I have downloaded dozens of Asteroids "clones" over the years, and Spheres of Chaos is one of the best that I have come across. Not only does it have great "eye candy" and "ear candy," but it is fun and challenging to play as well. The keys are customizable, the difficulty level and the amounts of "bad guys" are customizable, and many aspects of the graphics and sounds are customizable as well. Plus there are many interesting "power-ups."
Many parents are understandably concerned about their kids playing "shooting" games, although the level of realism is often a factor in parents' decisions concerning such games. For example, a "shooting gallery" type of game (in which you are trying to shoot at various targets) might be acceptable to many parents, while a game which depicts blood and gore might be unacceptable. In Spheres of Chaos you shoot at various shapes on the screen (it's like a moving "shooting gallery"), and there is one type of robot ship which shoots back at you. If you as a parent feel that it is more of a "shooting gallery" type of game then you might be comfortable with your kids playing it. My kids have enjoyed playing this game by doing the shooting while I do the flying and aiming, which makes it a fun family activity.
This is a shareware game which emphasizes quick reflexes and hand-eye coordination, and it has a free demo.
This demo by Humongous Entertainment gives you a taste of their "Spy Fox" series of adventure games. Spy Fox is a cartoon version of James Bond, and your job is to guide Spy Fox and use various spy gadgets in order to help him carry out his mission. Humongous Entertainment has many wonderful adventure games for kids aged 4 to 8, and all of them are well-made and fun to play and very extensive (it often takes days to play one of their adventures because there is so much to see and do). My nine-year-old son still enjoys playing them (and I do too!), and my three-year-old daughter is starting to enjoy them as well. In addition to the main adventure, there are usually several little video games hidden in each adventure game, just for fun.
At computer stores I have sometimes been able to find 2 or 3 Humongous Entertainment adventure games bundled together for the price of one game. In addition to the Spy Fox adventures, they also have underwater adventure games featuring Freddi Fish (a young "super-sleuth" fish who solves mysteries with her friend Luther), they have adventure games featuring Pajama Sam (a little boy named Sam who goes on imaginary adventures as a superhero called "Pajama Sam"), and they have adventure games featuring a character named "Putt Putt" (a cute little animated car). We have enjoyed all of the adventure games which we have purchased, and we have played them over and over. The more recent adventure games are even better because when you start the adventure over for the second or third time, many of the clues and gadgets are different than before!
From a Christian standpoint, there are two games which I'm not comfortable with. One of them is called "Freddi Fish: The Case of the Haunted Schoolhouse." My guess is that by the end of the game Freddi learns that the schoolhouse is not really haunted, but I don't want to spend money on a game which has a "haunted" theme. The other one is called "Pajama Sam: No Need to Hide When It's Dark Outside." In this game, Pajama Sam discovers that he doesn't need to be afraid of the dark. Unfortunately, throughout most of the game it seems that "Darkness" is a dark and sinister and scary character (he turns out to be friendly and lonely at the end of the game), and when Pajama Sam goes inside Darkness' house it is full of "haunted house" features. Even though these things are done in a cartoonish way, I didn't want those kinds of images in my kids' minds.
When you run the demo, make sure that your computer's sound is on so that you can watch the introductory movie as "MonkeyPenny" tells Spy Fox what his mission is. After Spy Fox lands on the Greek island of Acidopholus, the game will display some of his spy gadgets so that you will know where they are located when you need them. Then Spy Fox will stand there and wait until you click on something to tell him where to go. As you move the mouse pointer around the screen, sometimes it will turn solid white to indicate that you're on a "hot spot" which will do something when you click the mouse button. Sometimes funny little things will happen when you click a hot spot, and other times Spy Fox will pick up the object that you clicked on (you'll need those objects later in the game, so try to find and collect them all). When the mouse pointer changes into a large white arrow, it means that Spy Fox will walk in that direction if you click the mouse button. When you move the mouse down to the bottom of the screen, Spy Fox's spy gadgets will appear on the left side of the screen, and his spy watch will appear on the right side of the screen. Hold the mouse pointer over each of his spy gadgets, and he'll tell you what they are. The spy watch allows you to save and load your games, plus it lets you play a fun arcade game, plus it lets you communicate with MonkeyPenney at the mobile command center, plus it lets you quit the game. These features (other than Quit) only work in the full game, not in the demo. Click the arrow at the top right corner of the screen in order to leave the spy watch area and return to the adventure. In the demo, you'll need to use a spy gadget to open the steel door in order to enter the Feta Factory.
This is a free demo, and the full game is aimed at kids from about 4 to 8. These adventure games help teach your child how to listen carefully to what people say in order to learn important clues, they help reinforce logical thinking and problem-solving skills, they challenge your child in remembering how to visit places which he or she has visited before, and so on.
Spy Fox Website
(also see my reviews of other demos at this website:
Freddi Fish
and
Putt Putt).
In this well-known Chinese puzzle, the goal is to form various shapes using puzzle pieces such as a small square, small triangles, large triangles, a parallelogram, and so on. This program displays an outline of a picture on the left side of the screen, and on the right side of the screen all of the puzzle pieces for that picture are shown. Click on a piece to "pick it up," then move it to the desired spot, then click again to "drop" it. In the Easy mode (which is good for young children), all of the puzzle pieces are already in the proper orientation so that they fit properly into the picture, but in the Medium, Hard, and Very Hard modes you will need to rotate the puzzle pieces (after you pick them up) by clicking the right mouse button. There is also an editor which lets you exercise your creativity by creating new pictures to challenge the family with.
This is a freeware logical thinking and spatial perception puzzle.
Tangram Website
(also see my reviews of other programs at this website:
Child Proof,
Drawing for Children,
Game Maker,
and
Motion Planning).
If your child loves Thomas the Tank Engine then he or she might enjoy this simple game. The object is to use your mouse to guide Harold the Helicopter so that he picks up some boulders of different sizes, then you move Harold until he is hovering over one of the cars attached to James, then click the left mouse button to drop the boulder. At higher levels, you have to get each boulder into the proper car based on the picture on each car. That's all this demo does, but it is good practice for getting used to the mouse, and my three-year-old daughter loves it.
This is a demo which is good for kids who are just learning how to use a computer mouse.
In this puzzle you use the arrow keys to move the person around the game board. Your goal is to push all of the boxes, one at a time, into the green squares.
After running the program, click the Game menu, then click "New Game." Click on "Pack_01.pak," then click the OK button.
This logic and strategy puzzle is freeware, and young children might enjoy playing it with a parent or older sibling (who can help plan ahead which moves need to be made). This makes it a fun family activity.
Pente is a two-player game in which the winner is the first player to get 5 in a row (horizontally, vertically, or diagonally), or the first player to make 5 captures (which I'll explain in a moment).
After running the program, maximize the game board. Click on the Options menu, then click Game to select some game options (such as "Pente" (for regular Pente), "Tournament Rule" (explained in a moment), and "2 players"). Click the Options menu and then click Players to select Human or computer players. If you select "H" for #1 then you (the Human) will go first, and you can select "H" for #2 if you want a two-player game, or select a number for #2 if you want to play against the computer (the higher the number you select, the better the computer will play).
To play, click on any intersection on the game board to place your piece. Using the "Tournament Rule," the first player must make his first play in the center of the game board, and then the second player can make his play anywhere on the board, and then the first player must make his second play at least 3 spaces from the center, and then each player takes turns placing their pieces anywhere on the board. This helps to eliminate the advantage which the first player would otherwise have.
Capturing is always done by capturing exactly 2 of the opponent's pieces. If 2 of your opponent's pieces are next to one of your pieces, and if the spot after the 2 opponent's pieces is empty, then on your turn you can place a piece in the empty spot and then remove the 2 opponent's pieces (see the Help file for pictures of how to capture). This is the only way that capturing is done. If you capture 10 of your opponent's pieces (i.e. if you make 5 captures) then you win.
This logic and strategy game is freeware, and it is suitable for older children.