many streamers/youtubers start as being super enjoyble to adult viewer, then as they gain viewers/subscribers they start to target more kids. E.g. stop swearing, change their whole personality. After few years you see the chat/comments average age being 12 and the channel being the same as all the others.
blade and sorcery subreddits are like that too. it's either hyper edited videos that make you motionsick, edgy kids talking about all the different ways they want to torture virtual enemies, or just someone spinning around and stabbing someone 20 times lol.
Ugh, BoneLab early on was rough. It seems the entirety of that subreddit just kept saying "gimme a furry NPC to murder" until it happened, and then for a couple months it was just people killing furries on that sub. Saying all the weird stuff they wanted like the NSFW Avatars and NPCs... It's just so... Unsettling to see the craving for violence. It's one thing to play the games, whatever, but to demand an audience and discuss the killing and rate peoples' kills is weird.
I think for a lot of kids the idea of death is too abstract to understand, and violence is complicated because they likely only have experience through video games or media where no one actually gets hurt. But it’s also transgressive when they bring it up to adults, so it can become “cool.” Which is one of many reasons I want to play with adults and not children in multiplayer games.
I felt that in my soul Used to play Halo reach with my dad and bro when I was like 10, and I replayed recently now that I'm a grown up and man Those deaths hit you hard once you know what death is, if that makes any sense
I just checked it out and holy shit it’s infuriating
Dang that sucks
Yea I love Bonelab wish the Reddit was better. Got banned and mods didn’t respond when I asked why was I banned.
Yup. Kids ruined that game extremely quickly
Meta said they'd be cracking down on enforcing the 13+ policy recently. It's a double and edged sword. I like that kids are getting into VR ( at the appropriate age) because it will help the future VR market space. But, the amount of squeekers in some games has stopped me from being able to actually enjoy the game.
Same, I got a Quest 2 shortly after my birthday in 2021. I loved multiplayer until Christmas. Then, I just stopped playing multiplayer games almost entirely
For most of the games I play online, I'll now just play with a party of friends or some games have a discord where it's easy to find people to group up with
I’m sure they’ll be rushing to keep parents from dropping thousands of dollars on equipment and apps… It’s a stupid policy. They just need to design systems to properly handle different ages participating together. A lot of functionality doesn’t even need to be tied to age - features such as an option to automatically decrease the volume of chat from players you don’t interact with and areas unlocked based on skill level.
The reason i only play singleplayer vr
To be honest this is the same reason I mostly play PC and console games singleplayer or couch coop too, or only with a few people I actually know, rather than multiplayer online.
Yep, I love Fortnite (42 m), but I only play solo or with my friends. I tried a rando squad a couple of times a few months ago, and I either got people that went off on their own, or incredibly toxic players. I'd rather just do solo. Same in VR.
I just stick to the games, flatscreen or not that I know have servers where kids and tweens are bullied out of the server cause nobody wants them there
You'd love the DDCS discord/server on DCS World, place is the definition of boomer meetup last I went there.
Me and my friend meet up online maybe once a week. Some games like VR chat are straight up uncomfortable to play. It was filled with what sounded like 7 year olds. They really need to find a way to create separate servers for adults and kids. You can't lump adults and children together. I wouldn't even attempt Among Us.
It's actually a really hard problem. Kids often want to use adult accounts, and pedophiles are always trying to use kids accounts, and it's hard to figure out: a) how do you verify that a video game account is really an adult/kid? Require a photo of their passport/birth-certificate and check each one? (Expensive, easy to fake, every country has a different one, most kids don't even have a passport...). AND b) Once you have a rock-solid verified account, how do you stop people from just using their dad's, or their kid's, verified account? (Strong passwords and 2FA every single time they want to play a game? What if the parent doesn't care? What if the pedo parent just makes their kid/nephew give them the password? What about hackers?) Nintendo isn't just restricting their online interactions so much because they can't figure out how do text/voice chat. It's because that's the only practical way to make relatively safe online play for kids.
I feel like the best solution would be to not ban kids, but have a server option where people get to select which age group they want to play with. It won't completely solve the problem, but I think most kids would just go to the kids server. You have a lot less mixing
I think about 90% of the kids would choose the grownups server, assuming it will be better somehow. You could have tools identifying voice pitch, and allowing people to flag kids, and work out: *FrequentlyHighVoice + 10 flags = send to kids server*. But then what about women? What if a bunch of kids talk in deep voices, and flag each other as adults? Then flag adults they don't like as kids? They have more time to game the system than adult players have to counter them. It's much harder than it seems.
What about a reporting option? Something like where a certain number of people report someone as a kid (maybe like 20+?) then they get stuck in a younger server. Could keep the pedo problem to a minimum as well, if the kids servers could have a reverse filter.
I really like this, but any reporting system faces the chance of being abused. What happens when a group of kids brigade an adult area and report the adults?
That's fair! It could potentially send some recent voice clips to someone to be sure, and they could approve/deny. And/or if you made it a longer-term thing, like someone needs 20+ unique reports from different people in X amount of game time, that could cut down on abuse since people very probably wouldn't see instant results.
You add a sub option to a game and it destroys 90% of the kid population in that game
Let's just do a math option. Factor (7x - 5)(15x + 2). Most kids won't even try. And it will help the adults remember completely pointless lessons they learned in middle school (I have never used factoring in my career. ever).
Good idea. That'll keep most of the under 8's out. Though as a father of an eleven-year-old discord gamer kid, I suspect most of the real griefers will be tweens, old (and smart) enough to learn middle or high school math, if it allows them to get around some rules. Nowadays those skills are a 2 minute youtube video away. Perhaps if we could use all kinds of math problems, we'd trick these wannabe hax0rs into learning something 😂
A) just make people pay for verification, e.g. a $10 one-time fee to cover the expense of checking the ID B) this is only a small portion of the whole issue, you can probably get like 90% of the way there without even needing to address this Much better compared to the current approach of doing nothing and not even trying to fix this.
I would like it if we were able to create or activate a Kids profile similar to Netflix or any other streaming service with parental controls. That way game developers can restrict certain access to those profiles and even split children from adults in rooms.
Walkabout Mini Golf has an amazing community, I only join games from the discord and I've had maybe 3 people ragequit and one or two that were a little bit annoying So far tens of hours of great fun with great people, and I usually really don't like socializing online.
honestly all multiplayer games are a bit off with defult settings not having microphones as Push To Talk. Its absurdly dumb to have the microphone be LIVE by default when these people all have noisy fucking living rooms and are too dumb to adjust basic settings.
Green Hell Vrers rise to the top! Ain't kids in the amazon forest! And if there are, well.. let's just say some big cats are eating well
We need VR gatekeepers
aka “Screechers”
Daycare escapees
Googoogaagaas
Squeakers is what I call them
The amount of 5-7 year old kids that I find in vr (mostly pavlov) is insane
Just gotta love seeing your teammate have scoliosis because they are so short that the game thinks they are crouching
Or they’re 7.5 feet tall because they’re standing on their bed.
Yea I was trying to play and kids were targeting me because I wasn’t wearing the right skin. They had a cult where everyone(The little Timmys) would were the same skin. If you didn’t then they’d shoot you. Got targeted for 10 minutes then left.
I've tried playing pavlov a few times but I just can't enjoy it at all due to the amount of kids who don't sound like they could be more than 9 years old. Literally any server I joined was full of them screaming about random crap and making the game unenjoyable.
Free games will always fill up with kids..
Thought I’d escape them in paid games. Then I was screamed at in population one.
You thought you'd escape the kids in the VR version of Fortnite?
I thought surely there wouldn't be a lot of kids on the release date of Among Us VR, a $10 game. I was wrong.
I was in their seat at one point with games like cod and halo, but the difference is, I pretty much never interacted with anyone. I had a turtle beach headset with a mic, but I knew better than to talk.
Right?? I got called a squeaker once when I was a kid in a Cod lobby and didn’t speak online again for years
You saw the date of others, and wisely avoided it
I stopped playing VR because all the games I frequented were just filled with toddlers saying the n word at each other
As a person who has at most 1 brain cell I'm still smarter than anyone who says the n word disrespectfully
I just block them immediately- I feel bad for these kids because they clearly have no parental supervision and have been left with a digital babysitter in lieu of human interaction and parental attention Their behavior with the screaming n word and f word bombs all over bigscreen, poker and similar cements what I am saying These are neglected kids with absolute shit parents, and their futures are bleak filled with accidental pregnancies drug addictions, jail - you name it - these kids are headed there Just block and send them good vibes to overcome the odds stacked against them
I just wish there was a way to put them with other kids. I find it so ironic that the other people that hate playing with kids are…kids.
The 13+ requirement isn’t only for social features, some studies have shown that regular use of VR on those under the age of 13 can impact their motor skills significantly.
I enjoy fucking with children, best you can do is just ignore them, absolutely drives them up a wall if you dont block and occasionally acknowledge they exist but mostly ignore them. Dont take those first few words out of context
There was some kid on his dad's quest playing pokerstars. Everyone at the table convinced him to go all in and loose all his money. He actually thought he lost $10000 of his dad's money. I have never heard a kid cry so much before.
That is SUCH assholeish behavior. I respect it
Power move not editing that first sentence.
dont forget to register when you move
Ummmmm too late after I read that first part 🥵😳
I played pavlov shack during the day last week...big mistake...
ALWAYS play Pavlov Shack during nighttime and early morning, kids aren’t on then
I remember the old days of Pavlov shack when you had to fill out a Google form and then download the APK from the discord 👴
Probably not as old, but I remember grabbing it off of sidequest didn’t work so I had to use a different installer for it
I know someone who plays Pavlov, and I could not tell you how many dumb kids he’s come across. They get super annoying super quickly.
Most kids under 13 shouldn’t even be online unless they know what they are doing
Man I can’t wait for Pavlov shack to become fully paid so there are less squeakers.
I was in rec room a bit ago with some kid just running around yellling “n* n* n*” non-stop. Like wtf is going on in that kids life…
Being let loose with zero supervision. Saying all the shit they never get a chance to say around their parents, so they go overboard.
I have a VR YouTube channel and most of my viewers are children. I'm not even marketing towards children bro.
"Hello guys" "RRRRRRRRRRRRRRREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE"
This is a double edged sword. Going back in time, Gen X kids became video game and computer natives growing up in the 1980's, Millennials and Gen Z were digital internet and smart phone native kids, it should not be underestimated that this group of kids are going to grow up as VR natives. This is a good thing as it ensures the long term prospects of VR as an industry (even though many are claiming its death). The other edge of the sword is that many are too young and the impact of VR on them at such an early age is unknown.
Don't let your kids in VR. It's not about them being annoying, it's litterally bad for their brain development.
same can be said of reddit and other social media sites
Social Media is bad for adult brains too.
Social Media is bad ~~for adult brains too.~~ *Fixed it.*
Social media is like heroin. It’s horrible for us, we know it’s horrible for us. Yet we’re still here every day.
It might be more like alcohol or weed. Some people need to completely abstain. Maybe some people can indulge if they limit it to appropriate locations and times of the day/week.
most of what ive seen seems to say not that its bad specifically, but just that they really dont know the impact of young kids and VR with their development so the safe route is to just avoid it for kids under 13+ in case there are. Havent looked into it a ton though, so maybe there has been a bit more info or studies since ive head that, if ya have any info?
How? Wheres the proof?
As far as I know there is no actual evidence of this.
Still better than TikTok.
I Agree
A 12 year old child died in the country I live (Argentina) after following one of those stupid TikTok challenges, where they are literally told to hold their breath until they pass out then "say what they saw". It's a mix of terrible parenting, a social network designed to make this shit go viral, a malicious asshole who gets kicks out of seeing kids harm themselves, and the stupidity of people doing things to be seen by people they don't know and don't care about
Unbelievable, what the fuck is wrong with people
Citation needed
Why not both Both is good
Source?
Especially in Pavlov shack. It's rated R-18+ for goodness sake! And yet the amount of people who sound between the ages of 6-10 never ceases to amaze me.
I blame their dumb parents. Fuck em for letting their kids play some of this shit.
Games should introduce live, virtual staff in public lobbies asking an ever-changing list of 20th century popular culture and general knowledge questions, like a modern-day version of the [Age Verification Quiz](http://www.classicgaming.cc/pc/leisure-suit-larry/age-quiz) from the *Leisure Suit Larry* games. Set like a 15-second time limit so they have no opportunity to look it up online; you either know it or not.
Whatever you do, don’t play among us vr
I did. This kid was screaming because the other one wanted to know his name. (He thought that if he had his name he could track his house and kill him)
Me pretending to know his address (he doesn’t know his own address)
There are adult only discords for setting up adult only games :)
I let my kids use my VR, but only for mellow games (like Bogo) or Beat Saber. I never let them on anything multiplayer.
Personally I would argue that multiplayer should be 16+
Yeah, I'm not a big fan of all the children on VR. I only realized how bad it really was, when I jumped on vrchat and found lobbies filled with children. I've spent what felt like hours blocking the stupid little runts that are Vr children who seem to think they're hot shit because they can cuss at me or yell obscenities at the top of their lungs. Saying shit that would have got me beaten as a child.
I was playing rec room the other day, and some kid invited me to a train museum, called himself a “Tour Guide” I mean he reads fine but he couldn’t pronounce some words like “service”, “locomotive, “edinburgh”, “productive”.
Having tons of kids growing up with your product is infinitely more preferable than a bunch of fickle 30 year old males who bitch about video games as much or more than they actually play them.
It’s uncomfortable to play Echo VR at times even though I think it’s a great game - it literally feels like I’m at a futuristic recess of some elementary school in the year 3005. Feedback is feedback and fact is those bitchy 30 yr olds are the ones paying for shit or ultimately decide not to keep paying for shit. Fuck. Them. Kids.
Yeah you'd be surprised about who's paying for shit. Often it's the kids buying all the in game currency.
true. the outcry on the comments clearly showcases the difference of demographics between users of this subreddit and quest users in real life
I’m not that bothered by kids using VR and playing games and stuff, after all I can just mute or block them as I often do. That said, my main concern is their safeguarding.
My main concern is my eardrums. And I'd really love to go a day without some overprivelaged hyperactive 7-year old call me an n-word.
I report them (assuming the game has I report feature). And I tell them I'm reporting them before they're muted/blocked. If everyone did this perhaps word would get around that there are consequences to horrible behavior.
A conversation i had with a 13 year old trans in vrchat public world Me: "Sorry, i didnt know you were 13. Shouldnt have been talking about adult stuff near you" Them: "Dont worry, Ive already been into adult websites a long time ago" Me: "You really wanted to get rid of your innocence fast huh?" Them: "Innocence is overrated. Besides, Ive been groomed like 3 times before" Ooof
Yeah, I can handle loud kids sometimes but VR social apps will be a breeding ground for this terrible stuff. I don’t know what the solution is but something needs to be done
I played gorilla tag and this is what I hear as soon as I got it. Hey (not gonna say it cause I’m white) bitch. You live with your parents (not gonna say it cause I’m white). Your trash! (This was a 8 year old)
They get so mad when I keep getting them in Rec Room Paintball that they try to get me votekicked. I love that.
I made a outfit on Rec Room to mock a variant of a character I love, and unfortunately, since they character does possess cat/fox ears, every server I went to I had kids calling me “a fucking furry bitch.” I gave up trying to explain and I haven’t played since then because Rec Room in general isn’t that great.
Rec room paintball is so fun to absolutely destroy people in
Nothing wrong with doing VR as a kid. But there should be filters for those of us who don't want to be bothered.
Hey more people coming to vr means more games… so where are the games? Why are devs releasing buggy unfinished messes? WHY
Also why are they releasing more kids games?
fr, i play poker and we are all chilling being calm having a good time and a 10 year old comes in and starts screaming at everyone and we all just leave. like if you are a child, atleast act like an adult on a adult game so it isn’t obvious damn
Yeah, i cant play vr multiplayer games because of this. The games are fun, but id like to play with people that have learned how to be decent human beings
I just got a headset a few weeks ago, when I first started playing I was thrown into lobbies with yelling kids everywhere, super overwhelming and annoying. I only play one player games, all these little kids creep me out.
Gen alpha is about to be all with not fully developed eyes lol
Even worse is when it’s desktop players in a mixed VR game. Game loses out on so many VR players. (Looking at you rec room)
*parents
I wish I could give more upvotes to this post. You won!
Hey, does it give content? It does. Is it still a problem? Yes, it is. Suffering from success
I feel like daycares hand out vr during recess.
Online is generally not a good place for kids
Ngl a meth house would be safer then letting kids on VR 100%
yeah, coming from a 14 year old who plays Pavlov a lot, you’d be surprised how many 7 year olds are screaming the n word in every lobby to ever exist.
Same lmao
that's actually a very positive symptom for a new platform that is supposed to reach billions of users in \~15 years from now
It is a terrible symptom, but you are right -- it's a good sign.
I’m 16 been playing VR since I was 12 or 13 I believe could be wrong, yes kids can be annoying as fuck but for me I just stuck to single player games like boneworks, Half Life Alyx, H3VR
Kids play games. Go figure. Imagine if games were an adult only thing. I wouldn't have grown up gaming.
Difference is that most (video) games in earlier generations were either singleplayer only or had local offline coop/splitscreen/multiplayer so you only bothered your family and friends with bad social behavior. Online gaming and especially in VR with extended capabilities for communication like body language, gestures, spatial audio, ... is a whole nother story.
Good use of this template!
i'm less concerned about the annoying factor and more about the fact that several studies have now indicated that extensive VR use when you're young and still developing motor skills can cause a permanent detriment to things like balance/spatial awareness/etc
Exactly. I’m all for children exploring and seeing cool thing but when it effects their motor skill development that’s where I draw the line. Games like job simulator and beat saber are perfect for kids because they are single player (mostly) and don’t involve walking.
Oculus should offer bounties. Video game companies in general. If you can get video proof of someone admitting they are under the age requirements they give you a 20$ credit or some shit. Then they go after the people who violated the T&C
More, "If these kids had parents who actually supervised them and cared about their poor reading skills and comprehension..." Virtual reality and the technology that helps create and bring it to the masses is mind-blowing and awesome. Unfortunately, parents use it to occupy their children's time versus spending time with them and providing an upbringing. 🫣
As sad as I was when I was 12 or so and wanted to try the either a rift or a vive (I forget which) at a Microsoft store, I stand by the 13+ now
We just gotta come together peacefully… by bullying the shit out the annoying little kids so they never play again and we can be free of those annoying little rugrats
Can’t get a good game of Amung us vr because it’s filled with 5 year olds
Curious to see the amount of young adults with vision problems in a decade or so