Educational Mini-Game Review x4!

Free Rice! is a fun little Quiz game that rewards the player with the donation of Rice through the World Food Programme. The game doesn't seem to have a specific target age group, but I would guess somewhere around the over fifteen crowd due to some vocabulary words that are not used very often until the High School/College level. The designers are attempting to teach the player meanings of word, basic interface interactivity, and that a single person can make a difference in the world. The last point, of course, is more conceptual, but nevertheless does not take anything away from the user experience. I feel the game is successful through an education standpoint in that it teaches you definitions to words you may not regularly encounter. I would say the game could be improved by have different quiz categories, but on second look I noticed you can change the quiz topics to different subjects. 4/5.

Pirates of the Preamble, oh my . . . A quiz based game with the premise that Pirates have buried the Preamble to the constitution in ten separate states. It asks questions dealing with civic knowledge and the constitution in order for you to find the missing pieces of the Preamble. Interesting premise, horrible game. I believe this may be helpful in a High School Civics or American History class, possibly, but some of the facts are really pointless and obscure. History buffs may enjoy it, but I had to restart about 6 times before completing the 10 questions. It could be improved by creating some type of meaningful play/reward other than just seeing a piece of the Preamble appear on the side of the screen. Oh yeah, the Pirate "accent" was also incredibly annoying. 1/5

Medical Mysteries is a game designed for people who care about science, obviously, and playing spinoffs of classic games in a "scientific" setting. I'd imagine the target age group would be High School and up, and it attempts to teach the player the different types of agents that can cause illness/disease, that this information is crucial to learn because of the premise, and that it is important to shoot the right cure at infectious agents falling from the sky. Yeah, I am being completely serious, I hated this game, and I feel like they ripped off George Lucas' droids. 1/5

INNOV8 2.0 (Created by IBM) is an educational simulation game comprised of 3 mini-games. Smart Traffic, Smart Supply Chain, and Smart Customer Service. I played Smart Traffic, in which you help a city lower congestion and pollution levels by using Business Process Management. The target age group put around the College level because it takes a good bit of logic and reasoning in order to balance different planning goals. The concepts being taught are action/reaction based and the delicate balance between cost and efficiency with traffic control. I really loved this game and I'm going to continue playing it! 5/5