Add this to your growing collection of the ever cute kids apps by gdiplus.

Going along the same lines of iWriteWords and ABC Maze, with abcTris Animals, gdiplus takes the falling letter scenario to more spelling heights, taking the original premise of choosing letters in the right order, to adding timing and spatial deduction to the equation. Now, instead of simply tapping letters in the right order, your child must sort falling letters into their proper arrangement at the bottom. It’s a challenging task for the growing mind, and the quirky sound effects and colorful, cutesy drawings will help draw your child’s attention. I knew it drew mine.

Grand adult that I am, brimming with higher education and that white ivory tower complex, I cracked my knuckles with cocky upturned grin and tapped on Hard mode (there is a choice of Easy, Medium and Hard), my expression belying my inner thoughts of “Puh, yea, we’ll see just how hard you are, kids game. Mua ha ha ha.” I was so entrenched in my adult superiority, I even left the game unattended for the first 30 seconds to tend to some tea (or Theraflu, actually, for ye others stricken with the wintertime chills), and, boy, was that a mistake. My cocky upturned grin instantly took a downturn into a grimace as I realized I had no idea what was going on. Letters were collecting in rows in obvious disorder, and more were falling with a little girls voice, mischievously ringing out “B!” “A” “X” as if mocking my indecision. She, obviously, knows what’s going down – both letters and my pride.

Of course, after a quick look-over and three seconds of deliberation, I understood the objective was a bit like a word puzzle. An animal is shown – a bear, let’s say – and letters from its name start falling at random, leaving it up to you to move the letters around the screen, with your finger, to land in their appropriate order. gdiplus poses a new angle in this game by not having set boundaries for the letters. For their other games, which I’ve reviewed previously, a child might have the letters “d,b,r,i” in front of her, so she would logically surmise the order of letter selection to be “b,i,r,d” once she solved the anagram (with helpful bird illustration in the background, to boot). Tapping the letters sent them whizzing to preset boundaries, where they would then be voiced aloud for your child to hear, along with applause and children cheering. In abcTris, the whole bottom screen is your child’s playing field. She may start the word “bear” directly flush against the left side of the screen, or she may start the word in the middle of the screen. Whatever decision she makes, spatially, will have repercussions for all subsequent words, making the game not only more challenging with time, but with future space continuum. If she places “bear” at the middle of the screen, the next word of “goat” may not fit if starting from the left. It’s a very good problem-solving game.

I, personally, like the design of iWriteWords the best. Something about the colors and the bouncing bird is all so vibrant and cheery – it just reminds me of children and their youthful, rose-colored world. ABC Maze was a bit more metallic and trendy, hip even, I thought, but was effective as well, holding certain strengths over the original game. abcTris, I think, is the most challenging and complex of the three, which is offset by the toddler-ish drawings. I think the design should more effectively appeal to the older age of child that would play this game. For simple word games, I would think ages 4-5 would be appropriate, and based on my interactions with nieces and nephews of that age, I have the feeling they might view this game as too “babyish.” Who knows, maybe kids today in certain lights are way more precocious than previous generations (and by precocious I don’t mean intellectually or intelligently, just maturity in regards to how they perceive material possessions and their own self-identity). Then again, I started reading at age 2, so perhaps a game like this would have appealed to me at that younger age.

Regardless, it’s a great game for any kid testing out his spelling skills.