Are the Halo games suitable for 10 year olds?

[sphil]

Most of Ds1's (Yr 6) friends have at least one of the games. All the talk in the playground is Halo, all the games revolve around the game. Ds1 isn't particularly interested - he prefers role playing computer games - but is feeling increasingly isolated. One boy has started teasing him for not having the game or knowing much about it.

From the limited research I've done, I can see that it's a 16+, which puts me off from the start. DS says it's a shooting game, with some blood and swearing. Is it common for 10 year olds to be playing it?

If you paid any attention to my DS (13) then everyone is allowed to play these games from birth

Totally unsuitable IMO - my friends DS is 17 and showed me the game - tis very nasty

It is an incredibly graphic and very realistic game where the idea is to shoot and kill.

definitely not suitable for a 10 year old.

OlympicEater - I asked my 16 yr old nephew last night and he said they were fine! But my feeling is that the realism is just too intense.

DS is torn between his personal feeling that it's not suitable ( or particularly interesting) and the understandable desire to be one of the gang. He isn't one of the 'A List' boys in the class and is seen as a bit of a geek. In the last couple of years he's found a group of friends ( known privately and affectionately by the staff at school as 'the Lego Crew') that he gets on really well with. But with one exception all these boys are now obsessed with Halo!