Dublin City Public Libraries held its first Games Night in the new Youth Zone in Coolock Library on Monday, September 16th. Youth Zones are now active in the libraries of Cabra, Ballymun and Coolock. The facilities are popular with all users who appreciate the comfortable seating, the extra study space and the new stock of books, magazines, music CDs and DVDs. Each Youth Zone has a Playstation 3 games console. Serious studies have shown that children acquire skills of speed, dexterity, mental agility and fast decision making while absorbing and integrating a lot of information very quickly. In a world of instant communication and information overload these are hugely valuable skills.
Planning for games night began a few weeks in advance of this date. Coolock Library liaised with Gamestop gaming shop in the Omniplex Shopping Centre in Santry, who agreed to take part in the event and to provide prizes. Following agreement on the date and time of this event, Sphere 17 a local drop-in centre for teenagers were contacted and invited to attend and participate.
On the night of the event 20 teenagers attended and 16 of them participated in the tournament. All were very enthusiastic and the chosen game for the evening was Soul Calibre, a two player animated game involving bouts of combat. The participants used wireless gaming controllers and the action took place on the 46 inch LCD television in the Library’s Youth Zone. As the tournament progressed prizes were presented to the participants who were knocked out in each of the rounds. The overall winner and the runners up had their phone number and console type noted so that Gamestop could provide each of them with a new game which would be compatible with their own gaming console.
Public Notices to warn library customers that normal levels of noise expected in the library would be elevated at the time and date of the event were designed (See attached Poster). These posters were then put up around the library a week in advance of the event. Leaflet versions of the posters were placed at the issue desks. Two elderly borrowers commented on the noise levels of the teenagers during the event however they also said that they thought it was great to see teenagers being part of the library service and enjoying themselves.
The teenagers want the Games Night to be a monthly event. It seems likely that the numbers will grow as word spreads. Games Nights will be even more exciting when we can offer inter-Youth Zone competitions via the Internet.
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