Thomas the Tank Engine & Friends

This CD-ROM could win an award for cinematography--the "camera" tracks, zooms, and swoops through the activities. Thomas, Percy, and everyone's favorites, the Troublesome Trucks, move about the Island of Sodor preparing for the upcoming festival. The seven activities are either of the counting/sorting/pattern-recognition variety or ones that work on basic hand-eye coordination and mouse control. Kids can go to the engine shed to polish, oil, and wrench the engines into prime working condition; unload Bulstrode the Barge and fit the packages into the boxcar with the matching label; or help round up cows that escaped from a farmer's pen. Each task has only three levels of difficulty, and they can be completed quickly by a kid with some computer savvy or an older child. Between these chores are short vignettes involving Thomas and his friends, making this CD-ROM feel familiar to fans of the television show.

While the age range for this program is "2 and up," don't assume that it'll keep your 5-year-old busy for very long. But if you have a helpful 3-year-old who needs to learn how to mouse and count, Thomas and Friends can put your child on the right track. --Anne Erickson

Amazon.com Product Description
This game sets players on the Island of Sodor, where Thomas and his friends must prepare for a festival that will soon take place. Each of the five locations on the island includes stops where children can print scenes they can color, as well as awards and certificates.

In the Quarry,there has been a rockslide and you have to fly Harrold over the rocks,pick them up put them in the right trucks for James to tow away.

At the Station,Annie and Clarabelle need your help to figure out which passengers go and which stay.

At the Harbor,Well the Harbor game is pretty much the same as the Quarry game.

At the Fair Ground,help Harrold put together stalls and rides.

At the Field, help Terrence chase cows into their pen.

And at the Band Stand,listen to music and make music with the musicians.

Tip:Skip around after you complete the game.

I loved theis game.It was alot of fun.If you like Thomas get this game now!


Wonderful graphics, great audio   September 9, 2003
8 out of 8 found this review helpful

I bought this software when my son was around 18mnths old. He is a total Thomas fan so he is always asking to play it. He loves to sit and watch Thomas and his friends travel around the island of sodor. He is currently 2yrs old and wants to play it every day. It really is a great piece to have my only complaint would be that he is now starting to get bored with the activities. It doesn't allow children who can not use the mouse to interact with it's games , which is important to keep them content. It also doesn't give you much else to do once you've mastered the five step program. It's the pictures, sound and graphics that keeps them coming back not the content and tools to learning. I would still recommend it don't be too disappointed. It would be nice if they came out with a game that the children could actually drive the train and interact with it choosing what destination to go to as well as being able to stop, start, pull forward and back up the train. something to think about.


good graphics, poor entertainment value   December 28, 2000
L. Blackmore (Norwich, VT United States)
13 out of 14 found this review helpful

While there are some stunning sequences of Thomas & Friends zooming around the island, the interactive sections of this offering do not really cut it.

To begin with, they are mouse intensive, so a toddler who has not yet mastered the mouse will be left watching an adult manipulate the elements involved. Secondly, they are not all that inventive, and some of them downright illogical - when you are presented with a platform full of passengers to load on a train, why should you only be getting the number suggested by the game on board? My son keeps asking me "what about the others" - they just magically disappear off the platform.

Other activities in the game seem a little contrived - clicking on band members and trains simply to hear them make a sound grows old pretty fast, especially when it's done only by moving a mouse. If there had been a "hit a key, see who plays" feature, it would have been a little more enjoyable. Likewise the intitial section where you prepare the engines in the engine shed - putting a drop of oil on a yellow dot, then tightening an imaginary bolt on a yellow dot, then putting coal on a yellow dot - all a little tame.

For real entertainment value I would recommend Reader Rabbit's toddler, which is 100 percent "keyboardable" and offers challenges that can keep a toddler interested for quite some time.

A final word of warning: the game claims to be able to run on a 133Mhz or better PC with 2Mb of video Ram. there is no way that would happen, at least not to the enjoyment of anyone with the patience and attention span of a two year old. The game is slow and clunky, even on a 233Mhz it drags and the sound struggles.


Beautiful graphics but limited   July 19, 2000
55 out of 55 found this review helpful

This software was put together beautifully. The graphics are top notch as is the audio. My 3 year old enjoyed this software for the 8-10 times he played it. It would have been nice to have different levels that the kids could progress to instead of the same game and the same 3 trains in the car wash and other games over and over again. This software is fun and it is part of our library so that we can pull it out every few weeks. I would have preferred something that held his interest for a longer period of time. A nice touch is the ability to print out pictures of the trains either in color or black and white for your kids to color. This part continues to be a hit. Despite my reservations regarding different levels, I still recommend this software.


Outstanding graphics & sound, a bit light in gameplay   May 9, 2000
Louis Rios (Kansas City, MO USA)
33 out of 34 found this review helpful

Thomas, his friends, and the island of Sodor look absolutely fantastic in this game's high quality 3-D graphics. The stereo sound effects are also top-notch. (In fact, graphics and sound are probably much better than they really needed to be for a preschool-age game!) On the downside, the game itself is a bit lacking in terms of things to do, especially for older preschoolers. The activities range from the super-easy (i.e. click on the sponge and then wipe the dirt off Thomas) to the mildly challenging (i.e. put the large rock in the large freight car, the medium-sized rock in the medium-sized car, etc). There aren't a lot of activities, and they don't change with repeated playings. It's probably a great game for kids brand new to the computer and/or for Thomas fans, but more experienced computer-kids will lose interest after a couple of rounds.