Article published Oct 28, 2004 Weaned on Video Games By MICHEL MARRIOTT New York Times IT looked innocent enough: an orange box with undulating edges rested on purple pedestal feet. A lavender cartridge bearing the likeness of Simba, the cuddly cub from "The Lion King," rested in a slot in the box's plastic face.At the end of a cable, a bulbous purple joystick beckoned. It was beside four big buttons, which hovered above another button the size of a personal pizza.Four-year-old Alexander Nyiri, visiting New York with his parents last week, could not resist. He wandered over to the V.Smile TV Learning System set up in the cavernous Toys "R" Us store in Midtown Manhattan and began to play.And play. And play some more."He was heading elsewhere, and this game caught his eye," said his father, Lou Nyiri, a Presbyterian minister from Gettysburg, Pa. "He pretty much caught on to it within 5 to 15 minutes. He got the most giggles running Simba into the water."The object of Alexander's attention - a $60 item from VTech - mimics the basic design of popular video game consoles like Sony's PlayStation 2, Microsoft's Xbox and Nintendo's GameCube. And that is hardly a coincidence."We have been looking at data that shows that kids at an earlier and earlier age are starting to play video games," said Julia Fitzgerald, vice president for marketing at VTech Electronics North America. "We wanted to know how we could make this phenomenon work for Mom" - and make it educational.It is unclear whether video games teach preschool children more about phonics and problem solving than about simply how to tool around in a virtual playground. But everyone seems to agree that the ranks of young video gamers are substantial.A report last fall by the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, a health policy research organization, found that half of all 4- to 6-year-old children have played video games - on hand-held devices, computers or consoles - and one in four played several times a week. Of children 3 or younger, 14 percent have played video games."Companies have found that there was an untapped market with the really young kid," said Vicky Rideout, a vice president of the foundation.And indeed, while the industry's most anticipated titles this fall are the likes of Halo 2 and Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater, a growing number of toy and video game makers are aiming at children as young as 3 with a slew of products like the V.Smile system.Many of the new systems have bright colors and oversize buttons, offering games populated with the likenesses of Mickey Mouse, SpongeBob SquarePants and Jimmy Neutron.Atari is marketing a line of PC games for children 3 to 6 that come in see-through boxes that reveal toys, like a small Dora doll with the Dora the Explorer video game.Eric Levin, executive vice president of Techno Source, has created My First TV Play System, which is in stores now. The TV Play System ($20) has 20 arcade-style games and activities stored in its memory. The hand-held controller, which plugs into a television and carries the Crayola brand, looks strikingly similar to a PlayStation game controller.Mr. Levin said his game system is intended for young children, many of whom merely want to follow their elders' example."They see their older brothers or older sisters or even their parents playing video games, and they want to do what they do," he said. But, like many makers of children's video games, Mr. Levin emphasized that his games have age-appropriate content - including, for example, activities like virtual coloring.Some game analysts and developers also point out that children are getting older faster, meaning that very young children are developing more mature tastes for electronics, including laptop computers, personal organizers, portable DVD players and game systems.David Riley of the NPD Group, a research firm, said that partly as a result of this shift, conventional toy sales were flat. "If parents are spending $200, $400 and more on these things, they take away from other things kids can have," Mr. Riley said. "But kids seem very happy and content with a computer and a couple of games."Daniel Hewitt, public relations manager for the Entertainment Software Association, the trade group that represents computer and video game publishers in the United States, said that playing video games "comes really naturally" to very young children. "It is something we see consistently as this generation grows: they have this innate comfort with interactive software," he said.Alexander's mother, Candace Nyiri, said he already plays his father's Tiger Woods Golf game on the family's computer. "He learned all the names of the golfers just by playing," she said.Colton James, a 6-year-old from Olathe, Kan., who also found his way to the V.Smile store display last week, said he tries to compete with his more accomplished 10-year-old brother, Austen, in Madden NFL 2005 - a game for PC's and game consoles that is primarily marketed to adults.Starting video gamers younger is good news for the multibillion-dollar video game industry as it looks to expand its base beyond its core consumers, males from 14 to 34 years old."It creates a growing market," said Peter Dille, senior vice president for worldwide marketing at THQ, a major developer of video games, many intended for children. Mr. Dille noted that the influx of young video game players "helps to feed in new gamers all the time."And as these players mature, he and several other major developers noted, they tend to remain gamers for years."It's great for us, introducing kids to video games at a young age," said Joe Brisbois, a game producer for Sony Computer Entertainment America in Foster City, Calif. "Speaking as a designer, it will push us to create more challenging games for this generation of players that will master the basic skill sets earlier than any other in the past."At the same time, those early starters are likely to be more demanding, Mr. Brisbois said. "They'll say, 'Wait, I learned those kinds of things when I was 3. I want more than what button do I press to open a door.' "Already, Mr. Brisbois said, Sony is finding that its EyeToy, a video camera accessory for the PlayStation 2 game console, is opening doors, some unexpected, for children who might otherwise have trouble using the PlayStation's handful of a controller.Rather than fuss with thumb sticks, multiple triggers and more buttons than a dress shirt, children can play games by simply moving in front of the U.S.B. camera. Introduced last year, the EyeToy worked with a limited inventory of mini-games.Richard Marks, the developer of the EyeToy, noted that while the camera was not designed specifically for children, he finds that children love it - and he hopes it will become a widely accepted alternative to traditional controllers."I have three boys, ages 9, 7 and 4," Mr. Marks said. "My youngest can play EyeToy, and there are not too many games he likes."Sony is introducing EyeToy: AntiGrav, its most advanced EyeToy game, letting players speed through futuristic environments on a hoverboard. Control is managed by the way players stand and shift their weight in front of the included EyeToy camera while wearing special armbands. While the $50 game is primarily for older children and teenagers, Mr. Marks and Mr. Brisbois said, tests have shown that children 5 and younger have little trouble picking up its broad objectives.Mr. Dille of THQ said his company was also developing games that would use the EyeToy to control them. One level of a game lets children control SpongeBob's bowling by moving their own arms as if they were bowling."A 2-year-old could play that game, as long as the kid is capable of paying attention," Mr. Dille said.Similarly, Nintendo, long the most child-oriented of the three major game console makers - and the maker of the GameBoy, often a child's first game machine - has created games that use nontraditional control systems. Its Donkey Konga game for the GameCube uses a set of plastic bongos to control the game through beating and clapping - a sort of hand-driven version of PlayStation 2's popular Dance Dance Revolution, which uses a touch-sensitive mat.Parrin Kaplan, vice president for marketing and corporate affairs at Nintendo of America, noted that while young children may be able to play Donkey Konga games, the bongos were not specifically designed for them.Such distinctions mean little, though, to children like Alexander Nyiri.His father says the 4-year-old gamer has two items high on his Christmas list: a PlayStation 2 and a GameBoy.Mr. Nyiri said he believed his son was still a little too young for those systems. But the wish itself, he said, "is testimony to the power of gaming." original URL: http://www.goupstate.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20041028/ZNYT05/410280385/1051/NEWS01