Educational and fun - For all those budding detectives (Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego? (PC))

Member Name: Jcapulet

Product:	Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego? (PC)
Date:	25/10/08 (32 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Explore the world and use other skills to solve a fun mystery

Disadvantages: You may need to tweak your PC settings depending on your Windows operating system

This game has cult status in my home and trying to find educational games that are actually fun and what the children choose to play, is a bit of a rarity !!

There are a few great educational CD roms that I would recommend and this is one of them, especially to help reinforce the learning of geography.

Carmen Sandiego herself is a globe-trotting thief, learning all she knows from her days as an ACME detective agency operative. (She's kinf of like a female James Bond should he ever deflect from Mi5 !! ) And it's up to you to track her down and bring her to justice using different crime-scenarios with which to investigate and solve. As I said, the book forcuses on geography and world cultures as the game pursues Carmen through Earth's major cities. This introduces you to the languages, customs, and landmarks of their peoples along the way. There are also other Carmen Sandiego games that focus on other subjects such as "Where in time is Carmen Sandiego" (history) "Carmen Sandiego Word detective" ( English ) and "Carmen Sandiego maths detective" (maths.)

However, whilst you will find that although certain games 'target' different subjects in the main, they will also help children expand on other skills too. This particular game also helps master skills such as reading, deductive reasoning, logic, maps & symbols, combining information, memory and matching, problem solving and listening comprehension.

*Who is it for ? *

I would recommend this for 9 years and up in general, however, I would base that decision on what your child is capable of. However, the software programme was developed to support the UK and Scottish National Curriculum at keystage 2 & 3 level in general.

*Minimum system requirements*

With any game that has been reviewed I would ALWAYS check with your supplier about the minimum requirements for any software programme. That is because you will find that some games are updated from time and time to work with more powerful operating systems which will require higher specifications from their PC/Mac.

However, the version that I won, is for Windows 95/98. Should people who run their PC on a newer version of Windows have problems with running this software, I would always recommend running the programme in an older version on Windows. To do this you simply 'right click' on the desktop icon and click on 'properties'. Then click on 'compatibility' and chose a Windows platform with which you would like to use to play the software in. You can also change the display settings should your game require it so.

For the version that requires Windows 95 or 98 these are the minmum specifications.

66MHz 486DX or faster
8 MB RAM required, 16MB RAM recommended.
Minimum of 5MB Hard Disk Space
2 x CD rom drive or faster
SVGA video card : 640x480 display, 256 colours; High colour supported on Pentium with Direct X
Video and sound card compatible with Direct X for Windows 95/98

For a Macintosh on this version, the minimum specifications are :

Power PC required
system 7.1.2 or higher
9.5 MB free
Minimum 5MB hard disk space
2 x CD ROM drive or faster
Monitor : 13 inch or larger, 256 colours.

Summary: Great fun and you learn at the same time. For 9 years plus.