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Wii, Playstation, XBox 360, it’s out of control already - or is it? Video games are more sophisticated and therefore more expensive. The fully loaded average video gaming system can run in the $500 range. The games start at $50, with bundles like Rock Band going for upwards of $150. Plus it’s an addicting time drain when your kids can be outside playing sports and socializing. But yet, many of us are falling prey. Why?

Well, I certainly do my share of yelling to shut down the video games, put them on timers and play referee to my 3 boys that all want to be on the system at the same time. I also lose my mind when a $50 game gets scratched because they “forgot” to put it back in it’s case or the drums from Rock Band break because they hit them too hard (of course we’ll never know which one of them was the culprit) . But lately I’ve backed down a bit because I must admit many of the games are quite fun, interactive and engage a team (not just solo play) of players at one time.

Take Rock Band or Guitar Hero for instance. My boys love this game, in fact I love it too. To get the most out of these games you need team participation. Believe it or not, there are times my kids actually invite me to do vocals (of course it’s a bit self serving as not one of them can remotely carry a tune, but I really don’t mind at all). Imagine a 14 year old boy “hanging out” with his friends and family? That’s just unheard of right? And the Wii sport games like tennis, golf, boxing and many more actually make them sweat and again, are best played as a team.

And I don’t believe for a minute that a child will use Rock Band as a substitute for playing the real instrument. In fact, in addition to the saxophone and trumpet my kids are now interested in taking drum and guitar lessons.

Of course like anything else video games can be used to excess. But isn’t that true of anything? Our job as parents is to exercise good judgment in the amount of time spent and the type of games played by our children. But I will say, when I have a ton of kids partying with Rock Band in the basement at least I can say I know exactly where my kids are and to me it’s worth the investment, how about you?