Alphabet Blues
A Review of The Interactive Alphabet
Tina Velgos
Entertaining, exciting, magical and fascinating. What do these all these words have in common with Corel's hybrid (Win/Mac) CD-ROM, "The Interactive Alphabet"? Absolutely nothing!
I had great expectations that this software would live up to Corel's high
standards in software. Boy, was I let down! We tried the software on two
different Macs -- a Quadra 660AV and a Performa 630 series. Though each
computer met and exceeded the system requirements, the CD-ROM would only
run on the Performa. Even then, the software ran painfully slow and was
frustrating to use. Audio was garbled, even with Virtual Memory turned
off.
Aside from the technical difficulties we encountered, there wasn't much for
kids (ages 3 to 7) to explore on "The Interactive Alphabet". Kids can turn
26 animated pages ( a page for each letter of the alphabet), while the
words are narrated and highlighted as they are read. The "A" page, for
example, included the words accident, airplane, alligator, animals and
antelope. A nice feature for younger kids is they can click on any word to
hear its pronounciation.
Pages with silly sentences such as "Harry, the hog, can't get the hang of
the hula hoop" didn't offer the amount of interactive clickables my kids
are accustomed to. In fact, the blackboard border surrounding the screen's
animations was frustrating for 4-year-old Timmy. He was so sure the six
illustrations on the border were clickable items leading to games.
Unfortunately, there are no games on "The Interactive Alphabet", which
would have been a great added feature.
In less than an hour, Timmy had seen enough of "The Interactive Alphabet". I couldn't blame him. It's very unusual, in our house, for kids to stop playing a title on their own.
School House Scorecard
| Product: |
The Interactive Alphabet |
| Company: |
Corel CD Home
|
| Cost: |
$21.99 |
System Requirements:
Windows:
IBM PC or compatible, 486/33 MHz processor,
8 MB RAM, Windows 3.1 or better,
Super VGA video card and monitor,
256 colors at 640 x 480 resolution,
Mouse or other Windows-compatible pointing device,
PC-compatible double speed or faster CD-ROM drive,
SoundBlaster or 100% compatible sound card and Mouse.
Macintosh:
Apple Macintosh LCIII or higher, System 7.1,
8 MB RAM, 13" or larger monitor,
256 colors at 640 x 480 resolution or higher,
and a double-speed or faster CD-ROM drive.
Breakdown:
Ease of Use 1
Learning Value 2
Entertainment Value 1
Graphics 2
Sound 1
Overall Score:
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