Arthur video games facts for kids
The Arthur video games franchise was a series of learning and interactive story video games based on the American-Canadian children's TV show Arthur. The games were released in the 1990s and 2000s for PlayStation and Windows and Mac OS computers.
Creative Wonders games
Arthur was a 1990s video game series developed by Creative Wonders and published by The Learning Company. The games were created as part of the LearningBuddies line.
Titles
- Arthur's Kindergarten has the player learn kindergarten skills while attempting to fix Arthur's treehouse, which has been damaged in a storm. The game covers basic reading, arithmetic memory skills, and social skills.
- Arthur's Preschool
- Arthur's 1st Grade has the player participate in Bionic Bunny's "Good Deeds Contest" by doing good deeds around the neighbourhood. The game covers reading and math skills.
- Arthur's 2nd Grade has the player participate in "Take Your Kids to Work Day" by completing tasks and chores. The game covers reading, math, grammar, and geography. A new edition was released in 2002.
- Arthur's Reading is a two-disc CD-based game that contains more than 50 activities featuring Arthur characters. Disc 1 covers letter recognition, phonics, and word families, as well as containing an art room for players to print out. Disc 2 covers reading comprehension, grammar, and spelling.
- Arthur's Math Games contains five math-related activities.
- Arthur's Reading Games (1997) contains four reading games and the interactive story Arthur's Reading Race, written by Marc Brown.
- Arthur's Thinking Games (1999) contains six activities related to building critical thinking and logic skills. It was released in 2001 by The Learning Company.
Spyware concerns
The Congressional Record, V. 146, Pt. 15 wrote that a spyware expert found that educational software such as Reader Rabbit and Arthur's Thinking Games may contain spyware. U.S. News & World Report noted that a cause could be the free Arthur screensaver that players of Arthur's Thinking Games have the option to download. The New York Times reported that the Broadcast program, which ran in the background as an application called DSS Agent, used to be included on the installation discs of many software titles made by The Learning Company, including the Arthur video games; while Arthur's Reading Race "was billed as a product updater and communications tool"; online privacy groups put it in the category of spyware for this reason.
Commercial performance
According to PC Data, Arthur's Thinking Games was the ninth top-selling software of September 1999, and the top-selling home education software for that month.
Titles
- Arthur's Teacher Trouble (1993)
- Arthur's Birthday (1994)
- Arthur's Reading Race (1997)
- Arthur's Computer Adventure (1998)
- D.W., the Picky Eater (1998)
Other games
- Arthur! Ready to Race (2000): A racing game developed by Runecraft and published by The Learning Company. Released between 1999 and 2000 for PlayStation, this game has Arthur search for parts to build a cardboard box racer. It consists primarily of minigames in which the player partakes to gain parts, although the player is confined to exploring a small area in Elwood City. The graphics are in 3D, with three pre-rendered CGI cutscenes. The voice acting in the game is not done by the voice actors from the television show.
- Arthur's Absolutely Fun Day: Mattel Interactive/The Learning Company/Ed Magnin and Associates (GBC): Released in 2000, this game has the player control Arthur through part of Elwood City and partake in minigames so that he can visit the amusement park.
- Arthur's Camping Adventure (2000): A point-and-click adventure game. Superkids deemed it "interesting and fun". The game was also known as Arthur's Wilderness Rescue.
- Arthur's Pet Chase (2003): A side-scrolling platform game developed by ImaginEngine Corp and published by The Learning Company.
- Arthur's Sand Castle Contest (2003): An arcade game developed by ImaginEngine Corp and published by Riverdeep Interactive Learning Limited.
