Trying to get my child to go out and run a bit with me, worked ok so far but I know it might get boring at some point.
So I was looking for any kind of children friendly app that either counts distance or steps just for a run, so not at all times, and then gives some kind of reward for that. Like a dog growing up or whatever, something ok for kids. Zombie run comes up often but I don’t think my child is into that, bit too scary maybe with the zombie theme.
Other apps I found are counting steps continously, or there are some elaborate minigames connected. I really don’t want my little one to spend more time on a screen, so thats not great either. Like Pokemon Go, not into Pokemon yet anyway but its too much aside from the actual running/walking.
Anybody got a good suggestion that goes in that direction?
I think the Pikmin bloom game possibly? It’s been a while since I played but I think that was more step oriented
I heard good things about zombiesrungame
Yeah if more people could read my post fully before answering… ;)
Zombies may be a bit to scary for my child, is a bit young and I didn’t mention that in the main post to be fair.
If the Zombies theme would be more like Plants vs Zombies, maaaybe?
It’s got all sorts of different storylines, some don’t even involve zombies. There’s a magic one, for example
I only know of an app that is currently under developement which turns walking into am old school rpg experience. Though I have no idea when it is to be released.
Looks a bit too complex for my kid to appreciate and get into it. Should have maybe said its for a 6 year old who is on the verge of learning how to read, but not a native English speaker.
You could try Ingress, it was the game that Niantic built Pokémon on top of.
Not sure if it would be interesting for a kid, would depend on how old they are. And requires a lot of screen time. You have to fight over locations on the map, it really motivates you to go to “just one more” location.
There is also an item in the game that produces items for you, but requires you to walk certain distances.
🤷🏻
A dog haha, but also good to get kids to be bored sometimes, boredom is important for future hobbies and projects, I got stuck on reddit for a good while and all my hobbies suffered because it was easier to pick up my phone and browse than to put in the effort to continue my hobbies
Yeah sure, but this is exercise. Which is good for health but certainly not too much fun when you run the same area a million times. So if some app would help keeping up interest in that, whatever.
You could try the Finch self care app. Haven’t used it myself and it’s not just for steps but looks like you might be able to use it for that?
If you can’t find an app, you could pretty easily gamify it yourself. Use any step counter app and at home you can set up a page with a chart that you add stickers to ever maybe 5p or 100 steps or so, and when you fill up the bar you unlock what’s inside, like an advent calendar? You could do things like dress up a stuffed animal, or have an egg hatch and print out pictures of it changing and growing, little speech bubbles of encouragement etc.
That could definitely be an emergency alternative if there is really nothing else, yes. I will look into the Finch app, have seen it scrolling through the Play Store but like you said, does not work directly with steps. Maybe can do that indirectly though. Thanks for suggestions!
