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Nintendo’s Touch Generations brand strikes again. Big Brain Academy, like Brain Age before it, claims to train your brain in just minutes a day. Although it’s questionable just how true this claim is, the game gives you a number of random tests and a score on how well you did. It’s actually surprisingly fun and the game only costs $20.
Big Brain Academy includes five categories (memorize, analyze, identify, compute, and think), each with three separate games. The five categories are supposed to correspond to different parts of your brain. The memorize games have you memorizing things, the compute games are math-based and the think group has you focusing on the weight of items onscreen. All of the games are time-based and you have to score as high as possible in the time that you’re given. Once you’re done, the game gives you a brain weight – the premise here is that your brain gets heavier the more you use it.
The game includes three gameplay modes. In the game’s practice mode, you can play any of the 15 minigames on three difficulty settings. Your highest score is saved in any of the 45 combinations. The test mode takes one game from each of the categories, with the minigames getting progressively harder as you continue. Once you finish the test, you’re given a brain type like engineer and a letter grade. Unlike school, though, you can keep retaking the tests. The third mode is a multiplayer mode in which eight players can play with just a copy of the game. Basically, everyone gets the same task at the same time and the first person to win gets the most points. It is very simple yet addicting.
Visually and aurally, Big Brain Academy is just what you would expect. The game’s looks are colorful and welcoming but at the end of the day, you’re playing simple minigames. Likewise, the audio is equally simple yet charming.
Big Brain Academy makes great use of the Nintendo DS touch screen. Although it’s questionable just how much heavier your brain will get, at $20 this is a great time killer. -- Adam Nunez, PGNx Media
---- Oct 13, 2006
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