Learn and Play with Thomas review
Not to be confused with Avanquest Software’s Thomas and Friends Steaming Around Sodor released in the West; Kazuto ABC and Words to Learn and Play with Thomas was published by Nippon Colombia in Japan on 31 July 2014, although sadly only surviving twenty months before being removed from the eShop due to presumed licensing issues. Learn and Play with Thomas (rather predictably) follows in the tracks of both of Rocket Company’s’ Kikansha Thomas titles on Nintendo DS in being directed towards pre-school children.
Learn and Play with Thomas features two main gameplay areas: the first featuring twelve stages each containing several levels based around themes such as hiragana, katana, ABC, numbers and shapes. Occasionally there’s an ‘action’ orientated level involving moving the stylus in a circular motion to control Thomas before a random animal does a Snorlax impersonation on the track (mowing the animal down is unsurprisingly not an option) although the bulk of gameplay consists of selecting the correct answer from a choice of four.
Each level consists of five questions with a majority answered correctly resulting in the Fat Controller giving you a piece of track in order to reach the next level. The player is also rewarded with a picture book with 156 total characters to find and a video book with seventeen videos featuring a scene from the Thomas series. The second area involves a choice of hiragana, katana or ABC language with a Thomas character, animal or other inanimate object representing the letter and the player then able to draw the letter with his/her stylus!
Conclusion
Kazuto ABC and Words to Learn and Play with Thomas is not a game that will appeal to many readers of this blog but for those with small children that enjoy the Thomas the Tank Engine characters, and who want to learn hiragana, katana and ABC could do far worse than Nippon Colombia’s Thomas title. Unfortunately it is both arguably overpriced (at ¥5,184) due to the relatively limited amount of content offered, and is secondary to both recent Anpanman titles in being the ultimate pre-school learning experience on Nintendo 3DS.
5/10
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