Genre: Action/Adventure
Publisher: Take-Two Interactive
Developer: Black Lantern
Release Date: October 27, 2008

By now, most parents of very young children are probably familiar with Dora the Explorer and her male counterpart, Diego. The "Go, Diego, Go" franchise has been running strong for three seasons of pre-preschool-aged adventures, teaching kids Spanish and all sorts of simplified factoids that have been mashed up and made ready for general consumption. Diego's mostly concerned about saving the wildlife of the world, which is a noble goal, but it gets to be a little ridiculous when he dedicates an entire set of licensed games to saving a species that's been long extinct.

Go, Diego, Go! Great Dinosaur Rescue is an attempt to bring a recent episode of the popular show to life and make it even more accessible to kids through the DS' touch-screen. Of course, this raises the question of "How young is too young for video games?" but this is a review, not a child-care seminar. If parents are comfortable enough around technology to let the TV teach their kids before preschool rolls around, then they're not going to object to the kids prodding through a simple application on a touch-screen.

"Simple" is definitely the correct word for Great Dinosaur Rescue, though. It may be an interactive video game, but the show is probably just as interactive. As with the show, there's no real way for kids to get anything wrong. Throughout the game, no matter what you do, you won't have to worry about suffering from the consequences of your actions. Since the title is intended for such young children, though, it's unfair to fault it for its lack of difficulty. If you start punishing them for circling a deadly spike when they were asked to circle "something for Diego to land on," you'd have a bunch of crying kids who don't want to play the game anymore.

To get kids involved, the developers created about a half-dozen mini-games for kids to help Diego through as they go through the game. These include activities such as finding dinosaurs and photographing them with Click the Camera, following the Maiasaura footprints by picking them out of a lineup, and stomping like a dinosaur by clicking footprints when they appear. There's never any urgency in them, but they're a way for the child to get actually, physically involved in Diego's educational adventure, which is really a huge step up from the purely televised antics.

There's also a mode available right from the beginning of Great Dinosaur Rescue for the child to skip the story and just play through the games, but the games are repeated so often and the story is so short that there's no reason a child would ever have to pick through them. What is a nice addition is a little dinosaur-matching game that not only reinforces the names of the dinosaurs, but also provides a little something different from the rest of the title. There's a decent memory game buried in here that is really a highlight of the whole experience for the kiddies.

Perhaps Great Dinosaur Rescue stands out so much because it's really the only spot in the game that isn't a close copy of an action from the show. There's almost nothing here to differentiate it from the show on which it's based, which is a big issue when you look at the price. Currently, the game goes for $30, which is standard for a DS game. However, the DVD, which contains Great Dinosaur Rescue and two other episodes for only $15, and your kid will be as happy as peaches to watch those episodes over and over again.

So what is the point of making Go, Diego, Go! Great Dinosaur Rescue? It makes the most sense on the DS handheld than on any of the other consoles. The DS is a simple, tiny (and nearly unbreakable) system, with slightly cheaper game production costs and an incredibly easy interface. Any kid can click a stylus against a screen, which is a much more involving way for them to interact with Diego and pals, instead of just shouting at the TV screen. The game is just as good as the show at doing what it does, so I'll leave the purchase decision in your hands, capable parents.

Score: 6.0/10