While all eyes may be on Sony's newest machine, the Playstation 4 as we head into Christmas, there's still life in Sony's reliable Playstation 3 yet. With this year's line-up offering a huge range of games that are perfect for a wide variety of age groups, from the young, to the young at heart, and everyone in between, if it's a game you're looking to buy, there's certainly plenty of options out there.
But when it comes to buying Christmas presents for your family, buying games hasn't always been as easy as it should be. While PEGI ratings give you a rough idea about the content, they don't tell you whether the game's any good - or whether your child will be able to manage it. That's why we've put together the PS3 Family Christmas Gift Guide, a selection of our recommended games for each age group that come complete with our seal of approval. So, whether you're looking for a game for yourself, your other half, or your children, why not choose an age from the categories below, and see what the PS3 has in offer?
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PS3 Christmas ideas for a 3-5 Year Old
Wonderbook: Walking With Dinosaurs
Wonderbook is a concept that's difficult to get across in words, but that quickly feels like magic to children. Making clever use of a camera and a special blue book (the titular Wonderbook), the game uses a technology known as augmented reality to make things look like they're happening in your living room. In Wonderbook: Walking with Dinosaurs, while you may have a boring blue book in your hands in real life, if you look at the TV you'll be holding a gateway to a Jurassic world. Making use of the Playstation Move controller, you'll hold out a branch to feed to a nervous dinosaur, chisel away at a rock to dig up fossilised bones, roar at the camera, and even swing the Move controller around as two dinosaurs engage in an epic battle. With plenty of educational content that explains how the dinosaurs would have lived (as you'd probably expect from the license), and an entertaining game tying it all together, this may be a little bit tense for the little ones at times (particularly during the fight scenes), but it's a great pick for those who like all things dinosaur.
Buy this if they like: Dinosaurs, Wonderbook, Digging things up
Buy Wonderbook: Walking with Dinosaurs from Amazon
Buy Walking with Dinosaurs Starter Pack from Amazon
Wonderbook: Book of Potions
Much like Walking with Dinosaurs, Wonderbook: Book of Potions makes use of the titular Wonderbook to turn your living room into a cauldron packed lair of toil and trouble plucked straight from the wizarding world of Harry Potter. As your Playstation Move controller becomes your wizard's wand, you'll be dicing ingredients, mushing them with your hammer, mixing potions, and casting spells as you get put through your wizarding paces in a quest for the elusive Golden Cauldron. With a Hogwarts themed storyline tying things together as you learn how to create and use a variety of concoctions, making frogs float around your living room, goo cover your TV screen, and eruptions of flame to shoot out of your Wonderbook, while it may be a bit complex for the youngest players, this is bound to go down a treat with Potter fans.
Buy this if they like: Harry Potter, Wizards and Witches, Cauldrons
Buy Wonderbook: Book of Potions from Amazon
Super Rub a Dub
An oldie but a goodie, Super Rub a Dub is a downloadable game that was released within a month of the Playstation 3's launch way back when in 2007 - and that means that many who bought the system more recently may not even be aware it exists. An easy to pick up and play game that puts you in control of a bath full of rubber duckies, it's up to you to make use of the motion sensors in the controller, as you tilt the pad to tilt the bath on screen in an attempt to float a rubber duckie around and collect all her ducklings, before guiding them safely back to the, er, plug hole in the middle of the bath. It may be a weird concept for a game, but it was one of the most accessible games available around the time of the PS3's launch, and still raises more than a smile today. While later levels quickly ramp up the difficulty, adding baths that have no sides, currents, and even sharks that chomp your duckies (although a quick shake of the controller can flip them over), little ones will have loads of fun on the first few levels of this - and with support for four player, pass the controller multiplayer, it's one the whole family can get involved with too. As a download exclusive, this one's only available from the Playstation Store for the bargain price of £3.99, although you'll either have to add a minimum of a fiver to your account through the store, or buy the credit below to get your hands on it.
Buy this if they like: Rubber Duckies, Motion controls, Dodging sharks.
