"I have friends who have boyfriends or boys who come in to have sex," says Jana, 7, about some classmates who play on Roblox, a popular online video game platform that also allows users to program and play games created by themselves or other users. According to the company's latest reportThe platform continues to grow: by the end of 2025, it had 144 million daily users, who had dedicated 78.6 billion hours to the game throughout the year. This figure would be equivalent to the entire population of Catalonia (around 8 million people) playing Roblox 24 hours a day for more than a year.

There are several ways to invent a game. Some start by choosing a theme, such as a historical event, making fruit smoothies, or witch hunts. Others begin with the game mechanics: such as trying your luck, collecting items, rolling dice, and choosing the best results.

Days of wishes, smiles, and surprises are coming, and for parents, grandparents, and aunts and uncles, days of nerves and often, not knowing what to choose from so many options. We've put together a carefully curated selection ofevolutionary toys which guarantee many hours of play and a wide selection of toys to choose from, depending on their interests. There are also options designed for children with special needs. Four key points to understand this guide:

Just a few months ago, Gerard Ribas managed to break into one of the most prestigious lists for board games, the German Spiel des Jahres (Game of the Year), which annually recognizes the best board games in the world. In this case, the award recognized him in the children's category. Thanks to his game Island in sight, it reached a ranking in which two more games from our home team had already debuted, Sherlock –co-created by Martí Lucas and Josep Izquierdo– and Baobab, by Josep Maria Allué.

The essence of the game is free playThat is, being able to decide who you want to play with, what you want to play, and when you want to play. And for this to be possible, it is necessary for adults to value play—which is not only a vital activity for children, but also a right recognized by the Convention on the Rights of the Child—and to provide the necessary conditions: time, adequate space, playmates, and autonomy to do so. Play is a source of physical and mental well-being, of learning, and has a positive impact on children's development. But the point is to play for play's sake. Play is a pleasurable activity in which the process is more important than the results. Productive lives, consumer activities, and other tasks and responsibilities that we adults have seem to extend into childhood, and we are gradually forgetting that children up to the age of 17 are still children and have the right to play. In fact, for 10- and 11-year-olds in Barcelona, ​​​​one of the areas of their lives that has been rated the lowest since 2017 is the amount of free time: half of them think they don't have enough.

A few days ago we were listening to an episode of the podcast Stabbing pains dedicated to one of the four elements: the earth. They mentioned a lovely exercise that a university professor posed to her students: Observe what they stepped on for an entire week.