M&M's: The Lost Formulas

The Lost Formulas puts kids in the driver's seat as they engage in three levels of play per game, but it's not all fun. There's an "edutainment" component that allows players to practice multilevel math drills (covering topics ranging from basic number recognition to addition, subtraction, multiplication and division), all the while going bonkers searching for the lost formulas hidden by the mischievous Minis. "I could play this forever," raved our 8-year-old tester as he expertly manned the up-, down-, left-, and right-arrow keys for the ride of his life. To turbocharge the fun, our tester suggests pressing the ALT key (Command or Apple key on the Mac) to help Yellow "do his spin attack."

Players can earn extra lives in bonus rounds and play eight zany levels, including:

Get Out of Town: The best arcade driving game we've seen. Here, kids race Yellow and his car through superbly animated cities and suburbs to arrive at the candy factory. This game makes demolition derbies seem tame.

Milk Chocolate: Vats of bubbling chocolate and crazy robots could spell trouble for Yellow. Be sure to jump the chasms and land on the platforms with the correct math answers that match the clues.

Oh, Chute!: Cleverly named, this behind-the-scenes look at the chocolate factory has kids negotiating conveyor belts, moving machinery, and opening chutes as they boost their math sequencing skills.

Candy Colors: Watch out for the flying color blobs while you fly your way through this colorful mess.

Stampin' and Sortin': Dodge the stamping and sorting machines as you run for your sweet life in this cool down round of game play.

Pack It In: Jump on the right candy boxes or else you could be in dangerous trouble. This part is what disaster management is all about.

Warehouse Woes: Who says driving a forklift is work? What a hoot!

The Shocking Truth: Get the skinny when you go behind the factory's power circuits. But don't get zapped in the electrifying final round of game play.

In a nutshell, this fast-paced, cutting-edge CD-ROM plays like a video game, but includes math drills as an added incentive. Grab this software and a bag of M&M's for some yummy fun for the whole family. (Ages 5 to 10) --Tina Velgos

Amazon.com Product Description
In this math-building software package for kids, M&M's candies have turned the factory upside down and torn up all the M&M's candy formulas. It's up to you and Yellow to make things right. As you race through the factory, you'll face churning chocolate, rampaging robots, cascading candy ... and along the way, math drills to test your smarts and challenge your game reflexes. Children, ages 5 to 10, practice age-appropriate addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division drills while they race through a wild and funny action game. With stunning, nonviolent, high-resolution 3-D graphics and a high-paced adventure setting, this is a learning game kids will love.