Putting the 'role' back in role-playing games since 2002.
Donate to Codex
Good Old Games
  • Welcome to rpgcodex.net, a site dedicated to discussing computer based role-playing games in a free and open fashion. We're less strict than other forums, but please refer to the rules.

    "This message is awaiting moderator approval": All new users must pass through our moderation queue before they will be able to post normally. Until your account has "passed" your posts will only be visible to yourself (and moderators) until they are approved. Give us a week to get around to approving / deleting / ignoring your mundane opinion on crap before hassling us about it. Once you have passed the moderation period (think of it as a test), you will be able to post normally, just like all the other retards.

Good PC games for young kids?

anvi

Prophet
Village Idiot
Joined
Oct 12, 2016
Messages
7,530
Location
Kelethin
I have a little nephew who plays crappy ipad games so I wanna get him playing real games. But I need to ease him into ones that are good but not too complex, and not too violent, he is only 8.

Anyone got any ideas?

My ideas so far:
Atomic Bomberman, Worms, hm.....? Lands of Lore?
 

moraes

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Jan 24, 2011
Messages
701
Project: Eternity Wasteland 2 Codex USB, 2014 Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire
Freddi Fish Complete Pack
Putt-Putt Complete Pack
Ecoquest
Letter Quest: Grimm's Journey Remastered
 

JarlFrank

I like Thief THIS much
Patron
Joined
Jan 4, 2007
Messages
33,052
Location
KA.DINGIR.RA.KI
Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
Monkey Island. King's Quest if you're sadistic and want him to get stuck with no way to progress because he forgot to pick up a one-pixel sized item 10 screens ago.
 

skacky

3D Realms
Developer
Joined
Mar 5, 2013
Messages
2,506
Location
The City
Chex Quest
A few Doom mods like Hocus Doom or The Adventures of Square (similar to Chex Quest)
Serious Sam (with flower blood)
Z
 

spectre

Arcane
Joined
Oct 26, 2008
Messages
5,381
Back in my day I would play Doom, Mortal Kombat, Enemy Unknown, Civilization and Dungeon Master so wohat would I know.

More seriously, try something like this:
For strategy gaming, start with Heroes of Might and Magic 1, then work your way up.
World of Goo (my go to game for children).
Tyrian 2000
Lion King, Aladdin, Hercules, Tarzan - there was a bunch of disney-themed platformers, and I remember they were quite ok.
 

MRY

Wormwood Studios
Developer
Joined
Aug 15, 2012
Messages
5,703
Location
California
Pajama Sam and Loom are both great entry points to adventure games. I haven't tried Freddy Fish and Putt Putt, so I'm not sure if they're good as well (Pajama Sam is by the same company / team, which included Ron Gilbert), but I can vouch for Pajama Sam. It introduces the basics of point-and-click adventuring (inventory puzzles, exploration, logic puzzles) but in a very friendly way. The graphics are fantastic and it's very funny. Loom doesn't introduce the mechanics in the same way, but it's easy to grasp and engaging. After those, Monkey Island is probably doable.
 

Shackleton

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Dec 29, 2011
Messages
1,301
Location
Knackers Yard
Codex 2016 - The Age of Grimoire Make the Codex Great Again! Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag. Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture
No love for the Lego games? I've been playing Lego Batman with my little lad and he loves fighting bad guys with Daddy. They're not as simple as you might think, there's some light puzzle elements and a bit of semi-tricky platforming. They've got a lot of unlockables and little secrets as well as a semblance of a story.

I've been most impressed with the original Lego Batman and the Harry Potter ones out of the ones I've played so far with him, but he's only 4 (and a half!) so I'm doing some of the difficult bits myself but he's learning fast. Frankly, I'm enjoying the Lego games more than my run through of Pillars that I've got on the go!
 

Dzupakazul

Arbiter
Joined
Jun 16, 2015
Messages
707
Lego Racers is an older Lego game and it's a competent kart racer with the added allure of creating your own LEGO cars. Honestly, creating differently themed LEGO cars will remain fun even after you exhaust all the tracks. Lego Racers 2 has a fairly crappy campaign, is less sharp and concise and it has a restrictive building block limit, but it's okay.

Lego Rock Raiders is for a bit older children, but it's basically Dungeon Keeper with LEGO people trying to survive and not peons furthering their master's sphere of influence. Lil' kid will learn the importance of oxygen, too. For the most part, it's fun to crush rocks and uncover new places to build new laboratories and excavators in.

Those old games have enough of a fandom that I suspect there are tweaks to make them run on newer OSes.

Some more oddball suggestions could be World of Xeen with a melee-heavy party. See cute colourful monster - press A 4 times and he's gone. Insane Beggars will give him nightmares is the only downside. Heroes of Might & Magic 1 has fairy-tale like graphics and is the simplest entry in the series, too; I played it at that age. It's all enough of a fairy tale vibe; you'd see more violence in a Heman cartoon. HOMM1 creatures even disappear upon dying instead of leaving corpses.

Aside from that, the obvious answer of Realms of Arkania Remastered.

When he comes of age, play that one Streets of Rage game where at the end you can betray and murder your co-op partner character in a beatdown duel. Then kick him out of the house laughing maniacally.

Oh, and Serious Sam: The First / Second Encounter on hippie mode. Monsters bleed flowers!

EDIT: Remember OGame / Bitefight? I remember when I was at an internet cafe in a southern ski resort and a hobbit next to me got his pimp money in the very aptly named web-browser based game called DZIWKI. No points for guessing what that was and how that website looked like.
 
Last edited:

deuxhero

Arcane
Joined
Jul 30, 2007
Messages
11,326
Location
Flowery Land
KILLER BEAR
The thing I remember most about Outcast's levels are

1: Plenty of times you have to do obscure shit to progress despite the levels being linear like having to find a mostly hidden passage covered by water
2: right after the force power tutorial and a cool barfight with your "new" powers you're on a street full of snipers where careful progress with guns is your only option
3: The stealth segment

Story is way better though.
 

DemonKing

Arcane
Joined
Dec 5, 2003
Messages
5,958
The Lego games are great for young kids - no gore (unless you count minifigs exploding into blocks), when you die you respawn instantaneously (you just lose a few points which won't worry most kids) and you can play with a friend/parent/older sibling. They're insta-buys in my house and one of the few ways my kids will play together without squabbling.
 

KILLER BEAR

Educated
Joined
Sep 2, 2016
Messages
133
KILLER BEAR
The thing I remember most about Outcast's levels are

1: Plenty of times you have to do obscure shit to progress despite the levels being linear like having to find a mostly hidden passage covered by water

Well it has some parts where you can potentially stuck but they are like 3-5 in the whole campaign.
2: right after the force power tutorial and a cool barfight with your "new" powers you're on a street full of snipers where careful progress with guns is your only option
3: The stealth segment

Academy had way more pointless missions like these. Like the one where your fighter crashes and you have to find the tools to repair it while you are in constant need to jump all the time to avoid getting eaten by the giant worm. Or the other one where they take your lightsaber and the game forces you to engade in ranged combat only. Outcast has way less of this stuff.

Story is way better though.

Indeed. Also Outcast has way bigger levels, more complex level design and far more interesting missions in general.
 

Goral

Arcane
Patron
The Real Fanboy
Joined
May 4, 2008
Messages
3,552
Location
Poland
I have a little nephew who plays crappy ipad games so I wanna get him playing real games. But I need to ease him into ones that are good but not too complex, and not too violent, he is only 8.
Playing at such a young age is not recommended, he might end up here you know. Teach him how to play chess, go or other board games which are far better for kids this young. There are also games like Dobble, Jenga, Story Cubes...

But if you really want CG Jazz Jack Rabbit 2 is really good.
 

As an Amazon Associate, rpgcodex.net earns from qualifying purchases.
Back
Top Bottom