The Land Before Time: Early Learning Adventure review

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Verdict:

Mindscape's latest offering is an endearing educational game full of cute prehistoric creatures designed to help kids become PC-savvy.

Review Date: 16 Mar 2005

Price when reviewed:

Reviewed By: Jane Postans

Our Rating 5 stars out of 5

Review
Specs

With dinosaurs having become extinct millions of years ago, you wouldn't have thought they'd make the best of teachers.

But these aren't any ordinary dinosaurs, these are prehistoric chums of the cute and animated variety - a close encounter of the warm and fluffy kind.

The game takes its cute characters from the series of Land Before Time movies and is jam-packed with fun educational activities. Littlefoot, a baby dinosaur, and his prehistoric pals guide us through the various games on offer. And just in case young players aren't confident readers, Littlefoot gives clear spoken instructions as to what must be done to complete activities, and even offers hints and tips along the way.

There's plenty here to keep a young child amused for hours. Along with fairly standard activities - like making pictures using click and drag templates and creating character greetings cards - the raft of other activities on offer includes making music using a variety of backing tracks, matching shapes and sounds to make the dinosaurs dance and playing a board-style game to get the characters back home to their valley. There's even a worryingly addictive pinball game. All the games are simple to control and are accompanied by a great soundtrack and crisp, colourful graphics. As a bonus for completing activities, kids are rewarded with cartoon clips of their dinosaur friends in action.

All the games are suitably challenging for children aged four to six, and will help to develop crucial early PC skills like clicking/dragging and using the keyboard. Most importantly, kids will also have fun along the way. It's also nice to come across an educational game that's clearly designed with home use in mind. With high production values and providing good value for money, this is an all-round family treat.

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