Hamsters aren’t great for playing with, they are fast and naturally want to hide
Completely disagree with this, particularly with Syrians, assuming you learn to handle them properly. We’ve had four male syrians, males being easier than females, and they’ve all, with the right handling, become extremely tame, easy to handle, lovely little pets.
You can get a large shallow storage box and pop him in it to play and handle, after a few quiet days settling, start by gently handling for just a few minutes each day, hand feed treats such as peanuts, sunflowers seed, timothy hay, apple, broccoli, cucumber and gradually build up.
Kaytee clean & cozy or Carefresh is the best bedding by far, much better and more hygienic than shavings and easy to spot clean.
Ours have been happiest in a big cage, with natural style accessories - log house (ours is actually for guinea pigs but is a good size for a grown male Syrian, from Zooplus) coconut house, sticks to gnaw on, gnaw stone, log bridges and steps etc. They can also have the little vegetable dog chews, we get hedgehog shaped ones from Pets corner.
My dd1’s hammy will sit with her in the crook of her arm while she reads 😊 We’ve recently said goodbye to dd2’s (13) hamster at 2 years old as he had a mouth tumour, he was adorable and I was really sad to see him go.😢