Animal Genius combines wacky animal facts, entertaining fast-paced animal games, and photo-realistic graphics to make this into an outstanding video game for kids. Plus all directions, words and identifications have voice-overs so young kids who aren’t yet reading can play. It is rare to find a Nintendo DS game that talks to you.
The game is themed around earning 25 animals — five animals in each of five habitats. Kids select the rain forest, arctic, woodlands, ocean or grasslands and once there, the game offers them an animal to earn. Kids earn the animals by playing games to get points, with animals varying in cost from 25 up to 125 points.
Kids gain the points by repeatedly playing four fun games in any order they wish. In the game called “Scratch and See,” kids see a blank gray screen. By moving the DS stylus back and forth across the screen, kids “scratch” away part of the gray mask covering an animal underneath. Since kids will only see part of the animal, they must deduce which animal they are viewing from the traits they can see. The game then asks them to select the correct animal from a list of four.
The “Maze Munch” game lets children become a lion, a clownfish, a skunk or a chameleon that travels through a maze. When playing as the clownfish or the skunk, they need to gather food while avoiding predators. Playing as the lion may be a little disturbing to younger children because you chase zebras, pounce on them and devour them (no blood is shown, but you do hear a loud roar).
“Matchomatic” cleverly asks kids to match animals to specific traits such as the body coverings or the type of tail. Kids use the stylus to select an animal on the lower screen and then fling it up into one of two circles on the top screen showing the trait.
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