Monday, July 20, 2009

Humongous Entertainment

Back about 15 years ago there was a company called Humongous Entertainment which produced a series of computer games for kids. Little kids, I should say. Their target audience was kids aged 3-8. They had several series of games: Freddi the Fish, Putt-Putt, Fatty Bear, Pajama Sam, and Spy Fox. They also made Backyard Baseball, Football, etc. The sports ones eventually started being geared for older kids, but the others were just for young kids. The games fall into two categories: Junior Adventures and Junior Arcades. Junior Arcades are just boring arcade games. But the Junior Adventures are so much fun for a little kid. I know. I got them for Zaven when he was little. He loved those games. Then Caly did. And now Zoe does. In fact, when I dug them out for Zoe, Zaven and Caly started singing the theme songs.

You can download the games for free for a time-limited trial here. I think the trial is for a half hour. I'm not sure. You can probably download them for free to keep somewhere. But I have no idea where. And you can buy them at Amazon for about $10 each. My personal favorites are Putt-Putt Saves the Zoo and Fatty Bear's Birthday Surprise. Fatty Bear is fun because as you play the game you get a recipe for made-from-scratch chocolate birthday cake. Putt-Putt Saves the Zoo is fun because of the songs. They stick in your head. (We kept singing the Zoo, zoo, zoo song on the way to the zoo.) Anyhow, my kids love the games. They're very simple compared with modern games, but they're good ones. Non-violent, very simple to play, but they're designed to teach problem solving. I hope you enjoy the free trial. And be sure to click on the "topiary creatures" outside the zoo entrance to hear them sing my favorite song.

5 comments:

Tara said...

Thank you. I will send Rob on a finding mission. Games are his territory.

Unknown said...

We've played this game many times - once with my older son who is now 12 and now again with my younger son who is 4.

We used to love the topiary creatures song, but for some reason it doesn't play when you click on them anymore. Any ideas why?

liz said...

I was searching for a reason why I can't get the topiary creatures to play...so it's not just me?

But for some reason, the computer at my son's daycare does play the song...where my son saw it, and wants to play it at home.

If you just want to hear the song it's on YouTube, of course.

Unknown said...

The lack of the 'topiary creatures' song in this game was noted as a bug and has been FIXED in the most recent version of Scummvm! :D Yay!

liz said...

Sweet! Must download newer version then.