Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time

It's my favorite video game! I love it! I have played it over and over again so many times, and now my oldest son Darien is playing it through for the first time. It's funny to watch! He is doing it all by himself with out any help or hints from me. He finished the Dodongo's cavern yesterday... for the third time (he kept forgetting to save the game, because he is so use to auto saving games). He knows where most things are because he has watched me play it so many times, and even though he knows I won't tell him where to find anything else, he still asks. The other day he was in the Kokiri Village gathering up all of the chickens for the little red haired girl and he only had one chicken left, but he couldn't find it. "Mom I can't find where that last chicken is." (and no response from me) "Is it near the windmill?" (and no response from me) "Should I go and look there?" (once again no response from me). He ended up just giving up on the chickens altogether. Zelda is one of those games where you need to think and figure your way though it, and sometimes you have to do it by trial and error, and I told him it's better if you do it by yourself, after all I had to my first time around.

This makes me think of the time I only let my kids play old games (to teach them a lesson, so to say). This happened about a year ago. I was cleaning up the living room when I noticed a broken game. It must have gotten left out and then stepped on. With most games costing $50, needless to say I was not happy. All they had to do was put it away and this would have ever happened. So I did what any mom would have done. I took away the video games, for 3 weeks. Then I did something out of the ordinary... After the 3 weeks I told them that they could only play the games that were on the system already. (we have a wii, and I was referring to the games that were downloaded from the wii shop). The only games they could play were... Mario Kart 64, Super Mario 3, Donkey Kong Country, and Bubble Bobble (I know I'm really mean). I told them that now they don't have to worry about leaving these games out, because they don't come out. This went on for another 3 weeks... Darien and Nathaniel gave up after some time, because "the games are too hard," but Zachary was the only one determined enough to master some of them, and that was funny, and made the other two even more mad. I think it did them good to have to go through that. It showed them how easy they have it now days with their auto save, and 3D adventures. Lucky kids!