The listing, AMAZON TRAIL 3RD EDITION RAINFOREST ADVENTURES has ended.
Good news from South America! The third version of this adventure simulation is greatly improved over its predecessors. Children get to travel once again, through the jungles and down the Amazon River. As in earlier versions, kids choose their guide and supplies before beginning the journey. It's still slow going at first, but after ten minutes on the river the action begins to take off. Players automatically stop at predetermined points throughout their journey, encouraging them to talk to jungle inhabitants. If kids listen carefully to what they hear, they'll earn special seals to place on a medallion. As kids progress, they'll need to stop and get some nourishment by fishing and collecting fruit. The hunting, gathering and plant identification activities were significantly easier to use in this version and we made good progress up the river. We actually played for extended time periods without getting eaten by piranhas or suffering from some untimely affliction. As for educational value, the program rates high as it teaches about 100 types of plants and animals, has three levels of difficulty and provides lots of exposure to historical figures and Amazon residents. While in general this is a solid program, our testing revealed some technical glitches. When we clicked on our guide we got a distorted picture of the front end of the boat, instead of a picture of the guide we expected. Also, the guide would try and flash us messages, but they happened so quickly that we couldn't read them. On the whole, this latest version is very engaging and comparable in quality to its sister program, The Oregon Trail 3rd Edition.