Sea Monkeys

Rating:
Summary: Simple Amusement for the Kid or Kid at Heart.
Review: All I can tell you is that myself and another adult enjoyed playing this game. I would not necessarily recommend it for small children, more in the ten and up age range (or possibly 8 and up) as you do see some things that might upset small children: There is a fish and a plant that can eat the sea monkeys, plus you can see the sea monkeys curl up and float down to the bottom of the tank dead at the end of their natural life span (6 yrs in their time; about an hour in our time ! But maybe that's cos I kept feeding them the Super Growth food, maybe with just eating algae they live longer ?). Also sometimes they can get sick and when you see one of those even we were like eww ! And hurried to get it well. The two illnesses we saw the virtual sea monkeys get (even though we took good care of the tank) were one where their head gets really huge and they flail around, and another where they puff up into a star shape. Both sicknesses also put spots all over them, and they flop around in the water. That might distress a small child.

Anyway, for the older child or the child at heart, this is basically what the game plays like: You choose an empty tank; you get three 'free' eggs to start with. I recommend using the link that is written inside the game case to read the online manual cos our first monkeys died before we learned they have to have a 'home' before they can have babies, (for privacy) and before we knew how to make them 'harvest pearls' from the clams, which you need to get new things for their tank in the game.

After those eggs hatch, if you get them a small home they will disappear inside and come back out quickly with some babies. If the tank is clean and kept with plenty of oxygen bubbles (you can buy a bubble machine and tank cleaner in the game, by 'buy' I mean with game points, not in real life), then they will rapidly become a huge population. Just like real sea monkeys I guess, they reproduce quickly but don't live all that long. Put a snail by a clam and left click on it to make it glow. That will attract the sea monkeys to the clam and they will kick out the pearl. That gives you more 'credit' in the game to 'buy' things.

They can have a karaoke machine, jukebox, beach ball etc. Also you will want to click on the question mark then on each item to see what it does. But they ignore most of the stuff. They did flock around the jukebox and some of them 'sang' on the karaoke but they ignored the dogfish ('best friend ?' not) and beach ball. Luckily you can 'recycle' things you no longer want to get the 'credits' back to buy something else in the game.

There are other fish, some are harmless and some will eat the monkeys so read what they are first ! And there are things to help them be healthy, like growth food, plasma (if they feel ill or tired, which you can tell by watching how they swim), a volcano if they are cold, air bubble machines in 3 kinds, seaweed to keep oxygen in the tank etc.etc. So once you do all that where is the fun ?

Well it's more like being amused or relaxed watching them. WE liked the game simply because it was not stressful or violent. If you liked real sea monkeys you will probably like this game too. It is kind of like having a 'virtual aquarium' without the cleanup and the mess. They do swim, giggle if you 'tickle' them (you are represented by a 'hand' in the game), chatter in nonsense sometimes, dance around, do what look like jumping jacks, things like that. I saw one do some flips in the water. They do enough random things to keep you amused if you are watching them. This is not a competitive type of game, it's one to relax with. If you like games where you take care of things or where you just kind of monkey around (haha) then you will like this one I think. They are cute, and they grow, reproduce, and (eventually) die. They dance around, smile, etc. They start tiny then get big enough for you to see what they are doing.

Oh, and they even are born with names you can see if you hold the mouse pointer over them (which we thought was kind of fun for some reason, especially if it was the name of someone we knew, haha); but you can change those in the 'aqualeash' (a thingy you use to trap them in to cure an illness or rename them; again something explained in the online manual). Most of the things in the game will be easy to figure out how to use but I do recommend reading the manual to make gameplay lots easier. Some things are not easy to figure out, like how to get credits to shop for things in their tank, unless you read the online manual first. The sea monkeys all look the same by the way -- bald if they are a boy and a blond flip hairdo if they are a girl.

Only thing I wish is that it offered a way to install the screensaver later (I didn't but now wish I had) and a way to zoom in on them like you had a magnifying glass in your hand. The real sea monkey tank had something like that. Well anyway I hope this review helped someone. There are more reviews online but I think most of those were not into this type of game to start with. We thought it was cute and relaxing. It was a challenge to try and take care of them then once we figured it out we could just watch them play.

Rating:
Summary: Simple Amusement for the Kid or Kid at Heart.
Review: All I can tell you is that myself and another adult enjoyed playing this game. I would not necessarily recommend it for small children, more in the ten and up age range (or possibly 8 and up) as you do see some things that might upset small children: There is a fish and a plant that can eat the sea monkeys, plus you can see the sea monkeys curl up and float down to the bottom of the tank dead at the end of their natural life span (6 yrs in their time; about an hour in our time ! But maybe that's cos I kept feeding them the Super Growth food, maybe with just eating algae they live longer ?). Also sometimes they can get sick and when you see one of those even we were like eww ! And hurried to get it well. The two illnesses we saw the virtual sea monkeys get (even though we took good care of the tank) were one where their head gets really huge and they flail around, and another where they puff up into a star shape. Both sicknesses also put spots all over them, and they flop around in the water. That might distress a small child.

Anyway, for the older child or the child at heart, this is basically what the game plays like: You choose an empty tank; you get three 'free' eggs to start with. I recommend using the link that is written inside the game case to read the online manual cos our first monkeys died before we learned they have to have a 'home' before they can have babies, (for privacy) and before we knew how to make them 'harvest pearls' from the clams, which you need to get new things for their tank in the game.

After those eggs hatch, if you get them a small home they will disappear inside and come back out quickly with some babies. If the tank is clean and kept with plenty of oxygen bubbles (you can buy a bubble machine and tank cleaner in the game, by 'buy' I mean with game points, not in real life), then they will rapidly become a huge population. Just like real sea monkeys I guess, they reproduce quickly but don't live all that long. Put a snail by a clam and left click on it to make it glow. That will attract the sea monkeys to the clam and they will kick out the pearl. That gives you more 'credit' in the game to 'buy' things.

They can have a karaoke machine, jukebox, beach ball etc. Also you will want to click on the question mark then on each item to see what it does. But they ignore most of the stuff. They did flock around the jukebox and some of them 'sang' on the karaoke but they ignored the dogfish ('best friend ?' not) and beach ball. Luckily you can 'recycle' things you no longer want to get the 'credits' back to buy something else in the game.

There are other fish, some are harmless and some will eat the monkeys so read what they are first ! And there are things to help them be healthy, like growth food, plasma (if they feel ill or tired, which you can tell by watching how they swim), a volcano if they are cold, air bubble machines in 3 kinds, seaweed to keep oxygen in the tank etc.etc. So once you do all that where is the fun ?

Well it's more like being amused or relaxed watching them. WE liked the game simply because it was not stressful or violent. If you liked real sea monkeys you will probably like this game too. It is kind of like having a 'virtual aquarium' without the cleanup and the mess. They do swim, giggle if you 'tickle' them (you are represented by a 'hand' in the game), chatter in nonsense sometimes, dance around, do what look like jumping jacks, things like that. I saw one do some flips in the water. They do enough random things to keep you amused if you are watching them. This is not a competitive type of game, it's one to relax with. If you like games where you take care of things or where you just kind of monkey around (haha) then you will like this one I think. They are cute, and they grow, reproduce, and (eventually) die. They dance around, smile, etc. They start tiny then get big enough for you to see what they are doing.

Oh, and they even are born with names you can see if you hold the mouse pointer over them (which we thought was kind of fun for some reason, especially if it was the name of someone we knew, haha); but you can change those in the 'aqualeash' (a thingy you use to trap them in to cure an illness or rename them; again something explained in the online manual). Most of the things in the game will be easy to figure out how to use but I do recommend reading the manual to make gameplay lots easier. Some things are not easy to figure out, like how to get credits to shop for things in their tank, unless you read the online manual first. The sea monkeys all look the same by the way -- bald if they are a boy and a blond flip hairdo if they are a girl.

Only thing I wish is that it offered a way to install the screensaver later (I didn't but now wish I had) and a way to zoom in on them like you had a magnifying glass in your hand. The real sea monkey tank had something like that. Well anyway I hope this review helped someone. There are more reviews online but I think most of those were not into this type of game to start with. We thought it was cute and relaxing. It was a challenge to try and take care of them then once we figured it out we could just watch them play.

Rating:
Summary: It was okay...
Review: If you like sea-monkeys and other aquatic thingys, you might like this. It does not keep you interested very long, though. It was fun when my sea-monkeys were happy and stuff, but othewise it was not very good.

Rating:
Summary: Good Game
Review: This game is very very interesting.. I had so much fun the first time I played it.. To tell you the truth I still do enjoy playing it. It is so much fun A+++.