We have to admit how much we enjoyed Amazing Brain Train. This is Prof. Fizzwizzle’s most varied and entertaining outing yet with 15 games, falling into five broad categories, including Spatial, Number, Planning, Search and Memory. Some of the games are slightly disappointing, but the majority consists of pleasingly challenging games that creep skillfully from easy to rock hard. There’s also a Quest mode, in which you ferry stuff, in your Amazing Train, between some farm animals, who are as obnoxious as they are hideous.

The train is powered by an electrified cortex in trainers, so you must fuel it with answers: do well and you’ll have to play fewer games to get to your destination. Quest mode then, is an odd mix of intelligently designed and paced puzzles and semi-entertaining nonsense, such as a chicken that won’t eat a donut unless you bring her false teeth and a letter Q. Of course, the puzzles are slightly derived – humans have been making puzzles for millennia, it’s a well-trod meadow. But Amazing Brain Train houses a few genuinely entertaining games in a rewarding framework, with a collection of trophies that range in difficulty from ‘inevitable’ to ‘you’ll be lucky’.

If anything, they could have gone easy on the Quest mode, and spent the effort on more minigames and the ability to compare your score against friends online. It’s all very well getting an A, but half the fun of being clever is rubbing everyone else’s face in it. If you’ve got moderately studious children, or just like to reassure yourself that you’re not thick: either play word games on Facebook or buy this perfectly pleasant game. 

Jul 25, 2008