Reader Rabbit Thinking Adventures Ages.dmg

This is a list of Reader Rabbit games released since its debut in 1983. The series consists of sub-series such as Math Rabbit, Reading Journey and Reading Development Library. Reader Rabbit's 2nd Grade combines learning and fun in a multidisciplinary progressive adventure tale. This interactive environment encourages 2nd graders to explore the castle and, along the way, build essential skills for reading, writing, math, science, and thinking through six different types of activities including Skillways, Read.

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Reader Rabbit is an Edutainment Game series created by The Learning Company for kids up to second grade. The series consists of several games, each one dedicated either to a specific grade level (apparently 'baby' and 'toddler' are grades now) or to a specific subject. The games for third grade through sixth grade instead feature The ClueFinders.

It started in 1986 and became very successful in the educational market. In 2001, the series was given a big makeover; Reader Rabbit became more adventurous and was given a drastic redesign. Sam the Lion and the Pi-rats were promoted from supporting characters to major ones and were also redesigned. Two new characters, a floating book named Paige and a treasure chest named Chester, were added. Matilda Mouse, Babs Beaver, Charlie Chipmunk, Pierre Raccoon, Baby Bear, Papa Bear, Spike the Porcupine, Penelope the Parrot and Pop were all removed.

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This game series provides examples of:

  • Alliterative Name: Reader Rabbit, Charlie Chipmunk, Babs Beaver, Baby Bear, Matilda Mouse. Basically, a series staple.
  • Artifact Title: The very first Reader Rabbit focused only on reading. The developers tried to avert this by calling other games Math Rabbit and Writer Rabbit, but this caused confusion. Hence, all later games would revert to Reader Rabbit, regardless of what subject was covered. Eventually, the series stopped focusing on one subject and just focused on everything in the later installments.
  • Ascended Extra: In the late 1990s games, Sam the Lion and the Pi-rats were supporting characters. In the 2001 reboot, they became main characters on par with Reader Rabbit.
  • Barefoot Cartoon Animal: Reader in the 1989-1991 games (where he wears a red sweater and blue overalls) and the 2001 version (where he wears a red shirt and blue jeans). Some of the other characters are this as well.
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  • A Dog Named 'Dog': Baby Bear and Papa Bear, minor characters from the late 1990s games.
  • Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: Nearly all of the supporting characters from the late 1990s titles were left out of the 2001 reboot. Apart from Reader Rabbit, only Sam the Lion and the Pi-Rats were retained.
  • Compilation Re Release: Reader Rabbit's Playtime for Baby and Reader Rabbit Toddler was eventually combined into a single disc release called Reader Rabbit's Playtime for Baby and Toddler, with a bonus Fly the Dreamship game thrown in the later versions of the disc (which stands out as a sore thumb because the Dreamship is not part of the pre-2001 canon that the other two games are).
  • Cool Boat: Reader and Sam's flying Dreamship.
  • A Day in the Limelight:
    • Sam the lion, who is usually a supporting character, became the main character of 2nd Grade.
    • Mat has a minimal (or nonexistent) role in most of the other games, but she is the lead character in Reader Rabbit Playtime for Baby, Reader Rabbit Toddler, Reader Rabbit and Friends: Let's Start Learning, Reader Rabbit Preschool and Reader Rabbit Kindergarten
  • Early Installment Weirdness: Reader Rabbit and Friends: Let's Start Learning has a few. Mat is drawn differently and Reader still retained his older 92-95 looks. Also, Wonder Pony talks—Wonder Pony doesn't speak in the later titles.
  • Foreshadowing: In the second grade game, the dragon's song at the top of the second tower gives an early hint that the dragon doesn't have any malicious intentions (and relatedly, Reader Rabbit doesn't need saving from him).
  • Game-Breaking Bug: Version 2.0 of some of the titles introduced Speech Recognition. The ADAPT 'Personalized' versions of said titles (internally version 3.0) has broken support for speech recognition- the feature rarely worked out of the box and under certain circumstances the user won't even be prompted about it during install. In the latter case, the feature is effectively Dummied Out unless the user takes the initiative to enable the feature manually, which involves installing the support libraries and then editing the configuration file by hand. On the other hand, speech recognition rarely worked as intended and often mishears commands anyway.
  • Half-Dressed Cartoon Animal: Reader only wears a red sweater in the 1992-1995 games and a red-and-blue-striped sweater in the 1997-2001 games.
    • Sam in the 2001 version only wears a green shirt, even though he wears no clothes in previous versions.
  • Hello, [Insert Name Here]: Reader Rabbit Thinking Adventures takes your name entry and matches it against a database of pre-recorded names available on the CD-ROM.
  • In Name Only: Within the franchise itself to boot. There are effectively two games with the same titles from Reader Rabbit Personalized Preschool through Reader Rabbit Personalized Second Grade- one set from before the 2001 reboot, and another set from after. Seeking Baby Bear, Babs Beaver, Pierre Racoon, Charlie Chipmunk, Mat the Mouse or the other characters you so cherished playing with back in your childhood? The ones that are currently still being sold isn't the title you're looking for.
  • King of Beasts: Conversed at the beginning of Interactive Reading Journey, in which Sam was crying because he has no kingdom (despite being a lion, no less) and he tells Reader (who asks him what it means):
    'I'm a lion, and a lion should be king. King of the forest. That's what a lion is. But I have no kingdom, I have no castle, and I have no crown!'
  • Meaningful Name: Reader Rabbit is a rabbit who likes reading. Also, Paige is a manual.
  • The Musical Musical: The theme of Reader Rabbit 1st Grade.
  • No Name Given: Three of the Pi-rats: the Only Sane Girl, The Unintelligible, and the Cool Old Guy.
  • Off-Model: Many of the pre-rendered cut scenes.
  • Panthera Awesome: Sam.
  • Poor Communication Kills: In one game, Reader leaves Sam a letter saying, 'Dear Sam: Meet me at the castle, and hurry!' Since the castle is spooky and owned by a dragon, Sam assumes Reader needs rescuing. Actually, Reader and the dragon are friends.
    • Also present in the Pi-rats’ first game: they think Reader and Sam want to steal their cheese. In their final cutscene before they try to attack them in the ending, the Only Sane Girl attempts to reason with Ratbeard that they’re about to leave the island and they never took any cheese, but the other Pi-rats shoot down her opinion.
  • The Power of Friendship: While Sam is wandering about the dragon's castle, he wonders if he does actually have what it takes to defeat him. He concludes that if he has to in order to save Reader Rabbit, yes, he does.
  • Pungeon Master: Monstrous Mirror in 2nd Grade. Almost every time he shows up, he utters a pun, such as 'Let me spend some time...reflecting on that!'
  • Shout-Out:
    • Pearl the Pi-rat often channels Ethel Merman.
    • Papa Bear makes one to The Lion King with a Sam the lion puppet in Thinking Adventures
Thinking

Chia Homer

  • Species Surname: Every character.
  • Summer Campy: Averted with the theme of the late 1990s Reader Rabbit Kindergarten, in which the summer camp it takes place in, Camp Happy Tales, is intended to be happy.
  • Updated Re-release: The personalized versions of the late 1990s games. They adapt to the abilities of the player; if you're doing good, you get the hard stuff, and vice versa, and before this, overlapping with Tech Demo Game, the inclusion of speech recognition in version 2 of some games.
  • Villain Song: Five of the Pi-rats get this in their debut game. The only one who doesn’t is The Unintelligible.
  • Wrong Assumption: In the late 1990s Reader Rabbit 2nd Grade, Sam believes he is the brave friend who rescues Reader Rabbit from the evil dragon. He is actually just picking up the widgets the dragon needs to finish a rocket ship.
    • In Math, the Pi-rats think Reader and Sam intend on stealing their cheese and thus try to hurt them, but they have no such intentions and simply want to leave.
  • You Dirty Rat!: The Pi-rats.

Reader Rabbit Thinking Adventures Ages.dmg 2

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