Built-in camera

Color Collector (or Colour Collector for my fellow Canucks) is a really neat concept for a game that appeals to a wide range of ages.

This is another game offered by the fine folks at Tickle Tap Apps, is available from the iTunes App Store for a budget-conscious $1.99.  It’s rated 4+, (and now I’m starting to understand that “4+” actually translates to “everyone” — most people don’t trust their phone with a 3-year-old though!)

The basic premise for this game is to send your children on a scavenger hunt collecting each of the six colours represented in the colour wheel.  You do this by finding objects of the appropriate colour and snapping a picture of them (by tapping the screen).

Snapping a picture

It’s ridiculously easy to use, and pretty darn accurate.  Occasionally, it will get the colour wrong (my testing showed most problems with Orange and Purple — it doesn’t do well identifying dark versions of those colours), but I’d say that it gets it right at least 85% of the time.

When you tap the screen, it will instantly identify the colour for you, and play a short animation.  A star will then appear in the upper-left corner representing each of the colours you’ve collected.  Every 2 pictures, a short animation will play (nice touch, but gets a little pointless and repetitive after the first couple of times).

My only real gripe is that once you’ve collected all 6 colours, the game just resets.  There’s no “final animation” or some indicator to show that you’ve collected them all.  That’s one of my complaints though, my kids have never commented on it. -by Jon

The amazing Jonathan Lane is the founder of Industry Interactive and Discover Gulf Islands. He blogs at Flying Troll and tweets here. He has worked with my brilliant & incredibly hot husband and according to him, Jon is one of the nicest and smartest guys you’d ever care to meet. My husband is a damn good judge of character, so there you go.

Win it! Tickle Tap Apps is giving away a $20 iTunes gift card to one randomly selected T.O.P. reader who’d like to try Tickle Tap Apps. Just comment below to be entered. Due to technical issues, we’ve extended this contest to close at noon mst on FEB 24, 2010.

As soon as I read about the Flip video camera, I knew I wanted one. I ended up ordering a Flip Ultra for next to nothing during an Amazon sale and had it shipped to someone in the US for free who then shipped it to me in Canada for just a few bucks. It pretty awesome with it’s super easy operation, 30 minutes of video and wicked flip out USB connection for seamless and fast transfers, but when I got my slick personalized Flip Mino HD I knew I had hit the jackpot. It shoots 60 minutes of footage in cinematic quality high-definition widescreen and is sleek like no video camera I’ve ever seen. As a parent, the customization appeals to me strongly – the picture of my children on my camera pretty much rocks – but the ease of use and quality of the video wins out over any other cool feature. It’s so convenient to just stick in my pocket when I head out with my kids and now I can capture anything and everything they do in high definition with just the push of a button, and transfer it all to my laptop, edit it and capture screen shots as images with no cords and no video editing ability.

Generally I like to share some negatives of any product – particularly when it’s a product from a big company – but I’ve got nothing. This thing freaking rocks.

Mom Central CANADA (yay!) is giving away 3 customizable Flip MinoHDs on Momcentral.com/canada. To enter, send an email to momcentral@live.com with the Flip password TOP in the subject line. Contest ends October 19, 2009 and is Canadians of legal age only.

Does your child love animals? Maybe they aspire to become a veterinarian when they grow up or maybe you always wanted to be a vet? My daughter adores animals and would gladly bring strays home whenever she can. However, she is just beginning to understand some of the responsibilities of caring for pets.

Pet Pals: A New Leash on Life from Legacy Games is a challenging, educational and fun way to learn all about all sorts of animals as the new vet at the Pet Pals Animal Shelter. The graphics are amazing and the game play was perfect for her to follow along. My daughter adored nursing the sick animals back to health. We started with the tutorial, so we helped Sunshine, a stray kitten.

The game is packed full of information about not only animals but also many career options for those who want to work with animals. We spent a lot time in the tutorial, as my daughter is new to the computer and she really wanted to spend time with the kitten. With 35 unique cases to diagnose and treat, the game has lasting power. The cases were written by real-life veterinarians and introduce children to 15 different animals.

Our favourite part was once our kitten was healthy, and we were able to put the little guy up for adoption at the shelter. We adopted both our family cats, so my daughter was really into the process. All in all, a really fun game to play with your children (or once they have gone to bed!) Pet Pals: A New Leash on Life is available for both PC and Mac, and is rated E for everyone. Get it here for under $20. My five year old needed assistance & some explanation but enjoyed playing the game a lot. - by Chelle

Win it! We’re giving away a copy of this game to one lucky reader. To enter, leave a comment on this post by noon mst on June 11, 2009.

CONTEST CLOSED & WINNER EMAILED

Many of our readers are bloggers who are proficient designers, SEO optimizers and all around tech geniuses. Many of our readers are bloggers who know how to post from a blogging platform, Tweet a little and use Facebook. Some of you, we know, are simply folks who sit at home entering contests just for fun. We’re cool with all of you, and though we certainly identify more with the first group, this review is leaning a little toward the latter groups.

Christina Tynan-Wood’s How To Be a Geek Goddess from No Starch Press is geared specifically towards women who want to know more about all sorts of technology. Whether you’re buying a computer, surfing the web, shopping for a cell phone, checking your email, wanting to keep your kids safe on the web ro are wandering aimlessly in the electronics aisle, Christina has you covered. She has a great grasp of how the “average” woman and the “average” man differ (yes, I know…none of us are “average”…) and she gives the non-geek woman a comprehensive and incredibly easy to read & understand guide to today’s tech in this book.

How To Be a Geek Goddess is going for only $16 at Amazon right now, and qualifies for free super saver shipping.

Win it! We’re giving away a copy of this fab geek read! To enter, leave a comment on this post before noon mst on March 6, 2009.

CONTEST CLOSED & WINNER EMAILED