If you talk to the owner of a game arcade these days, he will tell you that the business is not as lucrative as it used to be. We all have in mind this glamorous image of the game arcade, with a beautiful display of flash games coming in different colors and shapes, one more appealing than the next. But things aren't what they used to be because it is now easier and cheaper to play free games online.



You can imagine the excitement of the children who used to gather the money they needed to go play a game at the arcade. You can even imagine a young couple going out on a date in a parlor where they could have fun just trying out all the flash games. The flash games do have something magical about them. They drag you out of the daily life giving the impression that you are in a huge Hollywood show or in a casino in Las Vegas. The flash games are meant to attract you towards them, to make you try them out, one by one, or at least to take a look at the others playing them. They have something of the magic of the roulette.

However, the game parlors are no longer what they used to be because they are no longer ?the only game in town?, so to speak. Nowadays we have the Internet which can provide anything. Playing games online means you can play all the games that you used to be able to find only in the parlors and some other new ones as well. If you have a computer with internet at home, you do not even have to get out of the house. You can find all the games online.

In fact, it is not just the fact that people do not have to go out of the house to play the games anymore. Playing games online is so appealing that it keeps people indoors. Apart from the children or teenagers who do not have a computer at home and are obliged to go to an Internet cafe to play games online, most people find it more appealing to stay at home and play the games online. Imagine yourself getting out of bed, preparing a breakfast and being able to enjoy the morning by starting to play the games online, without even having to get out of your pyjamas. Some people end up spending entire days and nights in front of the computer playing games online.

On the other hand, there are a lot of young people and children who go to the Internet cafes and spend entire days fascinated by the games online. They can do this because their parents are happy to get them out of the house and have a little peace and quiet. They get to spend their energy somewhere far from the ears of the tired family. So, leaving your children to play games online acts as some sort of modern baby sitter. The only question that remains to be asked (as a parent) is what that baby sitter will teach your child.

The great advantage for those who have the Internet at home (and I bet there are many) is that the games are now free games. As compared to the expenses at the game parlor, nowadays the Internet gives you free games of all kinds. All you have to do is pay for the Internet connection (and this is getting cheaper and cheaper by the day as more and more people get connected).

Free games can be found in many places on the Internet and all kinds of free games can be downloaded. For the parents who allow their children to spend time unsupervised in front of the computer thinking that they are just playing games it would be better to pay more attention which free games exactly are their children accessing.

Many of the free games contain violence and this is perhaps the most dangerous thing about the free games online. We call them free games because we do not have to pay money for them, but in fact these games come with a package. The free games can be paid for with the loss of the power of concentration of the children, in the best case. If the children spend too much time in front of the computer playing these amazing free games, they may literally end up being brainwashed, in the sense that the extended exposure to the kind of video and audio stimuli offered by the free games can lead to serious memory loss.

However, there are also positive aspects as well. Children can learn what a competition means. They can learn how to lose or win, how everything they want has to be earned through work, patience and perseverance. The physical aspect involves a development of reflexes and, sometimes, even focusing can improve. It is up to the parents and to the children to decide which of the many games online should be played.

We grew up with arcade games and our children will grow up with free games online. It si nothing weird about that. It should make us happy that they have opportunities we never had. They can learn from their experiences playing games online and it up to us to guide them to the best and healthiest offers.