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Toys come and toys go, but figurines, sometimes also called dolls or action figures, have achieved permanence in several cultures. The popular brands may change like fads or find themselves recycled with the passing generations but they are always there. GI Joe, Barbie, and Playmobile are stand-bys, and the Imaginext series of play sets is a current offering in stores. One of the Imaginext themes is a medieval castle with knights and dragons. Battle Castle is a tie-in game where players complete a series of mini-games to defeat an evil foe and become king of the land. Each mission in the game requires the player to start with a character and travel across each mission map, completing a number of the mini-games to earn mission success. The mini-games include dueling, prison rescue, castle defense, and castle liberation. Dueling is where the playerﾒs knight fights opponents in swordfights. The duels are basically a matter of marching your knight to the opponent and then pressing the attack key as fast as you can until you beat down the enemyﾒs armor. Thereﾒs little to no strategy involved. Prison rescue is a little better, with the player guiding the knight through a basic side-scrolling platform exercise. Castle defense involves traversing the top of a castle wall and pushing away the assault ladders the enemy ogres put against the wall to climb it, and castle liberation is a variation on the classic shooting gallery. This GamerDad found the mini-games to be simple and repetitive and predicted the kids would tire of the game rapidly. The graphics are plain and lack depth. The difficulty level is low but the game balance is off enough that combined with interface inconsistencies, I felt it would be hard for children to get into the game. For example, the main interface uses the mouse. The main world navigation and most of the mini-games use the arrow keys and space bar as the interface to movement and action. But the castle liberation game switches to the mouse to aim and fire. Iﾒm not sure why keyboard and mouse support were not enabled for all the games. I ran Battle Castle by three children. My son, who just turned four, and two of my nieces, ages five and eight. They thought it was a great game, which just goes to show you that this veteran reviewer can misfire as badly the next guy. The game elements I found simplistic and repetitive they found approachable and familiar. The fact that a fair range of ages and sexes in my test group found Battle Castle interesting speaks well of its general appeal. Missions start out easy enough that even playing poorly, youngsters can have early success. However, later missions proved difficult enough that the children did need my guidance. By the second half of the game we were effectively teaming up to play, with me handling the movement keys, and the kids pressing the action button. This teamwork proved quite inspiring to them and playing Battle Castle ended up being a great family activity. Nothing wrong with that, but if you are looking for an activity appropriate for the kids to play alone when the parents need a break, Battle Castle likely wonﾒt be the best choice for kids younger than six. I sloughed through all twenty six missions and donﾒt see how anyone else could have kept interest since the missions change little except to require different number of the mini-games for completion. There are a few elements that help, such as the special quests that can yield new armor and swords and new vehicles like horses or magic coaches, but while this adds a basic role-playing feel, itﾒs pretty superficial. As your armor increases, so does that of the enemy knights. As your sword becomes more powerful, so do those of the opponents. The new shields you can acquire appear to be useless except as cosmetics. The kids, however, didnﾒt know any better, and liked the variety of equipment. The vehicles on the other hand do make a difference. The horseﾒs speed is an upgrade over your knightﾒs walking speed, and the battle wagon has a drill on the front that lets it dig through otherwise impassable mountains.  There is one last section of the game that Iﾒve noticed many games geared to children have. The castle design segment gives players a template for castle creation, and they can pick a basic floor plan and then add to it the various castle pieces they win from the mini-games. The castles are printable, and my test subjects all liked making the castles. I suppose veteran gamers would wish that the castle creation had a larger effect on the gameplay. For example, wouldnﾒt it have been nice to tour your castle creation like you get to ride your own roller coasters in Rollercoaster Tycoon or Sim Theme Park? Or get to see how defensible your designs are when put to the battle test like you could in Castles, the old Interplay classic. But perhaps thatﾒs asking too much of a game intended for five year old kids. Still, Iﾒm unconvinced Battle Castle is the best game for the buck. If you can only buy a few games, I believe there are better ones out there that can be just as entertaining and considerably more educational for the kids, and far more entertaining to the GamerParents out there. The gameﾒs track record with the kids canﾒt be denied, however, and they clearly enjoyed it. The package also comes with a knight figurine as a bonus. Kid factor: Battle Castle keeps things clean and free of gore and death. There is some violence in sword fighting and castle attacking, but in the case of the former the opponents raise their hands and surrender when their armor is depleted, and in the case of the latter the cannonballs you fire blast only other cannons and not any living beings. The castle defense activity has you pushing assault ladders off the castle wall before ogres can clamber up them. The ogres that fall presumably land harmlessly on their side of the wall, and the ones that get past you just jump down into the castle but donﾒt commit any violent acts on the castleﾒs denizens. There isnﾒt much educational value in Battle Castle, the usual expected bonus of games meant for youths, but it does seem to appeal to them and the controls, if inconsistent, are easy to use. Some content may be a concern for some parents: the game features concepts like magic and mythical beasts. Reviewer's Recommended Ages: 5+ ESRB: E - Everyone Developer: Knowledge Adventure Publisher: Vivendi Universal Reviewer: Bernard Dy Score: 3 stars 
Toys come and toys go, but figurines, sometimes also called dolls or action figures, have achieved permanence in several cultures. The popular brands may change like fads or find themselves recycled with the passing generations but they are always there. GI Joe, Barbie, and Playmobile are stand-bys, and the Imaginext series of play sets is a current offering in stores. One of the Imaginext themes is a medieval castle with knights and dragons. Battle Castle is a tie-in game where players complete a series of mini-games to defeat an evil foe and become king of the land.
Kid Factor by Bernie Dy
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