During their press conference last night, Nintendo revealed a new feature some will say is a great new tool, while others will say it is ridiculous, bent on ruining gaming for everyone. Granted, that outlandish claim will probably only come from gamers with a younger mindset.
Nintendo changing things for young gamers?
Introducing “Nintendo Switch Parental Controls.” An app you will be able to link to the new console Nintendo Switch that will allow you to set time limits for those who play. The feature itself may not be one-hundred percent new, but its implementation is.
Parents, utilizing the app, will be able to set specific time limits for the console itself. It won’t limit just the player, but if anyone is playing you have the same restrictions. From the video explanation, which you can watch below, parents will be able to set time limits for each day of gaming. Once the time limit is up, you will be notified on the screen that time has expired. Seems pretty straight forward, but there’s another ability which could prove much more sinister.
While in the app, parents will be able to see if the player has turned off the system or gone over the allotted time. If the time has expired, parents will have the ability to put the system in sleep mode, which will effectively shut down the system and stop whatever game was being played.
Is this really the right way to handle things?
One might agree that this is a great tool to help parents and kids who have issues regarding the amount of time played, but ponder just for a moment if a sibling or disgruntled spouse utilizes the app. Could Nintendo be setting up relationship failure with this app? The video even stresses how the sleep mode feature should only be used as a last resort.
Unfortunately, we have seen in the past exactly how time allotments and parental controls of this nature have worked. Some have been great and others have had bad results.
No matter what the end result will be, I do commend Nintendo for at least attempting to find a way to alleviate some parental concerns when it comes to gaming.
