It's probably fair to say that if you have a child of five and under you will have come across Peppa Pig and her chums. She features on at least two tv channels, her face is plastered over many a back pack and t-shirt; there is a whole raft of Peppa merchandise of varying quality. This particular item, I'm happy to say is excellent and, if you have a four year old or under a great introduction to the nintendo ds in my opinion.

Peppa Pig the game features the whole Pig family, the graphics are very faithful to the programme and the voices and music are both authentic and will be instantly recognisable to a young player. I found that my four year old was able to pick up this game and play instantly, most of the play is via the touch screen and the stylus - she played on an old style rather antique ds but the game will work equally well on newer versions of the console. It's a fairly simple game that doesn't make full use of all of the possibilities of, for example, the dsi, however for the age range it is going to appeal to it's fun, intuitive and challenging enough to keep their interest. Though it is not particularly educational as such, playing with it is a valid use of their time and great for fine motor skills and working out how technology works; I think probably this game is best for the 3-6 year old age group, beyond that they are going to want to play with something more complex.

The game features 9 mini-games in all, all based on the show. The games are fairly varied, from a simple colouring in, washing the car and making pancakes - as featured in one of my child's favourite episodes of her piggy friend. My child particularly likes the game where she has to get "Happy Mrs Chicken" to lay eggs - this she has seen on the show and she finds it great fun to tap the screen to get the chicken to produce! She also like hosing the car via the stylus and constructing nonsense phrases for Peppa's parrot to play, making a snowman and bursting bubbles. Probably her favourite game is hide and seek, but "jumping in muddy puddles", a regular feature of the actual show is also recreated in a most fitting way, with Peppa, guided by your child, competing with George to jump in the mud. Some of the games can be played at a varying level of difficulty, with a timer either on or off, none of the games are particularly very challenging, a child won't feel they are "failing" as such when playing, which is probably a good thing at this age, there's gentle encouragement as you play from daddy pig who will tell you that you are doing "really well" or to keep going. There is an "achievements" board for high scores which unlocks some new elements, but it's all pretty low key fun stuff.

What I think is really good about this game is that the interface has been so well designed for the age at which it is aimed. Navigating the menu and the various options is quite simply child's play. Even the very youngest player can, in our experience, quickly understand that to exit any game you tap on the mini-door and ticks and crosses are used where there are various options for the child to choose, it's all very, very well done.

I don't think this is the most long lived of games, though my child has had it for a while and hasn't tired of it yet when it is produced to liven up a wait at the doctor's or other idle 10 minutes or so, I can imagine that, judging from her sister, she will grow out of Peppa Pig and hence this game fairly quickly. That said I would still recommend this game, for which I paid a reasonable £7.99, if your child likes Peppa Pig and if the game is for occasional use. We are fast discovering that the quality of nintendo games really varies, and this is one of the better ones, I've even been known to have a quick go myself, but find mainly that my child needs just a little supervision to play this game, which she really enjoys. There is now a second Peppa game available, which we haven't tried; this one is fun, faithful to the most excellent Peppa show and seems to have been designed with kids in mind. Highly recommended.