Crazy Machines: The Wacky Contraptions Game (PC & Mac)

Customer Reviews:

My kids love this game! AND it runs fine on my computer
I bought this for my kids for Christmas of '05. One om my kids is playing at this moment - 12 months later. I have it installed on their Mac Mini and it has never once crashed or displayed any "buggy" issues. On occasion they have played it on my iMac G5, also with no issues.

I'm here today because I was looking for a similar game or an add on, when I read some reviews reporting issues. So to repeat - my kids love it, I love it (it is educational as well as fun), and it runs without problems on at least two my computers.

We also own, and love, Learn to Play Chess with Fritz and Chesster, which is from the same company. That software has also given us zero trouble.
--2006-12-17

Game will NOT work
We bought this game for my son Mark from a local Target. We could not get the game to run at all. We attempted to return the game to Target but they stated "We no longer carry it; you can return it to a store 90 miles away for an exchange." No thanks, Target. We also sent an email to the manufacturer and they never bothered to respond.

So stick with Nintendo games and you'll be happy.
--2006-12-07

Buggy
Continually pauses on a high-end computer with WinXp. If it didn't do this the game would be wonderful for children. Having read this in other folks disappointment with customer support and that there is no patch to be found on the Web, I wouldn't recommend it.
--2006-12-04

sick game
i am a very sad kid cos my mum wont let me play the PC on the week cos of skool but wen i found dis game she let me play it cos it is very educational and fun at da same time. dis is a good game and a saviour 4 kids like me. thx
--2006-11-28

Fun game, but runs very poorly on Macs
I have a fairly new Intel iMac and an older G4 Powerbook, and I was looking for games for my mechanically-inclined 5 year old son that would run on Macs. The game does run on both the Intel and G4 Mac, but crashes frequently - one learns to save "inventions" constantly to avoid losing a masterpiece. Also, the sound frequently stops and can't be restored unless you exit and restart the program. And, if that weren't enough, it becomes unbearably slow when you have more than 20 - 30 elements in your "inventions." I also have Parallels for the iMac which allows me to run Windows programs. The PC version would install but refused to run at all in Parallels. Needless to say, it's a very frustrating program, at least for Mac users. From these reviews it appears that some even some "real" PC/Windows users have similar problems. Apart from the Mac problems, the other weakness of the program is that there is very little help available and the (tiny) printed and electronic manuals are not particularly helpful, and there isn't much in the way of "getting started" or "hints." On the other hand, this is supposed to be a "figure it out yourself" type of game, so that's not a major problem.

Having said all that, the game itself is a blast, and my son loves building contraptions with building blocks of electricity (batteries, motors, generators, switches, etc.), fire, light, steam, bouncing balls, explosives, etc. (Think "Rube Goldberg" if that term means anything to you.) I see some resemblance to "real" contraptions I built (with considerably more risk...) as a youngster. The games are challenging, perhaps too challenging, even for adults. And it's technically accurate - for example, in a daisy-chain of light-bulbs and solar panels, each successive light in the chain will be dimmer than the previous one due to losses in transmission. For those to whom it matters, the First and Second Laws of Thermodynamics are not violated. (Suggestion to the authors: create a sequel program that allows one to build moving vehicles and obstacle courses based on these building blocks.)
--2006-11-24

- Viva Media