Mayan Mysteries {Educational Website Review}
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We have been having lots of fun trying out Mayan Mysteries, an educational computer game from Dig-It Games for review. The game is intended for kids in grades 5-9, but my son is in 3rd grade & loved it! It teaches all about history of the Mayan people in ancient Central America in such an engaging way. It is $21.99 for a single user license, there are also classroom licenses and an iPad version. While only one person can play it at a time with a single user license, you can start it over with another child after they finish.
The background story of the game: A looter has been digging up Maya sites, clearly looking for something specific. Could it be the mystifying Ladrone, a secretive thief with a history of stealing artifacts? Whoever it is, it’s up to Team Q to stop it! Can you help them solve the mystery? Put your puzzle skills to the test as you travel through history and uncover the adventure of Mayan Mysteries!
It starts with a comic telling the story about an artifact thief that you have to help find and capture. You learn information about different historical topics related to the Mayans. Then you are quizzed on what you learn. As you accomplish different tasks, you get clues about the thief to help you find him.
There are many educational games and activities along the way: Digging up and identifying artifacts, treasure hunts back in time, marking maps to learn the geography of the area, helping people with selling their merchandise in the market (lots of math skills!), make a Mayan calendar, etc. Each one teaches great skills such as puzzle solving, math, geography, analyzing data, history, archaeology, and more.
You can try out a demo for free on their site to see if your child will like it. When we tried it to decide if we wanted to review it, my son immediately fell in love and wanted to keep playing. He has played through the whole game now and can’t wait for the next level to come out. When you finish this first level, you do not complete the whole mission. That was a little disappointing to him, since he worked so hard and didn’t get any resolution. That would be my one downfall of this game.
I will say I was really impressed with the quality of the game. I love how much he learned while playing it. There were some math problems that I had to help him work through, but other than that, he was able to do it on his own. The game has no violence or graphic content, which I really appreciate. There is so much to learn through playing it, that I don’t mind my son doing it at all!
