Buzz! Junior: Jungle Party

What’s the Story?

The back of the BUZZ! JUNIOR: JUNGLE PARTY box, which features a picture of a quartet of kids wielding Sony's five-button Buzzer controllers in active poses, might make you think that this PlayStation 2 game has an interface similar to titles available for the Wii. But these Mini games require none of the wrist-twisting and arm-flailing antics associated with many Wii games; a speedy thumb will suffice. Kids may only move their digits, but they're still likely to get a kick out of most of Jungle Party's two dozen or so activities.

Raindance, for instance, is a compelling rhythm game that involves pressing the red button in time with scrolling icons to make your monkey dance. Also fun is Ostrich Egg, which has players sneaking up on a large avian to pilfer her egg, stopping and playing it cool whenever her beak pops up out of the sand. All of the games take less than a minute to learn and are suitable for ages 6 and up.

Is It Any Good?

While Jungle Party's games are uniformly easy to figure out, some are a lot harder to master than others. This disparity can be frustrating and unfair, especially if one player in a group has spent more time with the game than others in the group. Also bothersome is the fact that Sony forces players to use its simple, game show-like Buzzer controllers; while these devices are well suited to the game, the option to use a standard PlayStation 2 controller would have been nice.

These issues are annoying, but Buzz! Junior: Jungle Party delivers enough fun extras -- including an engaging score-based single-player game mode, monkey outfits to unlock, and customizable multiplayer games -- to keep it on the right side of recommendable. Put simply, it's a bit of mindless and goofy interactive entertainment that's both safe for and accessible to most kids.