Classes are starting back up over the next couple of weeks, and, even though you still have some time before your first paper is due, you’re still going to need to appear a little with it on your first day. What better way to dust off your summer sun baked brain than with some video games designed to make you think… not too much (we wouldn’t want that), but just enough to prime your neurons to be fired once school starts.
Professor Layton and The Mysterious Box (Nintendo DS)
I know… you don’t want to think about Professors until your sitting in class again, but “Professor Layton” is a little different. His adventure to find out the mysteries of a box that kills people will work your brain right back into shape. Help the Professor out by solving puzzles for every character you meet in the game, and set the world right again.
1 vs. 100 (Xbox 360)
What better way to get ready for setting your classes curve than proving that you’re smarter than 100 other people in Microsoft’s free (for gold members) “1 vs. 100,” the massive trivia game based on the TV show of the same name. Oh, as an added bonus, if you’re smart enough, you could even win actual prizes.
Scrabble (Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii)
Kick your vocab into high gear, and get ready to write all those English papers with a few game’s of “Scrabble,” one of the games that’s a part of “Hasbro’s Family Game Night” compilation on Xbox Live Arcade. If the standard game is a little much for you, there’s always Scrabble Ladders mode where you race to get from one side of the board to the other.
Jeopardy (iPhone)
Remembering to phrase your answers in the form of a question may not help you at your Chem Seminar, but rattling off answers to challengingly random trivia questions should. Besides, you get to write your own name to be displayed on the podium – how cool is that?
Art Style: Base 10 (Nintendo DSi)
“Base 10″ proves the theory that “everything you needed to know, you learned in kindergarten”; it’s always the simplest math that really matters. The entire game is based around making single digit numbers add up to ten. Sounds easy right? Yeah, not so much. You’ll learn very quickly that two 3s, a 2, and a 1, in fact, do not equal 10. Give it a few rounds and you’ll be ready to bang out those spreadsheets for your accounting class in no time.
Brain Age Express: Art and Letters (Nintendo DSi)
Think of “Brain Age Express: Art and Letters” as “10 Minute Abs,” just for your grey matter. Like a bite size version of Nintendo’s ü ber-successful “Brain Age” series, “Art and Letters” focuses on the visual minigames that were included in the previous two compilations. But, it’s not just a rehash of old stuff, it includes updated features that showoff some of the DSi’s new camera functionality.
Trivial Pursuit (Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Nintendo Wii)
“Trivial Pursuit” has always had a timeless formula; mixing challenging trivia questions with people’s insatiable hunger for pie. Get your brain juices flowing by taking a trip around the board in original mode, or kick it up a notch, and play the Facts and Friends and Clear the Board mode with your friends. As an added bonus, since it’s a video game, there shouldn’t be any arguments over whether the card said it’s “The Moors” or “The Moops.”
Bookworm Adventures 2 (PC)
Thanks to AIM and Twitter your basic English skills may have taken a beating, well “Bookworm Adventures 2″ looks to rehab them just in time for school by mashing them up with a little worm-based combat. Yeah, you read that correctly. Spell the words and Lex, the game’s invertebrate star, will attack his foes including classic literary figures, like the March Hare and Medusa. It’s a pretty safe bet that your Classic Lit class won’t be anything like this.
Brain Challenge (Nintendo DSi)
You know what needs a workout? Your brain. Try not to think about the Freshmen 15 you’re going to put on (or are trying to take off), while you exercise whats inside your head with “Brain Challenges”‘ forty plus brain crunching minigames. At the very least, it will get you ready for organizing your schedule so you can have four day weekends.
Secret of Monkey Island Special Edition (iPhone)
If you’ve got a 19th century history class on your schedule this semester, don’t worry about it, “Secret of Monkey Island Special Edition” will have that whole pirate section covered for you. More of a traditional video game than anything else on the list, “Monkey Island” updates the original point-and-click adventure release from 1990, with shiny new graphics, and an entirely new interface. The game’s stars the one and only, Guybrush Threepwood as he sets off to become a pirate, and the mind-bending puzzles that he comes across will surely get you ready to take on anything your professors throw at you.
