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Question for parents or anyone that might know.


Importz2k9
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I have a 9 yr old son that is looking for friends around his age. The problem I'm having is that there is no way to tell someone's age. I am constantly accepting friends for him (parental control) only to find out they are 16 or older and then deleting them. I've already heard other kids cursing him out, kicking him from games and threatning him. (Thought live was supposed to be fun for them)..........right...

 

Is there any way through parental controls to only accept friend requests from kids his age? Or an age limit that can be set by me? I've looked everywhere on the console but can't find anything. I have him set on friends only for EVERYTHING. Anyone have any suggestions?

 

Thanks.

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I have a 9 yr old son that is looking for friends around his age. The problem I'm having is that there is no way to tell someone's age. I am constantly accepting friends for him (parental control) only to find out they are 16 or older and then deleting them. I've already heard other kids cursing him out, kicking him from games and threatning him. (Thought live was supposed to be fun for them)..........right...

 

Is there any way through parental controls to only accept friend requests from kids his age? Or an age limit that can be set by me? I've looked everywhere on the console but can't find anything. I have him set on friends only for EVERYTHING. Anyone have any suggestions?

 

Thanks.

 

I don't believe its possible to set age limits for friend requests. Can I ask what games your son is playing? If he's playing Call Of Duty types games it might be hard to find children around his age.

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Let him play any 18 rated game and it will be full of 9 year olds

 

am i rite guys haha

 

ok all joking aside there really isnt a way to tell. But having said that no matter what age gamer they play with they are going to be just the same. i mean some of the worst language and discussions i hear on the xbox is from kids in their early teens and younger.

 

best bet is to either just not let him add random people and let him add his real life friends or avoid it all together until they are a bit older. hes young and playing online just really isnt for kids its full of the worst people known to man and isnt all that pleasent.

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I have a 9 yr old son that is looking for friends around his age. The problem I'm having is that there is no way to tell someone's age. I am constantly accepting friends for him (parental control) only to find out they are 16 or older and then deleting them. I've already heard other kids cursing him out, kicking him from games and threatning him. (Thought live was supposed to be fun for them)..........right...

 

Is there any way through parental controls to only accept friend requests from kids his age? Or an age limit that can be set by me? I've looked everywhere on the console but can't find anything. I have him set on friends only for EVERYTHING. Anyone have any suggestions?

 

Thanks.

 

You could try and put his age and that his looking for friends his age, in his biography?

 

maybe it might work

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Unfortunately there's no way to filter them out by age.

The only thing I suggest doing is adding people you and your son know personally (I've done this before and it's worked out fine (: )

 

I've added family members and friends of mine that aren't complete dicks onto her gamertag. Nothing bad has come out of it so far.

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I let him play games like Forza, Gears, Halo, Crackdown, Splinter Cell ......... He's not allowed to play anything like Grand Theft Auto, Saint's Row or any games of that nature.

Occasionally I let him play MW2 and Left For Dead with friends or myself.

It's really hard to monitor sometimes because games can fool you. He's at the age where he doesn't want to play Kung Fu Panda anymore (because it's not cool) and wants to play what dad does. I try to test out every game first before letting him try it but that doesn't always work. The only other option that I can think of is to just take live away until he get's older, but that would really suck.

 

Thanks everyone for you're answers, I can only hope that MS see's this as a problem and can do something about it in the future. I've thought about writing to them but figure they won't give me the time of day.

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you could always just tell him to play online without friends. i mean they arent necessary to enjoy an online game.

 

Unfortunately, that's where all my problems began. It's like throwing a bleeding seal into shark infested waters. If it was up to me I wouldn't let him play online at all, but since i have to try and be fair..............well you know the rest.

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You could try and put his age and that his looking for friends his age, in his biography?

 

maybe it might work

I don't think that's a good route. Too many things can go wrong.

 

Honestly, I think the best route is just to have him game online with friends he already has irl. At that age, it can be really difficult to find others near his age online.

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Personally your 9 year old son should be playing outside, I think anybody who is under 13 should not be on a video game, and anybody who lets their child on the xbox is a bad parent because most do it for an easy life so they don't have the kid arguging, most kids under a certain age will be abused because of their voice I know some are ok and your kid may be the exception but still they will cuss you out with funny cuss words and will make annoying noises.

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Personally your 9 year old son should be playing outside, I think anybody who is under 13 should not be on a video game, and anybody who lets their child on the xbox is a bad parent because most do it for an easy life so they don't have the kid arguging, most kids under a certain age will be abused because of their voice I know some are ok and your kid may be the exception but still they will cuss you out with funny cuss words and will make annoying noises.

 

I think anyone over 13 should be able to punctuate a sentence properly - stop telling people how to parent sometimes its just not possible for a child to play outside.

 

Anyway, I say possibly play with him? Or best find out if his real life friends have Xbox?

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Well here is what I do, my son is only 5, he sometimes jumps on my console, but I throw him on a profile setup especially for him, with full parental control, and the account has no XBOX Live assigned to it, so no connection basically.

 

My daughter on the other hand, she is 12, and she is always asking to meet people on XBL to make friends with, her account is setup for XBL, but I refuse to buy her gold, as I feel she is too young to be playing in a male dominated sector, where most of the gamers are older. I let her play more or less any game I own, within reason, we did Saints Row 2 coop together over system link using mine and her console (bought second copy of the game) so I am fair with her, but when she starts moaning about XBL, that's when the iron hammer comes down!

 

I met her half way as her argument was she wanted avatar items, DLC, and the odd XBL game, so I made her account, but still declined her gold request. She recieved 4 weeks free gold when we signed up, and I let her online, on her account, but I took her headset away from her during this period, and setup full parental controls. Her account is also set to private in every way.

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Personally your 9 year old son should be playing outside, I think anybody who is under 13 should not be on a video game, and anybody who lets their child on the xbox is a bad parent because most do it for an easy life so they don't have the kid arguging, most kids under a certain age will be abused because of their voice I know some are ok and your kid may be the exception but still they will cuss you out with funny cuss words and will make annoying noises.

 

To be fair dude i started playing games at 3 and shock horror i also played outside. crazy i know but you can do both

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you know what would be better letting him pick for him self, if hes 9 im sure he can use a forum no worries and at that age you can pretty much tell who your going to get on with and who not so why not let him have a bit of freedom and he might be able to find kids his own age him self.

 

I can understand your worries but i know i wouldnt want my parents picking my friends then removing them from my list for me .

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The bottom line is, there not going to be a way to do it. Even if MS did add a "only allow me to add friends in *this* age range" feature, if you think about it, most of the profiles will be the parents, brother, or whatever, and a lot of people probably don't take the time to make it right.

 

My advice, such as it is, is that the only way to really know what he's getting into is to be there with him. This is true for all aspects of parenting, BTW, not just online gaming. There is NO way I'd turn my 9-year-old loose on any part of the internet without pretty close attention on my part.

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My only suggestion- be very active in their gaming activites. Unfortunately as others have already mentioned Xbox currently does not have an age filter.

 

I have a 9yr old and a 6yr old. Both don't play games that much but when they do it's either harmless Wii stuff offline or I am with them when they are playing Xbox online. The only friends they have on Xbox are those they know personally from school, or relatives. If I don't know the person then they are not going to be on their friends list... bottom line.

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not for nothing, but the games are rated M for a reason.... 9 year olds should not be playing gears halo or anyother game rated M,.....they are for older kids, so i see why this would be a problem....I would recommend sports games, racing games or Kinect.

 

and if you really want your kid playing those games, don't give them a mic or show their age in their profile...that would fix the cursing at him and what not.

Edited by nappster187
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