By Dale Farris, Secretary
Golden Triangle PC Club
March 2003

Game Overview

Welcome to the world of musical adventure! With this superb CD ROM rendition of Mozart's Magic Flute opera, Kids Music Stage continues to set a new standard in how to integrate great music with fun learning.

Delight in Mozart's timeless fantasy opera. Have fun with the finest music trivia. Learn how composers put music together, and do it yourself. This is a wonderful introduction to music, and Mozart's Magic Flute will also make you musical, even if you did not think you were.

In the genre of "edutainment," CD ROM titles that focus on having fun while you learn, this marvelous new title represents a unique venture in this field with its focus on having fun while learning about music. The program perfectly blends music and technology, while boosting the imaginations and creative interests of all players. You will also sharpen your ear for music in a neat and different way.

The program is built around Mozart's famous Magic Flute opera, a classic opera that never ceases to intrigue audiences over the world. The Kids Music Stage company has chosen a high standard in this second title in their new series of music games for children, and they successfully exceed their high expectations. This means players will enjoy learning about this famous musical work, while improving basic learning skills, and while all the time having fun.

Kids are cast in the role of little "Wolfie" Mozart on a dream quest to break the terrible spell by the Queen of the Night to steal the Sun, and to rescue Prince Tamino and Princess Pamina. The game begins beautifully, with the initial dream sequence, that places Wolfie in a magical land of night with the captivating character Papageno helping along the way.

The first task is to get out of a pretty park, on your way to the queen's castle. However, the gates will not open until you win two of the many wonderfully designed music games. You find many birds in a tree that play short pieces of music, similar to what is played by three birds on the ground. You have to carefully listen to the music piece played by the 3 birds on the ground and then match this with the music played by the birds in the tree, trying to find the right bird. When you do this 3 times, you win a magical object that goes into your backpack inventory and you can proceed with the game.

You reach a magical gazebo where the music jigsaw puzzles await. These musical jigsaw puzzles are just about the most fun you can have in any computer game for children, a real testament to the creative energies of this unique computer game developer. You listen to music from The Magic Flute, Eine Kleine Nachtmusk, and other Mozart music, and then piece together the different instruments playing it. Once you find the 4 correct instruments, and do this 4 times, you again win a magical object and you continue on in the game.

The combination of interesting aspects of Mozart's life during these games is another intriguing feature of this game, and these biographical sketches will likely amaze children who may be learning for the first time in their life about Mozart's amazing musical gift.

The game settings are beautifully produced, creating the dream-like state Wolfie is in as he plays the game. In this game, children will get a sense of interacting with a beautiful children's book that has come alive in this interactive beauty.

Learning Skills

This program focuses on enhancing the following functional skills:

Audio and Visual Memory
Critical Thinking
Problem Solving
Pattern Recognition
Listening

Since most all readers are likely to have at least a recognition of the famous Magic Flute opera, we need not here explore in depth the background story to the opera. However, one of the many features of this fine program is that the developers have included a super, concise history of the Magic Flute, just enough to fill in some of the gaps that might exist in the minds of players.

Game Features

In addition, the game features the following additional fun things to do:

Music Games
16 Music Jigsaw Puzzles
9 Truly Twisted Riddles
The Finest Music Trivia
The Magic Flute Tale
Mozart’s Biography

The program presents a neat user interface, designed for simple pointing and clicking, and players are guided by Papageno, the opera's comical bird-catcher, who explains what is going on and acts as a guide. The interface provides various objects that represent the various games and information areas of the program. As you begin the game, you face a linear path ahead of you, and as you click the mouse you walk along the path. Feathers suddenly emerge as you walk, and when you click on these feathers you learn snippets of the life of Mozart.

These biographical sketches come in handy in the last Music game that includes trivia questions about the life of Mozart. At this last game, these feathers you have clicked on and placed in your inventory bag appear at the bottom of the screen, and the one that has the answer to the question wiggles as a clue that it holds the information that will help you answer the question. This means the game is designed to be ever so easy for young players to play, another nice touch from this super children's game producer.

As you enter and successfully accomplish each of the games, you win an item that goes into your inventory bag, and when you go back to that game, that item shows up, a nice reminder that you have already won the game and do not need to do anything more in that game. The games can be played over and over again, a nice touch that allows players to just enjoy the game and not necessarily bother with accomplishing the eventual object.

The games are all keenly focused on learning about music, as players attempt to solve the various puzzles and challenges. In one game, players listen to a piece of the Magic Flute suite, and then try and piece together the different musical instruments that play the music. This musical jigsaw puzzle is one of the most intriguing, unique ideas I've seen in any computer game in many years. Kudos to the developers for this wonderful new design that will certainly delight all players.

In another game, you hear different pieces of Mozart's music, and then you have to select one of various objects that when clicked play back a piece of the music, but in a distorted manner. This approach means you have to carefully listen to the music, the object in the game after all, in order to pick out the correct item that is playing that piece of the music, but in the distorted manner. These are the parts of the game that may challenge very young players, but with help from Mom or Dad they should be able to correctly guess these distorted samples.

Age Group

While the game is designed for ages 4 and up, I think it has great potential as an educational tool for use in music classes in all elementary levels. Parents can also look forward to having great fun with their very young rug rats, as they play along with them in their journey of discovery of the marvelous music of Mozart. In addition, many young players will likely be able to play alone through the games, while some very young players may need a little bit of coaching from adults.

For all adults that may still have little understanding of Mozart, this wonderful program will also serve as a super tool to better understand a bit of the life of Mozart, as well as some of the background to the Magic Flute story and the famous opera.

Targeted Customers

While the targeted age group, 4 and up, is certainly realistic, I also think music teachers in all elementary schools will want to give serious consideration to adding this program to their existing teaching resources.

With adult supervision, I also think this super program can be used with small groups of children in music classes to aid in their learning about music, musical instruments, and of course about the Magic Flute music and the life of Mozart.

In addition, I think this program belongs in all public libraries. For those libraries supporting Little Bookworm programs, I think this program can serve as the focus in one of these programs. Also, I think the program can be supported in libraries with a layout and design of their children's library area that would support the use of the program in a manner that would not disturb others in the library. Or, you could also support the program on computers with headphones to direct the music directly to the listener.

For schools and libraries, I also suggest considering loading this program on higher end machines with better sound cards and better speaker system. While the program certainly does not require this, I suggest that with this higher hardware players will just better appreciate the marvelous music of Mozart, as well as have a more rich auditory experience with the program.

Install and Setup

The installation and setup presented no difficulties on my machine. You use the Windows Add/Remove tool to uninstall the game. The entire game will load on a machine, and you will need the disc in the CD ROM drive to play the game.

Price

$24.95
$39.95 - Special 2-game combo price

System Configuration Requirements

P-400 MHz or higher processor
Windows 98 or higher
64MB RAM
300MB free hard disk space
4x CD ROM drive
Mouse
Sound card
Recommend a high-end sound card and speaker system

Note:  The Mac version is due for release during Fall 2003.

Not requiring a 3d graphics accelerator card, and needing a relatively minimally powered CPU means this game is playable on many systems, a wise move on the part of Kids Music Stage. While it is true that more newer systems either come with or are being customized with newer 64MB or even 128MB 3dfx graphics accelerator video boards and high-end, 3d audio boards, driven in part by the high-end requirements of many of today's newer computer games, in fact I suspect there are many "older" systems still working that will likely run this game.

Note however, that the recommended processor to run this game is a Pentium 400, or higher speed processor. This is a step up from the minimum P-360 MHz required in Kids Music Stage's equally marvelous music game, Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker: The Music Game. With the continual increase in computer system power at relatively less expense, it is understandable when a game developer begins to ramp up the system requirements for their new releases.

Kids Music Stage seems to recognize the need to not leave behind all those with relatively older systems, in order to maximize their potential impact on their targeted customer group, by not designing a game that absolutely must be run on today's "state-of-the-art" hardware. A lot of Moms and Dads will be very thankful for this decision.

The above system configuration requirements indicate the minimum and recommended system configuration requirements, and as any experienced gamer knows, if at all possible, you will want to load and run any computer game on as powerful a system as you can afford. Although this game thankfully does not demand high end systems, computer games are notorious for taking over machines, and this is why users will need to be sure and close out all their other open files, before playing this and any computer game. However, in the case of this super title, I think we have an example of a computer program for children that will actually very likely play just fine even on a minimally configured system.

Also, since the game is designed to delight in the music of Mozart, you will really enjoy this experience if you have a high end sound card with a high end set of speakers. In addition, the game does play well and sound well even on systems with less demanding hardware.

About Kids Music Stage

The Magic Flute game was created by an award-winning team of composers, animators, and educators at Kid's Music Stage. This new company combines the award-winning talents of Mirek Nisenbaum's Studio Mobile (Best Animation, South-by-South West 2001, Audience Award FIFI 2001) and ProNetMusic (Best Music, FIFI 2001).

Kids Music Stage is a division of Kids Music Stage LLC, with offices in New York and Boston.

Kids Music Stage is dedicated to the creation of quality non-violent edutainment for children. The Magic Flute is the second game in their planned series of interactive music game titles.

In addition, at the company's Web site, you will find a link to super sample lesson plans for teachers interested in integrating the program into their classroom.

If you thought this game was super, just wait. In 2003, this fine company plans on releasing still more new titles that will continue their successful venture into the world of having fun while learning about music. Titles on their drawing board, in addition to the already released Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker: The Music Game, include Prokofiev's Peter & the Wolfe, Vivaldi's Four Seasons, Strauss's Vienna Woods Tales, Christmas Carols, Children's Classical Music Favorites, Children's Songs From Around the World, Nursery Rhymes, and Hanukkah and Other Holiday Songs.

Contact Information

Music Games International
P.O. Box 1376
Amherst, MA 01004-1376
1-877-877-1369
www.kidsmusicstate.com
info@kidsmusicstage.com

You can also order from other retailers or online vendors.