My first games console was a Spectrum, do you remember those? They took tapes which after about 2 hours of whirring and squeaking would allow you to play a game of Manic Miner until it froze and you had to start the process again. Gosh those were the days – huh!

We thought it was pretty amazing a few years later when consoles like the Sega Master System and SNES came out. 8 bit graphics and endless rounds of Sonic The Hedgehog on the former while the latter played host to Super Bomber Man and Mario Kart. I remember playing for hours on these at about aged 12 and we thought they were absolutely amazing but by the time 64bit consoles came out a few years later I was well and truly past the ‘gaming’ stage and since then have never re-visited.

I’ve been aware of it all going on, some of our friends are very into playing Fifa rather seriously but playing on a games console just hasn’t been a part of my adult life and since having children they’ve not been terribly interested either up to this point. But… This may have all changed since we were invited to a Kids Showcase this past weekend by PlayStation.

I’ve been waiting for the children to show some interest but I guess perhaps they’ve been a little young until now so I wasn’t sure how Florence and her pal would take to the PlayStation games at the party? Would she be interested at all? Would she be able to play them if she was? I was intrigued as I was about her age all those years ago (30 if you’re wondering) that I used to play (or rather wait and try to play) on my Spectrum and I used to love that so would Florence feel the same about the (far cry from the Spectrum) new PlayStation which is apparently slimmer than every before!

She said ‘I don’t know how to use this’ and looked very trepidatious about it which is uncharacteristic for her. She was nervous and although she could see all the other children playing away, I think she felt a little self concious not understanding how this new piece of equipment worked. Florence is a whizz with her iPad and found the controller rather alien but within probably only a couple of minutes she had it mastered and sat down to a game of Tricky Towers (which is rather like Tetris only instead of fitting the blocks together you have to build a tall tower without any of the unbalancing). She LOVED it!

Her and her pal, feeling more confident having played on one game already, visited the next game, then the next, then the next and they went around the room getting more and more excited about them. She particularly liked ‘Skylanders’ which judging by the graphics I wouldn’t have guessed with ‘Little Big Planet’, ‘Lego Dimensions’ and ‘Minecraft’ being her favourites.

I think she may not have been interested before now because I’m not particularly interested so where would she get the idea from but now that she’s had a taster? Well, I’m sure she won’t forget. There were helpful PlayStation fairies on hand to help with the working of each game which was mega helpful to us as clearly I haven’t moved much on from my own childhood when it comes to this sort of thing and these days everything is instant, real looking and absolutely full of colour. I can’t help but wonder what I’d have thought if someone had shown me this back in 1986? It would have probably made me just as excited as Florence is!

I spoke to the guys at PlayStation as Florence enjoyed the games and though I could see she was excited and loving every second I was still in two minds about whether it would be something she would need to have at home right now. I wondered if she might still be a little young but then after the information i was given I’m starting to change my mind.

So you can turn roaming off, I had no idea? I assumed games consoles like this could be quite dangerous for such little ones as you hear about being able to chat to other people on line as you play and I really don’t like that idea but… You can turn this function off. This sounds great!

You can also use it as a streaming device for the TV, play music through it like a Sonos speaker and just surf the net (if your Mummy lets you of course) too. So… There’s more to this than meets the eye and it’s becoming more and more appealing I have to say.

The games don’t have to be expensive either and actually quite a lot of them are downloadable which is great for not having loads of truck around. I’m seriously considering buying one as a gift for the whole family to share this Christmas because it does seem to do so much more than play games.

They come with two controllers and if you shop around there are some terrific deals so… Perhaps this could be just the Christmas present!

We had a great time at the party and Florence has been chatting to me about PlayStation and how much she likes it ever since. I’m sure her brother and Daddy would feel exactly the same way!

I’ll keep you posted but it’s definitely on our Christmas list this year!

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