For some reason, the Hard Rock Cafe is very concerned with teen gaming habits.
On the surface, there doesn’t seem to be a lot of overlap between gaming addiction and the Hard Rock Cafe’s usual fare of reasonable food with a classic rock flare. Dig a little deeper though, and it still doesn’t many any sense. But whatever–2019 didn’t make any sense, so why would 2020 start off with reasonable associations?
We’ll stick with the facts. Hard Rock International is pairing up with EduNetwork Partners and the Florida Council on Compulsive Gambling to create a resource “to help teens, parents and educators navigate digital, social gaming.” They’re also hosting a contest where teens make an advertising campaign to convince other teens to game responsibly.
The resource is GamePlanChallenge.com. There, you’ll find a bunch of stuff related to gaming responsibly. The site seems to take particular interest in gaming addiction, whereby a person becomes so consumed with a game that they start forgetting about school, friends, and everything else. It’s a real problem that’s also related to gambling addiction, whereby the gambler just keeps going for “one more round” only to find they’ve lost their entire savings.
Gaming has its own gambling problem when it comes to loot boxes. The site explains the differences between loot boxes and games and gambling in real life and challenges teens to spot the differences.
As for the contest, The Game Plan Challenge is open to all students aged 13 to 18 in the United States. Entries are accepted on GamePlanChallenge.com until February 3rd. Students will need to create a campaign that explains the dangers of social gaming and gambling in either video, social media, or print formats.
Entries can be from individuals or teams of 2-4 people. Winners will be announced March 4th with 5 grand prizes worth over $2,000. Grand prizes include a new guitar, amp, headphones, and t-shirts from the Hard Rock Cafe. There’s also 15 runners-up prizes worth $250 that includes wireless earbuds and a hoodie.
Now that we’ve looked at it, this all seems like a way to try to convince kids to game less and take up music as a hobby. If they don’t, the Hard Rock Cafe might need to rebrand itself in the next 20 years or so. Maybe the Fortnite Cafe?
Source: GamePlanChallenge.com
