National Videogame Arcade Celebrates a Year of Engaging Families
We talk to Iain Simons, the director of the National Videogame Arcade (NVA) to find out how their first year has gone.
The NVA is a great place for families to have a day out and discover what games can offer them. Not only will they learn about video-game history but also be able to try out new games first hand. There are experts on hand to find the best games that work for them and help navigate this sometimes confusing space.
"I, and games people, believe that games already are culture... they speak to a human and culture agenda. They can be about different things, about our lives in different ways, offer different perspectives on what it means to be human."
"This is about parents equipping and inspiring daughters and sons to think of video games as a means to express themselves. It's their responsibility to wider the breadth of what video games can be about... More importantly this is about video games being encouraged to take their place as a platform through which people can express themselves."
"It is our responsibility as parents and as custodians of games' future to help encourage that. The great intervention that the culture sector can take is encouraging new voices to make new kinds of video games. The same thing happened with VHS in the 80s when kids at home could suddenly make their own movies, we're now in that position with video games... At some point soon an eight year old girl from Wells is going to completely reinvent everything that we thought video games could be."
"In all honesty I think parents need a guide... the presence of people who will help you find your way. Explaining how games work and which games might be for you. You can't shortcut that because the barriers to entry can be really high. Imagine you've never held a dual shock controller, they are really complicated things. That's a really fragile moment, if you don't get that right you will walk away from that thinking it's not for me."
More details on the National Videogame Arcade website.
