Dora the Explorer: Lost City Adventure Screenshots The Final Say! Gameplay 7.0 Graphics 7.0 Sound 7.0 Value 7.0 Dora the Explorer Lost City Adventure - reviewed by Tory Favro Review Date: 31 October 2002 Review Score: 7/10  Distributor: GameNation

Dora the Explorer is a popular children's character on the Nickelodeon cable network and has now made the jump to educational kids software. Dora the Explorer: Backpack Adventure is developed by European software giant Infogrames and is aimed at children aged 3 and over.    Dora the Explorer: Lost City Adventure Features Multiple locations to visit with math-related games to play Printable activity sheets 2 ways to play - Adventure and Freeplay Modes 3 adjustable difficulty levels   In this particular game, Dora has lost her teddy bear, Osito and she, Boots, Backpack and Map must make their way to the lost city by solving simple math related puzzles that the game puts in the way of their quest. Players need to sign in to play the game and during the initial play period they need to make a treasure chest and also identify themselves to the game.   The small games within this title are fun to play and perfect for their target audience. Even on highest setting I would not give this to a child older than possibly 7 years old and then it would only be an amusing distraction. The world that Dora lives in is bright and colourful and for the most part looks great and should capture the imagination, and more importantly the attention of kids, helping them to learn without being too overbearing in the process. The tasks are simple but fun. There are activities such as the ones shown to the left in the screenshots such as putting pirate pigs in boats and painting a picture by numbers. The difficulty never really goes past that point and considering the age of the audience that is good. One thing I did find entertaining is that Dora does use a fair bit of Spanish during the game and eventually even the kids start associating the words with objects. Whilst certainly not aspiring to be language software, it's a nice touch and gives the game character. The game is American and as such, Australian audiences will have to deal with those accents which normally is not a problem. However we found on more than one occasion that we had no idea what was just said, unsure if we'd just heard some of Dora's Spanish or English. I do think this was unfortunate. Otherwise all the stories and songs were entertaining and even toddlers will bop along to the music in the game.

I thought it was good when checking the system requirements of the game that it will operate on older computers and is also compatible with the current operating system, Windows XP. Please see below for the system requirements.

In summary Dora the Explorer: Lost City Adventure is a bright fun filled game that will have little kids glued to their mice as they try to solve simple puzzles and games. It is this sort of software that gives kids that head start that we want them so desperately to have in all facets of their lives. The game can be played through fairly quickly however so that should be a factor in purchasing the game. At this time of writing, the retail price on this game is $29.95 which makes it's purchase quite an attractive proposition.

- Tory Favro