in what may be somewhat more of a hot take, i would argue that there is an incredible amount of educational value to be found even within the most meritless garbage games as they are still fundamentally systems to be dissected and solved and learning the maximally efficient way to do something worthless is a skillset that transfers quite handily to the valuable things in life. also unlike tv, games have a lot of potential to be immensely collaborative [or competitive] and social. some of my fondest childhood memories were going to my friend's house and co-oping diablo with one of us controlling the mouse and the other controlling the keyboard. there are many far less ad-hoc ways for kids to share games and even singleplayer is a highly rewarding shared experience.
in what may be somewhat more of a hot take, i would argue that there is an incredible amount of educational value to be found even within the most meritless garbage games as they are still fundamentally systems to be dissected and solved and learning the maximally efficient way to do something worthless is a skillset that transfers quite handily to the valuable things in life. also unlike tv, games have a lot of potential to be immensely collaborative [or competitive] and social. some of my fondest childhood memories were going to my friend's house and co-oping diablo with one of us controlling the mouse and the other controlling the keyboard. there are many far less ad-hoc ways for kids to share games and even singleplayer is a highly rewarding shared experience.