Reviewer: Stephen Borders (badersk on Aximsite)

Developer/Vendor: Mastersoft

Price: $19.95 Introductory price of $14.95
Rating: 4.25(Updated)

From the website:

“This is a brain trainer with a difference..... 20 amazingly addictive and FUN puzzles, each at 5 increasing levels of difficulty. Not only fun, but it will train your brain across a wide range of differing aptitudes........ challenge your brain and make sure it's functioning at it's optimum potential!”

Ultimate Brain Trainer!

“What a pity school days were never this much fun. This is one school from which you'll NEVER be tempted to play truant!!!!”

Probably on of the most Addictive games I have played. My personal favorite is the plastic puzzle, where you have 4 different pieces that can be used to make numerous other shapes by rotating, flipping and fitting them into the different configurations. Some of them are just mind boggling.

According to the documentation it benefits the following aptitudes:

• Mental Speed
• Numerical
• Logical
• Memory
• Spatial
• Verbal
• Musical

Now I am not going to pretend to know how all of these work but I can say that I improve in each category each time I play. Of course my mental speed has no where to go but up, memory and numerical aptitudes seem to have benefited as well also not much of a stretch, but seriously. I have no doubt that playing games like this have more value than playing solitaire, it is the amount that I will have to defer to the experts. What I do know for sure is that I enjoy the most of the games and I play them regularly and I keep taking the same ones over until I get an A+. For some of the categories this is no easy feat because some of them change each time you try the same level over again.

I installed this on my Cingular 8125 (aka wizard pro) running WM6 and the install was straight forward enough. The game runs pretty well although it would run much better on an Axim or other PPC with more than a 200Mhz processor. It caused a few lockups when I got impatient waiting for it to do something but in all fairness the example I have is a beta and that might have something to do with it. It isn’t enough of a bother to stop me from playing it.

I do not have the time or space to mention each and every game but I wanted to mention my most liked and the least liked. First as I have already mentioned my favorite is the Plastic Puzzle, I would have never imagined that four different 2-dimensional shapes could be put into so many different arrangements. I have played this one the most and it is because, for what ever reason, I am intrigued by it. I play it whenever I have a moment and it actually was hard to leave this one to try all of the others in order to properly do this review.

The one I liked least is really more because of a feature of the game that is beneficial to successfully completing it but to me is just annoying. It is a game called School trip. In this game you are shown you a number (4 on the first level 6 on the second, etc.) of squares with pictures of animals in it. The pictures light up and you hear the sound of the animal, (1 and then 2 and so on) and you are required to tap the pictures in the order they lit up. My only annoyance with this game is the sound files; you hear the sound when they light up and when you tap the images trying to match the sequence. I guess the real reason I don’t care for it is that the animal sounds make it sound like a kid’s game, so I end up turning the sound off, which, actually helps you play the game because now your hearing as well as sight is involved. I imagine it will probably draw some puzzling looks from passers by as you tap tap tap tap tap and they hear moo, moo, baa, ribet, and cock-a-doodle do.

Never the less I really enjoyed using this game/learning tool as I did math using numbers, shapes and pictures, configured puzzle pieces, listened and repeated progressive musical notes, played sudoku and many other types of engaging, learning games. I have played almost every day since having it and will continue to make use of it. It will even give an evaluation of a possible career. So far I am up from Librarian to Teacher. Funny I am an Automotive Instructor/Technician!

Why not download the trial today I highly recommend it..

Here are the list of grades and games

Year 1

• Magic Hats
• Heavier, Heaviest
• Simple Sums
• Plastic Puzzle
• Shape Maths

Year 2

• Just Times Tables
• Building Blocks
• Class Register
• Pairs
• Paper Puzzle

Year 3

• School Trip
• School Bus
• Syllables
• Number Patterns
• Wordsworth

Year 4

• Roman History
• Music Lessons
• Kakuro
• Sudoku
• Maze Craze

“Can you graduate from Brain School?” A few more screenshots can be found at the link below, there are 20 different games + 4 types of test and progress reports. Check your improvement in mental agility every day! http://www.mastersoftmobilesolutions.com/brainpics.html

Pros

• Numerous games in one package
• Stimulates the brain while it entertains
• Runs on WM6
• Average price range same as other similar products.

Cons

• Some annoying sounds on some games
• Can cause lockups on a slow processor (No longer experienced with release copy)

Edit: I have since recieved a release copy of this game and due to some improvements it warrants some changes in my review. I no longer experience lockups on my device there are some quirks that occur if you are playing  and you recieve a phone call. The game will pause itself and let you take the call, afterwards the soft buttons will not work but the screen function for the button will. You simply tap resume on the screen and you are playing again. The timers on some games have been removed which is also an improvement. Graphics and instructions have also been tweaked.

I noticed that there is also an introductory price drop to $14.95 which to me makes this one a no brainer.