Families that Play together Stay Together

My dad is passionate about fishing, hunting and fighting fires. I enjoy philosophy, reading, and not being too harsh on myself. Although we might not have a ton in common, we do play a lot of games together. He prefers military shooters as he gets bored of the slow-moving, story-heavy games I play on my own. I was never going to follow in his footsteps at the fire department and he wasn't going to read Kant with me. Instead, we've bonded over virtual battlefields.

It's not exclusive to my family. Like my own father, Steven struggles to find things he shares with his children. One of his daughters is a professional dancer. The other one is in the band. As the girls get older video games have brought the family closer together.

"I've been a huge gamer since my time in college and my daughters have just started picking up the game," he told me. "About six to seven years ago, I bought my oldest daughter an electronic device. She and I started playing games against one another and also with each other. "I met Steven at QuakeCon in Dallas, TX, where the two daughters Nicole and Maya were getting ready to play the game of Torchlight 2. Steven stated that they used to have one room at home in which all the computers were. I asked Steven if they played many games together. "We'd sit and play for hours and hours."

They play various games together, such as Borderlands and The Secret World, though Steven told me that he as well as Maya, who is 11, currently have an affinity for Minecraft. The evidence suggests that Minecraft is an modern-day Lego set The two craft and create together. "I actually am a fan of Minecraft. We'll log into an online server and build things together and stuff."

It's more than just the games. Their house is also a home of technology. Nicole's relatives coordinated to get Nicole a part for the brand new computer. Her father also built it with her. They learned how to put in hardware the same way that other children learn to change a tire on a car. "I try to show them that this is what you must do when building a computer to ensure that they know how to do things themselves," Steven said. "I tried to make them as self-sufficient as possible."

Of course, having activities you love doing at home does not always guarantee the best family time. Sometimes life gets in the way and you need to take a break to be able to spend quality time together. But where do you go when exploring magical kingdoms (albeit in a virtual way) is already part of your normal family bonding?

For Steven's family, the answer was QuakeCon that takes place in their home state. The event is advertised as the world's largest free LAN party, the Bethesda-hosted convention draws thousands of people to Dallas. "It makes us focus on doing this together," Steven said. It's an enjoyable experience to go out and look around at what people are doing and what new things are being released. It's something we all love doing and it's not too expensive.

They don't go to QuakeCon by themselves. Like many families go camping with their friends, QuakeCon tends to be an activity for the whole family. Steven and his daughters attended with friends, including Nicole's friend Sean and his family. "His dad and I have become good friends," Steven said. "I would invite Sean and him Sean to our home to host mini LAN parties in our house, and I would invite around three or four friends and my daughters would join in, and we'd have a fun time at the house." For the past couple of years, QuakeCon has been another activity to do with the family.

"I do not know if it was the family sitting down at dinner saying, 'We should go to the park!'" Sean 17, 17, shared his story with me. He was still up playing games in the Bring Your Own Computer (BYOC) section of QuakeCon while his father, mother and little brother seven-year-old Reid were playing elsewhere. "It was just my dad and me saying"This is kick A, we have to go to this,' and the two others kind of got carried along. Especially with [Steven's family] coming, we're close to them and we play together anyway and they said, 'You guys should come and join us, and it just sort of took place."

For those who are in this group who want to book a hotel for a weekend of video games is one of the most natural things in the world. And why shouldn't it? Anyone who is younger than 18 today was born into a society where video games are already an everyday activity for millions of people. It's been a long time since video games were something parents were aware of. Instead, they're something adults enjoy with their kids.

Steven's oldest daughter is going to college close to home He hopes that QuakeCon at the very least can be an annual excuse for the entire family to gather and play games over the weekend, regardless of when the girls grow up and move out. He added, "I have at least six to seven more years with my oldest." Minecraft servers "But yeah, we'll try to go on for as long as we can."

It isn't a matter of what they do, as long as they are enjoying their time together. "The most important thing we're here for is a bit of a getaway. It's just to play video games and kind of hang out. Time with Daddy." Britton Peele is a writer for hire based out of Texas. His work has been featured on GameSpot, GamesRadar and The Dallas Morning News. You can follow him on Twitter at @BrittonPeele.