Treasures of the Serengeti
By Christopher Healy,
Common Sense Media Reviewer
Common Sense Media Reviewers
Fun, fascinatingly different puzzle game set in Africa.
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Treasures of the Serengeti
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What’s It About?
At its heart, TREASURES OF THE SERENGETI is a puzzle game in which players must connect color-coded, jigsaw-cut pieces in a moving gameboard, but there is a storyline framing the puzzle action. It revolves around an African village which is destroyed by an elephant stampede and then abandoned by its people who believe it to be cursed. A young female shaman is the only one who wants to restore her home and bring back her people. As she tries to do so (by collecting gems in the puzzle games), she also deals with some romantic drama as the man she loves has also left the village and is rumored to have married another woman. The shaman also reconstructs the tribe's sacred musical instruments through some very original audio-based mini-games.
Is It Any Good?
There are innumerable puzzle games out there, but Treasures of the Serengeti shines among them by offering a completely new and different kind of matching game. What at first seems very simple (connect interlocking jigsaw-type pieces of matching color) ends up requiring a lot of strategic thinking and very fast fingers. The three types of mini-games, which are used to break up the action and add a bit of variety, are also mostly original as well (with the exception of a fit-the-pieces-together building game). One is a seemingly typical memory match game -- until you realize you have to match sounds, not images. And another requires you to tune instrument strings in order to play a demonstrated tune. The framing story sequences can seem a bit disjointed at times, but they're not really necessary to even sit through. With or without the layered-on plot, Serengeti is a stellar puzzle game.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Families can talk about the real power of music. The tribe in the game will not return to their village until all their sacred instruments have been restored. Can you understand why music would be so important to a people? How important is music to your life?
Also, the sacred instruments in the game are all real types of African instruments. Have you even seen or heard instruments like these before? What is the value of learning about the music of different cultures? Or learning about different cultures in general?
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