Life is all about learning new things, and edutainment games have been around for a while now, teaching varying subjects to children and adults alike. They can be a great tool to use in the development of children, especially, andthere have been plenty of great options on the market readily available.
While a good number of the best edutainment games were released in either the 1990s or early 2000s, certain platforms like Steam and the internet as a whole have done a good job of preserving most of them.Whether you are looking for games to play with your kids, or want to experience these games for yourself, there are plenty of options.
8Putt-Putt
The 1990s were filled to the brim with plenty of point-and-click adventures for kids to explore through and the Putt-Putt series was one of them. The games have you take control of the titular character, Putt-Putt, a pinkish-purplish car, and go on adventures through town, a zoo, and a racetrack to name a few.
In your adventures, you typically learn more about the locations you are in: animal facts from the zoo, and the important parts of a race car at the track, all while solving puzzles and thinking through problems. The series is very colorful and fun for kids to experience.
7Freddi Fish
Another series under the Humongous Entertainment umbrella, the Freddi Fish series, has you follow the adventures of Freddi Fish and her friend Luther as they swim around the sea doing detective work. The games are standard point-and-click adventures with a mystery flavor.
The Freddi Fish games offer children a chance to develop problem-solving skills, as well as learn how to follow a trail of clues to their logical conclusion. By the end of each game, you either solve the mystery or discover the villain by using the clues you’ve gathered.
6The Clue Finders
Created by The Learning Company, The Clue Finders series follows the adventures of a group of kids as they solve various mysteries around the world. The first few games in the series were marked with a grade level (e.g. 3rd grade, 4th grade, etc.) showing the rough age range of children who would benefit the most from the games.
The series can provide strong, well-written characters for the player to follow, as well as complex puzzles, and difficult problems relating to math, science, reading, history, and more to solve. The games are great educational tools to use, as they cover so many subjects.
5Pajama Sam
Pajama Sam was a series that dealt a lot with the theme of overcoming fears and personal weaknesses or the strange and fantastical while exploring the game world with its titular main character, Sam. Sam is a young boy who always seems to be wearing his blue pajamas before being whisked away from his bedroom to some imaginary world.
While the games are a point and click adventure,they feature many different NPCs to interact with and also contain hidden collectibles to discover. While exploring, you can even find cameos featuring other Humongous Entertainment characters, leading to the feeling of an interconnected world with the other games.
4Spy Fox
Who doesn’t love spies? Spy Fox, clearly modeled after James Bond, is a globe-trotting spy who works to thwart dastardly schemes carried out by other anthropomorphic supervillains. Whether it’s replacing all the world’s dairy with goat milk, or stopping a can of aerosol from depleting the ozone layer, Spy Fox will save the day.
While still being point-and-click adventures, the Spy Fox games are intended for a slightly older audience than the other Humongous Entertainment products. As such, they feature more complex puzzles and mini-games when compared to the other games by the company.
3Carmen Sandiego
Whether she’s somewhere in the world, or running through time, Carmen Sandiego remains a well-known figure in the edutainment industry. This red trench coat-wearing super villain is always up to no good, and it’s your job as the player to find her before it’s too late.
Her games would teach a lot about geography and the world we live in, as players would be tasked with following a clue trail to pinpoint just exactly where Carmen Sandiego is in the world. She also had a time-travelling escapade that taught a lot about ancient and modern history as well.
2The Oregon Trail
The Oregon Trail was a period of American history that saw mass migration from the eastern half of the country to the western frontier, as Americans all over traveled west for a better life. The game that shares the same name sees you controlling a family of pioneers as you travel out west to Oregon, controlling every aspect of the journey, from what supplies you bring to the route you take.
The game featured many historical and geographical lessons about the period and areas the trail would pass through, sometimes offering branching paths to take that might shorten or lengthen your trip. Of course, your family could die while en route, which is where the famous meme “You have died of dysentery” came from.
1The Logical Journey Of The Zoombinis
The Zoombinis are strange, silly little blue creatures that need the player’s guiding hand when leading them out of oppression in their homeland to a new place to settle in and call home. The journey is long and perilous, but at the end of the road, the Zoombinis build Zoombiniville, their new capital.
Along the way, you will have to solve many logical puzzles of increasing difficulty. If you fail to get every Zoombini through a certain challenge, they will travel back to a previous checkpoint to wait for your next caravan to pass through and try again. This game is a fantastic tool for practicing logic skills, and the puzzles can be incredibly hard on the highest difficulties.
