edutainment- the status quo

upon playing my 8 year old brothers new birthday present, where in time is carmen sandiego? it struck me.

what the hell happened to edutainment? i remember the first computer my family got had an interactive encyclopedia that had a little video box with patrick stewart giving little speeches here and there. it was definitely a novelty at the time, but it made me want to learn. playing where in time recently made me realise the importance of edutainment in its modern context. for a recent example, i suppose millionaire or the ps2 version of trivial pursuit could apply, but considering how shit they actually sell, its more of a novelty.
people can postulate lots of theories about why this has become somewhat of a lost art, but i would put it as a testament to the growing influence of kids (western) on their parents, or rather their parents wallets. back in the day of kid pix and carmen sandiego, our parents bought us the games and we played them contentedly. nowdays the parents are generally ignorant of what their kids are playing, and are limited to following such requests as 'i want halo 2 for xbox' and either complying or not. im linking censorship with an ignorance of technology here, and the accumulating weakness of parents. but this isnt without its justification- in a free market, what youre willing and able to pay for, you get. so since edutainment seems to have declined, or at leastin the mainstream market, and gamers are not getting too much older it follows my idea that the forced edutainment regimes of parents have declined greatly.
i would personally like to see some more development with computer edutainment, but i seem to be the minority in this case. suck for me. why doesnt anybody like learning anymore? maybe its a lot more fun to steal cars, shoot people and drive around south central in an armoured tank. maybe.
did u know
-the first novel ever written was called tales of genji by Shikibu Murasaki
- the days of the week as we know them are derived from norse (scandinavian) mythology like wodins day, thors day etc.
thats why everbody should play carmen sandiego- really its the shit
marC