If you have a changes consoles such as an Xbox or PlayStation then you may well sign up to allow you to play online. Both consoles allow you to pay a monthly or annual subscription which gives you access to play online against other players. It often costs around £50 for the year but you can sometimes get it on special offer which brings it down to around £35. If you choose to pay monthly instead of annually then you will end up paying quite a bit more.

Not everyone realises that often with these subscriptions you also get other perks. This may include beta versions of games that you can download, special offer prices and even free games. The PlayStation Plus package for example allows to you download about three new games a month that they have put on offer. Each month there will be different game and you can pick and choose which one’s you want to download. Once downloaded you then own the game so even if they put the pride back up you will still have access to it through your online account and can download it to any devices that you are signed in on.

Children all over the world are filling up their Christmas lists with toys, gifts and games that they have had their eye on all year round. Every year there seems to be a certain toy or game that proves to be so popular that everyone wants to get their hands on it.

Games consoles are a popular Christmas present but the new ones such as the PS5 can be in excess of £500 often meaning that they are a shared present with other siblings. You may decide to get your children separate games that they can play on the consoles but if there is one you have your heart set on be sure to be quick about getting it before it runs out. There is nothing more frustrating than not being able to get hold of a copy of a game that was previously in stock but has suddenly become in high demand.

You may struggle to get it from high street stores or online retailers but you can still scourer Facebook market places and Gumtree / Ebay to see if they have copies. Keep going back and checking stock as shops are often having deliveries every day of new items.

There have been a number of different Nintendo DS models such as the original, the 2DS, 3DS or DS lite. These have now been superseded by the Nintendo Switch hand held consoles, but is there still a market for the DS. Although you cannot buy these new anymore, you can buy them second hand and still get the games for them. Overall, they are a good little console. They are not comparable to a tablet as although you can get the internet on them it is very slow and clunky to use. The graphics are not great but when you play the types of games that were designed for the DS you will realise that you don’t need to have superb graphics.

All Nintendo consoles tend to work in similar ways and the graphics tend to be very similar. If you look at the Nintendo Wii and the Nintendo Switch you will notice that they still have a lot of similarities.

The Nintendo DS is a great console and it is also very robust, so is good for you get children who may be more inclined to drop it. If you do opt for the 3D version be sure to check the recommended age and do not let them, go on it for too long.

Whether it’s computer or games console games or board games, you can often save quite a bit of money by buying second hand. It may be that your son or daughter has a games console and always seems to want new games. If they play on it a fair bit then you might find that they are completing the games within a few days or a week of buying them. Games for the newest PlayStation or Xbox are often priced around fifty to sixty pounds each so not cheap. If this is the case why not look at buying them second hand. Once a new game comes out is usually comes up to but second hand within a few weeks. To start with you may find that you don’t save a massive amount but if you buy games that have already been out for a year or so you can often more than half the price it retails at by choosing second hand.

Many people worry about buying second hand games if it is for a gift for a son or daughter or niece or nephew but often they do not mind as it may mean they can have something else instead if you are spending less on that one game.

Now a days tv programs and many games for children are in fact quite educational. Although it is not a great idea to allow your child to spend hours on their games console at a time, if you can persuade them to play certain games, at least you will know that they are getting some educational value from it. The game Animal Jam has been created by National Geographical. It allows the player to pick an animal and also a pet as its avatar. They can then move this character around the different worlds interacting with others and playing mini games to earn gems and sapphires. As the screen loads it shows you facts about the different animals. You can also go to different items in the game to find out more interesting facts. Because children are learning these in a fun way, they are more likely to remember.

Other games such as Minecraft can help teach your child about instructions and building. There are some great coding games out there based around the game Minecraft which allow your child to drag and drop elements of code in to place to make the characters carry out a set of instructions.