Here’s the sitch: my hubby works out of town a lot. He tries hard to stay ‘connected’ with our 10YO daughter, and he calls her every night. As soon as she gets home from school, I ask her about her day, and I email him with some highlights, so he’ll know what’s going on with her on that particular day (I throw in other relevant info, too). But I’m thinking if there were an online game of some sort where they could take turns and email the turns or results or whatever to each other, it would be pretty cool. But I can’t think of anything.
Just a heads-up, they are both very literal-minded, both very geeky. Hubby is horrible at spelling, and while his grammar is fine, he doesn’t get into language-type stuff (unless the language is C++; he’s very old-school. )
So, any ideas on what they may be able to do? All suggestions are welcome, and I will check them all out, then let them decide. There must be stuff out there, right?
Mods: I almost put this in IMHO. If you think it would fit better there, by all means, move it. Thanks!
Although the OP describes her husband and child as “very geeky”, I still don’t think that moving threads to different forums would be engaging to a 10 year old. It may be fun for sarcastic, power hungry misfits, but I’m not sure it would be good for the kid.
Yeah, ol’ twicks didn’t get her joke in, so someone had to do it.
As for the question: do you mean a game that is played by email? Or just a game with stats that they can exchange via email, each trying to best the other?
I assume you do not mean a game that both can play simultaneously, right?
I was thinking of something they could both play online, independently of one another, then email or talk on the phone about what’s going on in the game. A chess game that could be played remotely would work, they both play chess.
People used to play chess by snail mail, and there were a couple of different notations which told which piece was moved to which square on a turn. Of course, during a castle, two pieces are moved. Anyway, if your daughter and husband play chess, this might be something.
Facebook has multiple games like this. Everything from Scrabble to Chess to Othello to anything else you can think of. Have them both get Facebook accounts and start playing some games.
Well, there’s Free Realms. By all reports it’s both extremely child friendly (Sony is putting in great efforts in that regard) and still reasonably amusing for adults. It might fit your criteria here.
gameknot.com has a correspondence chess engine my gf and I used when we were living in seperate states. You log on, make a move and then the next person has x number of hours to log on and make their move and so on. Its good for this sort of thing cause it only takes a few minutes to make a chess move (especially when playing against a ten year old), so it shouldn’t be too hard for your husband to keep up his end of the game even if he’s at work.
There are similar websites out there for about every other game you can think of (Risk, Settelers of Catan, etc) but IMHO chess works better then most other games in this kind of format.
There are also the MMORGs. When my husband or I travel, we often play World of Warcraft or City of Heroes with each other for an hour or two in the evening. That may be more intensive than what you are looking for, but my kids can play both games.
I think World of Warcraft is great if you have the time to play simultaneously. Even if you don’t, it’s great fun to talk about with other people.
Other than that, it sounds like something a little more involved than chess would be fun for your family. Settlers of Catan is a personal favorite of mine. Risk would be good too. Look for strategy board game types.
Well, mudgirl already has a Free Realms account, so this is something I will address with my hubby. As for Facebook, I thought you needed to be 13 to have an account?
Does the hubster move around a lot. I do and I try and remember to send my Mom a postcard from wherever I happen to be. She enjoys following me around, although she’s not 10yo any more
She’s not a gamer, though I could see the potential that she may be, in the future. Mostly, we’re just looking for new ways for them to bond while he’s not here. Obviously, since she’s only 10, I wouldn’t want games that are super-violent or very intense/scary.
Typing chat doesn’t bother me.
Many evenings, he has a good deal of time. He also has internet access just about always, thanks to a NetBook and an Android.
Similar to something like WoW, there could be a game they could play independently and collaboratively compare strategies. Simple strategy games might be nice to let them discuss how to play, even if they aren’t always playing each other.
This is more of a ‘throw-it-out-there’ suggestion: There’s a free-to-play collectible card game called Elements (requires Flash). You can play against AI opponents or other people, and there’s a chat function to play against specific players. A single game rarely lasts more than about ten minutes.
For this game in particular : It takes a while at first to build a deck that won’t get you killed half the time you play, and if you build a bad deck early, it takes even longer to fix it. Possibly have him give her advice on starting out.
Also, once you’ve got something you like, tweaking and improving requires a whole lot of games. I don’t know how much it would appeal to her or if she’d get tired of it, but there may well be similar games.
Panamajack, I will definitely have hubby check out Elements. They are both big on strategizing (hell, for her, it’s almost a hobby! ), so something like this might work well. The fact that a game doesn’t last very long is a plus. It’s something they can do ‘together’, even when they’re not together, but if one of them is particularly busy that evening, they will know a game won’t take long.
)
), so something like this might work well. The fact that a game doesn’t last very long is a plus. It’s something they can do ‘together’, even when they’re not together, but if one of them is particularly busy that evening, they will know a game won’t take long.