LEGO Creator
© 1998 LEGO Software
Children love creating with LEGOs because it's so easy to succeed— just put together a few pieces and you've got yourself a house. Grab a few more and you can make a skyscraper. The kids are in control and limited only by their imaginations. The title of this program implies the same scenario, but the reality is rather different. This program is actually more of a town programming kit, with which children position and then set into motion prefabricated cars, buildings and LEGO people. The first step to using this program is to master the navigation system that enables you to zoom around in virtual 3D space, much like a helicopter. Next, you select one of two modes. In the play mode, you merely watch a village in action as the people and cars move. But in the build mode, different blocks, buildings, LEGO people and vehicles can be dragged onto a generous 3D building area and programmed. You can make your helicopter fly in a figure eight, adjusting for direction, altitude and speed. Placing cameras around the town lets you see things from overhead in the helicopter, or perhaps from atop a building, security camera-style. You can even put a stick of dynamite inside a moving car or building to cause a random, LEGO-scattering explosion. While parents and educators might question the moral and educational value of this, our testers loved it. Although it is possible to build things block-by-block, adjusting the view and getting the LEGOs to line up just right is a frustrating process. You'll want to make sure your computer can handle the robust system requirements— a computer equipped with a 3D accelerator card— as several test families brought the product back, unable to get it running. All in all, this is a clumsy but conceptually exciting program that provides children with a unique spatial thinking opportunity. Please see LEGO Creator: Knight's Kingdom and LEGO Creator Harry Potter.
$39.95, Win 95, Win 98 (CD-ROM)
Teaches: logic, spatial thinking, programming