Common Sense Media Review
By Christopher Healy
,
based on child development research. How do we rate?
Great strategy adventure with physics lessons built in.
Parents Need to Know
Why Age 7+?
Any Positive Content?
Where to Download
Videos and Photos
Max and the Magic Marker
Parent and Kid Reviews
What's It About?
Kids control Max's orange marker by using their finger to draw lines, shapes, and other objects. The objects help Max on his quest to keep evil blob creatures from destroying his sketch world. Kids will draw stairs, ramps, bridges, levers, and other items. Gravity in the game works much like it would in real life, so you need to anchor anything you draw to keep it from sliding away. Players earn stars by completing a level within a designated time limit or collecting special objects along the way of this 2-D platform adventure.
Is It Any Good?
MAX AND THE MAGIC MARKER works wonderfully as a touch-controlled app game -- better than it did as a mouse-controlled PC game, actually. Using your finger as the "magic marker" provides much more precision than was possible with a computer mouse, which you will appreciate when you're drawing bridges for Max to walk across, steps for him to jump up, or heavy weights to release on top of bad blobs, causing them to squish. The story is imaginative (and is essentially an ode to imagination itself) and the artwork is clean and colorful, with clever whimsical touches. The levels start out pretty easy to get through, but as you go on (and there are more than 50 levels), you'll really be racking your brain to figure out how to make it to the end. It's a great game for thinking kids.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Connect gameplay to the physics of everyday life, such as ball rolling or the action of a seesaw.
Steer kids who love drawing toward this title. They can learn some basic physics concepts while channeling their inner Picasso.
App Details
- Devices : iPhone , iPod Touch , iPad
- Subjects : Arts : drawing , Science : gravity , physics
- Skills : Creativity : developing novel solutions , Thinking & Reasoning : problem solving
- Pricing structure :
- Release date : March 26, 2011
- Genre : Strategy Games
- Publisher : Electronic Arts
- Version : 1.0.9
- Minimum software requirements : iOS 3.2 or later
- Last updated : November 11, 2020
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