Nanda's Island
By Christopher Healy,
Common Sense Media Reviewer
Common Sense Media Reviewers
Cute but tough puzzle game with a nature theme.
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Nanda's Island
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What’s It About?
The title character of NANDA'S ISLAND is a panda whose homeland is now barren. He uses a rain dance to call up little clouds, but they're never directly over the seeds he plants, so you need to draw lines that will direct the raindrops down to the seeds and help the flowers grow. As puzzles get more challenging, obstacles are added, forcing players to do things like make drops ricochet over tall structures. You have a very limited amount of \"ink\" in your pen, so on most levels, you'll need to keep erasing and drawing afresh, even while the drop are coming down. Each successful level will earn you coins that you can use to buy props that you can place around your newly green island.
Is It Any Good?
Nanda's Island has a fun concept, but slightly flawed execution. The puzzles are very challenging (maybe too challenging at the beginning) but should prove entertaining for lovers of brain games. It would have been better if the line-drawing mechanic was a little more precise and if you didn't have to scroll around so much to see the entire play area, but on the whole the game works pretty well. Being able to customize your island as a reward for winning levels is a nice touch, too. Overall, Nanda's Island is a decent but unspectacular puzzle game.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Families can talk about the real-life versions of events in the game. Why do flowers need rain? How do seeds grow into flowers? Where does rain come from?
Families can also talk about why playing puzzle games are both fun and make you think.
Game Details
- Platforms: Nintendo DS, Nintendo DSi
- Available online?: Not available online
- Publisher: MumboJumbo
- Release date: February 22, 2011
- Genre: Puzzle
- ESRB rating: E for (No Descriptors)
- Last updated: August 30, 2016
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