Nintendo Switch advice

[BernadetteRostankowskiWolowitz]

Ds is after a Switch for his birthday (November). He will be 7. He has a Kindle Fire, which is coming up 8 years old (used to be DH's). It is laggy, cracked, and the parental controls are ok, but not as good as on other devices we own. The range of apps is not as good.

Weve been putting it off for a year due, in no small part, to the price. It's ridiculous. However I need to accept that as he grows, he will choose items for his birthday that are more expensive than they were when I was young.

I know nothing about them. Is the range of games (both physical and apps) good? Do I have to attach a credit card (if so it will be an immediate no).

Are the parental controls good? Can I plug in headphones?

Switch or Switch lite?

He has been warned in advance that if he gets the switch there will be little to nothing else to open on the day.

Adding to my voice about how good the switch is. It got us through lockdown with our DS. The parental settings are easy, my loves the Pokémon and Mario games the most, he likes Mario maker where he can make the levels which he gets us to play. We also have animal crossing which I am slightly addicted too.

We've very little tech for under-13s in this house.
But Switch is great. Some of the games are great. There's a Dance one that I love

The parental controls are very good; I can remotely extend or stop their time!

Now, they can essentially ignore it - an annoying alarm plays but my 2 younger ones can tune it out.

Broadly they stick to their limits tho. Mine play FIFA 99% of the time. We use actual games not online ones which use up the space quite quickly.

They also don't connect with friends online. Probably would have been great in lockdown but I just didn't get around to it.

Great in car journeys.

Get extra handsets so useful for having friends over etc

Mine play mostly through TV. I like that as I can keep an eye.

Mine fight fairly regularly eg when playing FIFA. It gets frustrating & often they lose it for a day or so.

Definitely worth the purchase.