Yet this intuitive design also encouraged the development of other games. These games eschew the normal format of games we would expect, instead encouraging players to develop and improve every day, useful skills.
Whether it’s spelling, cooking, mental capabilities or even drawing, here are a few examples for your DS. If you don’t own one, this might be the best time to get yourself such a device, as there are plenty of ways to both buy and sell DS online.
Scribblenauts
Although it’s now moved onto the Wii U, the two Scribblenauts games for the original DS are still worth picking up. Whilst the goal of collecting the star is simple, these games challenge you to do it creatively. As long as you know the word (and in the second game, adjectives), you can more or less create it; the perfect way to improve your vocabulary.
The fun in Scribblenauts is all down to the words that you know. The game encourages creativity and unique ideas, so those with a bigger vocabulary well benefit more, whilst others will simply find themselves learning new words and mastering new parts of the English language.
Cooking Guide
Whilst Cooking Mama would be an obvious example, you can’t over look the likes of Cooking Guide. This game, if you can call it that, does exactly what it says it is. The game has plenty of cooking guides and recipes to help anyone be creative and improve their cooking.
It also has other features, such as being able to search by ingredient, so you can use what you have on hand rather than what the game would otherwise tell you to use. Cooking is something many do, but not everyone enjoys, so having a little electronic assistant in the kitchen is a welcome form of help for many.
Brain training
The game that inspired a lot of other ‘self-training’ as well as More Brain Training, offered plenty of small, yet fun, puzzles and challenges. These increased in difficulty and encouraged the brain through repetition and reward.
Yet the small-time frame of each individual game kept people focused, improving their mental skills whilst being fun at the same time. The challenge adds game play elements and a competitive goal to beat your own score, yet this in turn encourages children to get your brain working and improve your cognitive skills along the way.
Art Academy
Whilst drawing isn’t an everyday skill, it’s something many like to do throughout the day, getting better where they can. Art Academy offers just that, using the stylish to help guide and improve people to draw better and learn some of the finger techniques.
I try to express my belief that, although still a form of entertainment, gaming can have a lot of benefits on people’s lives. This is something I stress in my blogs, highlighting the good that gaming can cause, showing others the right products and examples and how to buy, sell and recycle DS and old consoles online.
