Family video games – Christmas 2014 buyer’s guide

2014 has seen the video game business continue to go from strength to strength.  With consoles such as Sony’s Playstation 4 having sold over 15 million units more and more family homes are making use of these to provide family entertainment.

Video games provide a great activity for children and their families to enjoy sharing at home but many are not suitable for younger gamers.  Despite various aged certification on game boxes children are frequently being exposed to games that are not suitable for them to play.  What games are children allowed to play and which ones are they likely to want to play?

Parents beware/rejoice – “Let it go” is in Just Dance 2015

The popular dance game series, Just Dance,  has its latest version out now and is likely to be appearing a lot of Christmas lists this year.

The game is avaliable on Xbox 360, Xbox One, Playstation 3, Playstation 4, Wii U and amazingly the Wii.  I was not aware anyone was still making games for the Wii but such is the popularity of Just Dance and the Wii that they appear to be perfect partners.

Geometry Wars 3 is out today!!!

This looks amazing!

So far one of the Playstation 4’s best games was Resogun, a similar style game to the Geometry Wars Series.  Will this prove to be a better game?

That Dragon Cancer – An adventure game unlike any other

That Dragon Cancer is a video game unlike any other.  The game is an indie title that has been made by a family who have 4 sons, one of whom battled terminal cancer for several years.

The game tells the family’s story and in particular their experiences in dealing with Joel, their son’s, illness.

It is advertised as “A videogame developer’s love letter to his son; an adventure game to inspire us to love each other; a voice for those fighting cancer.”

Open world action-adventure game face off

This Month has seen the release of a number of BIG games.  Titles such as Dragon Age: Inquisition, Super Smash Bros and Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare will be popular on plenty of people’s Christmas lists.

Games featuring “open worlds” are growing dramatically in popularity.  They afford their players large worlds to explore, enjoy and usually offer a hours of content.  Of the various genres of open world titles that are available it’s the action adventure titles traditionally attract the most sales.

This Christmas the most popular of these open world action-adventure games are Assassins Creed: Unity, Grand Theft Auto V and Far Cry 4.

The question is, if you’re a fan, which one of these is the game for you to spend hours exploring.

Far Cry 4 impressions

Far Cry 3 was without doubt an outstanding and ground breaking first person shooter.  Far Cry 4 looks to take what number 3 did so well and keep on trying to make things better.

I’ve just played my first couple of hours on Far Cry 4 and am itching to get on and play some more.

Nintendo Kids Club and Nintendo Extra

Nintendo has recently launched a couple of new websites with children in mind; Nintendo Kids Club and Nintendo Extra.

Nintendo Kids Club is a site built entirely for children to enjoy. It’s packed with games, puzzles, colouring, craft activities and the “Cat Mario Show”.

Phonics fun with Biff, Chip And Kipper update

Following my previous post of first impressions HERE we have continued to enjoy playing with Phonics fun with Biff, Chip And Kipper on our 2DS.

Moo has played through the initial Stages 1 games and activities that focused on sounds and is now beginning on stages 1+ and 2 which are more focused on simple phonetic words such as “bug, Dad and pot.”

Assassins Creed Unity and Rogue

The Assassins Creed series has steadily been bringing out new titles since 2007.  They have become some of my favourite games and are possibly the longest running series of games that I have brought and played through every release.

This year though the series splits it’s releases into two titles, both being released at the same time; Unity for PC, Playstation 4 and the Xbox One and Rogue for the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3.

Both games look absolutely amazing and continue the long running battle between the Assassins and the Templars.

Lego Batman 3: Beyond Gotham

With Christmas approaching it only seems right to begin highlighting entertainment products that will be popular this festive season.

One of those products is Lego Batman 3: Beyond Gotham.

Is it something you should pick up as a gift for someone this Christmas?