On the one hand, the devs had finally found an excuse not to have a game timers.

On the other hand, the idea of a game timer kind of takes the responsibility of direct involvement away from a parent and lets the machine take over for them.

And when one of the biggest criticisms of parenting seems to be that parents keep letting machines like television and videogames do the parenting for them, it's arguably a step in the right direction.

The only problem is, I don't know which side of this coin I should invest my beliefs in. Part of me wants to believe that this whole line of thinking really was just an excuse made up by the devs to have a console that doesn't ::gasp!:: shut itself down.

But even without having a child of my own, I imagine it's extremely important for a child to see a parent as an authority figure, and part of being an authority figure is simply being present.

So I really don't know. Like anything that really matters, I have too many mixed feelings about this.

minister.of.rhetoric

stonefry

Tuxy79

Jacksci-fi

Each code can have a specific number of hours it allows electricity a week. There are also buttons to temporarly add/subtract hours per week depending if the kid was good or bad.

He says it has changed his familys life, and he doesnt have to be the 'bad guy' anymore. The funnyest thing was he caught his kids selling each other hours

quyrean

Scrapple

cheswick

Justcrim

Genius

gwolf

lestat730

ShyGuy91284

Gagamus

inajeep

I believe it was Rainbow Six that the "Chocolate Milk Screaming Child" was playing not Halo. You are not realizing the beauty of the timer if it in fact shuts the 360 off, the little douche bag will be gone and we wont have to hear his cries and screams anymore!

icarusprime

Am I the only person who absolutely hates this idea? Interesting that there's so much praise for a device that limits the kids of today from playing the very thing that the kids of yesterday (that's us here reading this website) came to love so much and even... build websites and blog about!!

What if we all had super devices that limited us to 2 hours of games a week? Would we be nice, well adjusted boring people? Or will this just develop more rabid fans, eventually? oh, the possibilities!

reecord2

making little joe play X amount of hours = less of chance xbox 360 could go RROD

ATT

I think it prepares him for a lot of things in life like work. Also, make sure he doesn't get to the update before you. Smart kid like him, he'll probably input a password you don't know so you wont ever be able to use it. ;)

Tried using the password. When the warning came up I simply input the password and got to play some more. Next time I made a note of not remembering so that wouldn't happen again... I'm waiting for the repairman right now. j/k

Spiderbait

CorporateThug

edgeblade

Moonshadow101

What if I was saving the game and then the time went up and shuts down the 360?

carlogz

Ideally, it'd have a small transparent overlay in the corner of your screen (user decides which) with the current time or how much you have left.

The theory being that Japanese users are very time oriented cause of their jobs and rail schedules (this is why their TV shows have the time prominently displayed.

Of course, it was a moot point considering 360's Japanese sales, but it's cool to see something you suggest get implemented. Hopefully, the other stuff I suggested gets added (I also suggested the Last game played option on the Arcade blade)

Cth42

LemonproX

peacefuloutrage

Moonshadow101

EmTeeZ

SpcmnSpf

elevenoverzero

KingBroly

RaepGoblin

Dammit, there goes all my dreams of working for you guys. I thought all you did was play games, travel the world and receive free swag in the mail.

But you actually have to do work? Disappointed... :(

Doshu

Samos42

Samos42

If this works how I would think it does... timer is up... guide menu pops out asking for a PIN to continue. Since the guide menu pauses the game unless it's an online session then my son can just come get me to unlock it... save it and be done with it.

Personally I think it's freaking awesome.

Jabbertrack

KID 1: 5 more headshots and I am the fucking winner!
KID 2: Not if I have to do with it fuck ass shit!
KID 1: HA HA, I SHOT YA BITCH!!
KID 2: I'll get ya asshole!
KID 1: I found your resawn dickhead, NOW DIE!!
?????
KID 2: What happen to dat lil' shit? He frozed!
KID 3: *shoots both of them* TAKE THAT SHITHEADS! Oh goddamn it! Now I have to get off. Fuck!

-

MICROSOFT NEEDS TO ALLOW multiple people (more than 2) in private chats.

C4WDeX

BOMxAgonyxScenex

SpaceWhale

J. Kyle

Intrepid_Homoludens

ShaggE

That was RBS3.

Karttikeya

Intrepid_Homoludens

PBnZelly

Seven Is Darker

*=yeah I was snickering when I wrote that

Acker

Also, thanks for mentioning this, Defferoo!

Hawko

Intrepid_Homoludens

Intrepid_Homoludens

Any parent that allows their children to have voice chat with strangers over the internet, is just plain negligent. It's easy enough to turn that feature off, but apparently; very few parents actually do.

I don't think this feature will get any more use. Still it's great to have for those few responsible parents that must be in existance SOME WHERE.

robinandtami

Lyme

Papa Midnight

defferoo

Only good thing here is that it is optional. Hopefully, some parents will get to their senses and not use this.

Hawko

Bobinator2000

This is just a way of enforcing the parent's rules until the child has earned the trust they've been given.

Kuraudo

Now if only they had an app for limiting time spent checking out and commenting on posts at Kotaku, my productivity would go up exactly 204.36%...

zany_ninja

Seriously though, it's a good idea, if only to enforce my (lack of) self-discipline. No more gaming marathons when I should be studying for college tests!

SentientPudding

GoemonEbis

The moral of the story is yes the timer will be mostly ignored/unheard of unless there is advertising. Which there should be I th ink.

Wolfkin

I think for me gaming is only ONE way of exposing my child to culture. I would also take him to the symphony, the opera, museums, ballgames, sports, and encourage him to do volunteer work for less privileged kids. Really, I would take the time help make him a very well rounded kid.

Intrepid_Homoludens

animagnum

Blinded220

omnibot2000XL

Intrepid_Homoludens

...morons.

Wildarmsjecht

Probably fairly difficult to earn the respect of your child when an inanimate object is telling them it's time to stop playing and go to bed.

I just find it ironic how it's always kids who are accused of getting lazier and lazier as generations go by, yet parents want things inside of electronic devices to tell their kids how to act for them.

Brilliant!

mva5580

There is a reason that children have parents (otherwise we could all just asexually reproduce and go our separate ways).

HELLINAHANDBASKET

SolidFro

Why on gods earth would you want your kid to play VG's for 10 hours a day?

Oh I know why; so they'll be available to work at the gas-stations I own, getting paid next-to-nothing.

balls187

:-) Yep, if you hadn't made that point my next post would have. Psychology, like most things conjured up by us humans, goes through changes all the time based on ever shifting research and findings. But the bottom line will always be to keep one eye on the cooking and the other eye on the child.

Intrepid_Homoludens

He'll be flustered for weeks wondering why his XBox cuts him off every half hour.

Nice!

EQC

However I ended up with a job I like (pretend to work while posting worthless-comments on kotaku), so I don't consider that as part of the "crappy stuff"

I did manage to play 45 minutes of BioShock during a 3 day holiday :)

balls187

Rational thinking like that could get you into trouble one day, Microsoft.

Draconis

But, fat lot of good that did for me. I play games 4-6 hours a day continuously now. o_0

Giolon

whitey9

Tom Clancy's Samuraidino

It's like parenting classes, the ones who are willing to go out of their way to sign up for a parenting class usually don't need it. It's the motherfuckers that sit at home letting the 360 babysit for them that need it.

whitey9

Let_everything

Cartman86

Cwolf267

Some child-psychologists say that "bribing" or "rewarding" your kids for things they should be doing, sets a bad example.

It sets them up for the real world, though. I have to do all of the crappy things I don't want to do to 'earn' game time, too.

Work, pay bills, clean (sorta), occasionally hold the baby and talk to her, my spousal obligations, etc., but at the end of all of that, I have 'earned' 15 or 20 minutes of uninterrupted pure gaming bliss.

Just don't be too generous with the rewards and make sure to under-deliver on any promises. Then they'll be prepared for a corporate job.

doubtful

Brilliant!

priznat

TheOtherBarber

The Wii has a listing of all the games played each day and for how long. Iwata specifically mentioned that he wanted to allow parents to know how much their children were playing. It's also part of why you can't erase the play-time records.

So Nintendo basically leaves it up to the parents to review and deal with the time spent playing issue, whereas Microsoft allows them to turn off the system. I'd imagine Nintendo's is easier to use though.

Huckleberry

I remember I somehow convinced my mom that you couldn't just turn the game system off, you had to kill of your character and get to the game over screen first. Maybe that's why she never let another game system in her house after the original NES.

SpacePenguinBot

little Ash: @_@

Intrepid_Homoludens

hulkster081

Mongoosekun

OneFreeMan

Without knowing how the system is put into motion, it is premature to say it is "my fault". I am just playing Devil's Advocate.

LostToys

Wait a minute, little kids don't know when too much is too much. This is to stop Junior from playing for 7 hours straight thus causing next boot up to give you the red eye of death due to the motherboard melting on you.

Phazonmasher

Brian Crecente

spider splicer: "I was just getting started!!!" o_0

@SPIDERMONKEY: "Good idea, but I have one small little problem with this: Most parents won't even know about it, and those that do will most likely not know how to use the function, making it meaningless."

Then those parents are stupid idiots. Those are likely the same parents who spend too much time obsessing about getting the latest gadgets and SUVs to show off to their neighbours and then complaining that they must work 60-80 hour weeks just to buy their kids an Xbox360 and why the hell should they have to take several hours just to learn how to use a parental control on it. ¬_¬

Intrepid_Homoludens

snowilli

My productivity level during the day would skyrocket. (In theory.)

Raynre

JimmyHACK

gadgetfanatic

Seriously though, very good idea. I can only imagine the tantrums that could occur if the thing auto-shutdowns in the middle of a multiplayer game.

androvsky

jacksinn

Some child-psychologists say that "bribing" or "rewarding" your kids for things they should be doing, sets a bad example. I think that finding out what your kid loves to do, and using that as leverage to make them do the crappy things that will make him better off is smart parenting.

Beware, though. Soon enough your kid will be far more technically savvy than you, and he'll figure out a way to by pass this stuff.

Heck it's MS, so I'm sure there are all kinds of keyloggers you can install on the bloody thing.

balls187

So do your sources say anything about clan support?

Marasai

Then it is your fault. The feature will most likely give you periodic warnings that your time is almost up, which would give you ample time to save; whether or not you choose to do so is your own problem.

Spidermonkey

DigitalHero

GuaiGaWarui

devilhunterx

azupanda

Pro Tip: Soccer moms drive mini-vans, have 2-3 children, and smell like catalog inserts.

doubtful

Wardog

Apart from that, I can't imagine enough parents knowing about this from Fall Update details alone. It's something that should be advertised to some degree. Obviously I don't expect commercials saying "Hey, timer!", but there should be some way of diverting focus to it.

Heliophage

Brian Crecente

Welcome to the V-Chip 2.0.

LostToys

Kokuryukai

LostToys

RPharazon

Spidermonkey

Marasai

nickaix