Heart Street Market
Global girls' game has cultural info, needs more context.
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Heart Street Market
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A Lot or a Little?
The parents' guide to what's in this app.
What Parents Need to Know
Parents need to know that Heart Street Market is a game tied to a brand of multicultural dolls. It focuses on girls from four countries (India, USA, Mexico, and Ethiopia). All available outfits are free when you purchase the app. Younger kids may find a few of the games' controls to be tricky. Read the app's privacy policy to find out about the information collected and shared.
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What’s It About?
HEART STREET MARKET invites players into the communities of four girls from around the world: Mexico, Ethiopa, India, and the USA (Appalachian Mountains region). Each girl is helping out with tasks around town in an effort to create new buildings in the community. Players are asked to play mini-games to earn money that they can use to purchase items in the market, though they're given enough coins at the beginning to complete two missions. These items help the Heart Street Market girls complete quests around town. In each country, there are two mini-games that have some connection to the daily life or culture, and the game mechanics have some overlap. There are games where you connect baking ingredients or colored water on a grid, guide geese or skeletons to collect things, and run and avoid obstacles. Once kids gather money, they head to the market and buy whatever the girl has requested. When the quest is complete, one of the buildings proceeds to the next stage of construction. Market stands include construction materials, baking needs, herbs, fruits and vegetables, sports equipment, educational/creative items, and a clothing stand where kids can dress the girls up in a variety of outfits native to each of the four areas.
Is It Any Good?
While it's great to have an app with different cultures represented, the multicultural aspect and the market compete for attention. The pop-up information that explains where each girl is from and different elements of her life is great, as long as kids don't rush past it. Because the overall goals revolve around earning coins to buy items at the market, it would be great to get another pop-up explaining the significance of each item. Though there's plenty of cultural interest woven into the game -- skeletons marching in a parade in Mexico, powerful mandalas in India -- more information about how those elements fit into the lives of the people in those countries. The dress-up area is bound to be a hit, especially the sections where kids can do some of their own designing. The mini-games are cute and are tied in some way to the girls' cultures, but the connection might not always be clear, and the controls can be finicky. Overall, the graphics are beautiful, and the girls seem like kids you'd like to get to know a bit more, so even more information and context would make this a truly stand-out experience for kids.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Families can talk about different cultures around the world and in the Heart Street Market app. What are some things we have in common with those cultures? What are some differences? What do you have in common with the girls in the app?
Talk to your kids about screen use and limits. How can kids enjoy digital media in balance with other activities?
App Details
- Devices: iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad, Android
- Subjects: Social Studies: cultural understanding, geography, global awareness
- Skills: Responsibility & Ethics: embracing differences
- Pricing structure: Paid
- Release date: December 20, 2017
- Category: Kids' Games
- Topics: Adventures, Great Girl Role Models
- Publisher: Splashworks.com Inc.
- Version: 1.0.2
- Minimum software requirements: iOS 8.0 or later; Android 4.4 and up
- Last updated: July 11, 2020
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