by Beau Blake

Created on: January 11, 2008

Farm Frenzy is a great game for younger kids; the graphics and music remind me of Saturday morning cartoons like Sponge Bob and Jimmy Neutron. Each character (ducks, bears etc.) was easily identified and moved in a normal animal like fashion.

Each level of the game offered a slightly new challenge; whether it is the need to harvest more eggs or avoiding the bear throwing your ducks out of the yard, which I personally found hilarious. You can purchase more ducks by taking your produce to the market and selling it, which is done by adding your harvest to the back of a Green Acres looking truck. The truck moseys along the road to town to sell your goods. I say moseys because when you are waiting for it to get back to credit your account it seems like forever.

You can capture the bears by clicking on them really fast, once you have captured them they go into your store house and are sold by the farm the next time he goes into town. Some planning ahead is involved in the whole process, because if you don't have enough room in the store house to add the bear, he will escape and run away only to come back and throw mare duck no doubt.

There are goals for the game which are shown at the beginning of each level on a very simple chart so even the younger players will know what they are trying to accomplish in order to be awarded the Gold or Silver Seal. At the end of each round a chart appears showing the player how many levels they have completed and how many awards they have earned. A player can go back and retry levels where they didn't earn an award.

Players can purchase egg processing plants and cup cake making factories that are used during the higher levels to earn awards. As the game progresses the players have a new task added with each level making it just a little more challenging the longer you play.

This game promotes eye hand coordination and gives kids a sense of supply and demand by making them earn the money to buy water from the well. The water from the well makes the grass grow and the ducks eat the grass which makes them lay eggs. The player needs to harvest the eggs to sell at the market to buy more ducks and water from the well.

Large red arrows pop up anytime an area needs attention to let the player know what they have missed. Like if the store house if full an arrow pops up whenever they click on an egg to harvest. My little brother who is 6 played this game and loved it. I played for part of it and had a little trouble keeping up during some of the higher levels, but mostly we had a blast playing it together.

I would give this game a 5 out of 5 because it fun and sort of educational at the same time.

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