Brain Quest: It's Fun to be Smart!
May. 3rd, 2010 10:10 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chuckroBrain Quest is an edutainment game aimed specifically at 3rd and 4th graders. I pulled it out of a used game bin at I-Con and paid a whopping $5 for it, mostly on a whim.
If "Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader" was concentrated more on actual knowledge and less on gotcha questions, it would be this game. The "Quest Mode" plays out as a series of fetch questions between zoo workers, each one requiring you to go through a round of questions in one category to pick up the item, and another round in a different category to drop it off. Apparently my knowledge of 4th-grade material hasn't changed much since then: I'm still very good at mental arithmetic, rules of English grammar, and science trivia; and still rather weak on geography and history. (My knowledge of sports rules and general trivia has improved dramatically, however.) I suspect that I would have found this game fairly challenging but fun (at least, the sections I was good at) had it existed 20 years ago.
Heck, if anything, my biggest problem has been the fact that I read the Little House books in 3rd grade and remember virtually no details. They are apparently expected reading for 4th graders, as the game is assuming I just read them. Well, okay, I also had problems every time there was a question about flags, because apparently I'm useless at identifying any flag that isn't the USA, Canada or Israel.
This sort of game is interesting to play as an adult just to see how much you've retained from what you were supposed to have learned in elementary school. I suspect I wouldn't do nearly as well at a "Brain Quest: GRE level" nowadays, as there's probably a lot of my high school education that has faded from lack of use.
I may or may not pick this up again as a random time-waster. Overall, Professor Layton was better at actually exercising my brain. I might end up playing more of the Sudoku mode, though--there's something like 400 puzzles of various difficulties programmed in.
If "Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader" was concentrated more on actual knowledge and less on gotcha questions, it would be this game. The "Quest Mode" plays out as a series of fetch questions between zoo workers, each one requiring you to go through a round of questions in one category to pick up the item, and another round in a different category to drop it off. Apparently my knowledge of 4th-grade material hasn't changed much since then: I'm still very good at mental arithmetic, rules of English grammar, and science trivia; and still rather weak on geography and history. (My knowledge of sports rules and general trivia has improved dramatically, however.) I suspect that I would have found this game fairly challenging but fun (at least, the sections I was good at) had it existed 20 years ago.
Heck, if anything, my biggest problem has been the fact that I read the Little House books in 3rd grade and remember virtually no details. They are apparently expected reading for 4th graders, as the game is assuming I just read them. Well, okay, I also had problems every time there was a question about flags, because apparently I'm useless at identifying any flag that isn't the USA, Canada or Israel.
This sort of game is interesting to play as an adult just to see how much you've retained from what you were supposed to have learned in elementary school. I suspect I wouldn't do nearly as well at a "Brain Quest: GRE level" nowadays, as there's probably a lot of my high school education that has faded from lack of use.
I may or may not pick this up again as a random time-waster. Overall, Professor Layton was better at actually exercising my brain. I might end up playing more of the Sudoku mode, though--there's something like 400 puzzles of various difficulties programmed in.
Be Afraid
Date: 2010-05-06 12:16 am (UTC)Glad I'm still smarter than you are.
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