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| IMAGE COURTESY OF: TINA PHILLIPS / FreeDigitalPhotos.net |
One day I was walking along the street not so far from our home, looking forward I can see children jumping by means of rope or jumping next to stone thrown in the ground with line of chalk. It seems the traditional games, the legacy of old times for us were buried in oblivion. Have these youngsters really forgotten these alfresco games?, such as Hopscotch, Skip rope, Home run, Hide and seek, Spinning top, Rock-Paper-Scissors (also known as "Roshambo"), Jianzi, Jump over the cow and Jumping over thorns . Only few of these traditional games I used to play when I was a kid, When my grandmother did not allow me to go outside, I escaped and ran going to
the opposite direction of our home wherein my playmates were waiting for me, sometimes I caught myself still playing even the sun begins to fall below the horizon, I voluntarily went home because I'm sure my grandparents are pretty worried about me.
As time goes by, quite a few things probably make changes to what they habitually do, the modern technology plays tremendous role to influence the today's youth, many of them follow the latest trend, if someone has this, he/she must also have that. What a youngster sees to his/her fellow youngsters will do the same thing, till the number of modern game enthusiast expanding continuously, the few examples are these modern gaming consoles: Playstation 2 (PS2) /PSP by SONY, XBOX by MICROSOFT and Wii by NINTENDO.
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| IMAGE COURTESY OF: ARVIND BALARAMAN / FreeDigitalPhotos.net |
If we will go back from the past, there were many gaming consoles spread even in early 70's, mid 80's, early and late 90's, there are: Magnabox Odyssey, Philips Odyssey, Bally Astrocade, Intellivision II,Sega SG-1000, Sega Master System (II & III), Nintendo Entertainment System (Famicom), Sega Genesis, Super Famicom, Playstation, Sega Neptune and many more. Let's include the 2 of my favorite gaming consoles such as Nintendo Gameboy and Tamagotchi, a hand-held, egg-shaped, digital pet created in Japan. Aside from gaming consoles, another games play by gaming enthusiast are those brought by computer (Online and Local Area Network Games) such as: Real Time Strategy (RTS)-Warcraft III_Reign of Chaos, First Person Shooter (FPS)-Call of Duty/Resident Evil, Role Playing Game (RPG)-Dragon Age Origins, Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game (MMORPG)- World of Warcraft at Massively Multiplayer Online First-Person Shooter (MMOFPS)-Planetside. The list will not be complete without those games
brought by social networking sites like Facebook, there's Farmville play even by older ones, Pet Society and many more.
The difference between yesterday and today, before, even many gaming consoles spread globally, the youngsters were still patronizing the traditional games, the street games that are not only amuse them but also help them remain physically fit and ameliorate their social intercourse. In my humble opinion, the parents can help their children in order to bring their interest back to traditional games through encouragement and guide. The traditional games are not only legacy but also reflecting our rich culture.
