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Zoombinis are the main characters in a line of educational software created by TERC, and designed by Scot Osterweil and Chris Hancock. It was originally released by Brøderbund Software (now The Learning Company) in 1995. The series is aimed at children older than 8 years. Some educators consider the original to be one of the greatest educational computer games of all time, and numerous awards are shared by the trilogy. Brøderbund Software was a maker of computer games, educational software and the Print Shop productivity tools. ...
The Learning Company (TLC) is an American educational software company, founded in 1980. ...
Original storyline
Zoombinis ready to get on the boat at Zoombini Isle The original storyline of the series begins with the first game, Zoombinis: Logical Journey (originally called The Logical Journey of the Zoombinis when released by Brøderbund). As explained in its introduction, the Zoombinis are the peaceful and successful inhabitants an island called Zoombini Isle (or Zoombini Island). One day their lives are interrupted by a somewhat evil race known as the Bloats, who offer to expand their businesses and improve their quality of life. The Zoombinis naively trust the Bloats, who soon take over the island and enslave the Zoombinis. The Zoombinis devise an escape route and set sail on a boat to find a new homeland (later called "Zoombiniville"). To complete the game, the player must transport 625 Zoombinis in groups of 16 through a total of 12 puzzles to Zoombiniville. Image File history File links Logzoombini. ...
Image File history File links Logzoombini. ...
Since The Learning Company purchased Brøderbund Software in 1998 they have created two more games (sequels to the original) known as Zoombinis: Mountain Rescue and Zoombinis: Island Odyssey, both with different storylines.
Gameplay
Zoombini selection screen At the start of each game the player has the ability to choose a party of 16 random Zoombinis by selecting from five different types of eyes, noses, hair and feet. Each Zoombini has a different combination of each of these characteristics and only two Zoombinis can be the same. (Making the total number of possible Zoombinis as 1250, twice the number the player needs to rescue.) Each Zoombini has a name randomly chosen by the computer from its list of several thousand, though it can be swapped before its creation. This name remains with them for the entire game. Image File history File links Zoombini. ...
Image File history File links Zoombini. ...
The party of Zoombinis then must pass through one "leg" of three puzzles before arriving at a resting place. There are four legs of the journey, but the player can choose between the second or third of these sets and only needs to pass through three to finish. These puzzles vary in play, but usually involve determining and then following rules regarding the characteristics of the Zoombinis, for example, sending Zoombinis with green noses down the first path and ones with differently coloured noses down the second. If the player makes a mistake while completing a puzzle, then either the Zoombini involved is then lost or not all Zoombinis may be able to pass through. Those that do not make it through a puzzle are sent to the previous rest checkpoint. A full party of 16 must be present at a checkpoint to continue, but a party that has lost some members may continue through its leg to the next rest area. The levels of difficulty applied to each puzzle are "not so easy," "oh, so hard," "very hard," and "very, very hard." Once three entire parties of 16 Zoombinis have passed through one leg of the journey, the puzzles between those resting camps increase one level in difficulty and cannot be reverted. The first time a leg is completed perfectly at a certain level of difficulty, a new building appears in Zoombiniville. A total of 16 may be built, as there are four legs and four levels.
Storylines of new games
Zoombinis: Mountain Rescue After the foundation of Zoombiniville, the Zoombinis find peace once more, until a group of them become trapped inside a cave seeking shelter from a storm. Eventually they meet up with strange creatures called Boolies who occupy a city known as Booliewood. As a result of the storm, the Boolies have been scattered across the land, and their leader, the Grand Boolie Boolie, has disappeared. The goal of the game is to recruit a total of 400 Boolies to Booliewood to resurrect the Grand Boolie Boolie.
In the final puzzle, the game uses the Boolie characters to teach how binary values are stored in computers, replicating up to four bits (a nibble) at a time. Only addition is shown, never any other operation. For other uses, see Nibble (disambiguation). ...
Players have to try to change a series of boolean "Boolies" from random mood states (happy is 1 and sad is 0) into a pattern of all happy (1111) by adding integer values to the series. When they are all happy, they make their way to a ship that carries them to their promised land: Booliewood. After they've all made their way home, the grand Boolie Boolie returns and the game has been won. Map of the Land of Israel as defined in the Bible The Promised Land (Hebrew: ×”×רץ המובטחת, translit. ...
Other puzzles in the game include multi-dimensional movement, rotation puzzles, and several deduction problems, as well as new versions of puzzles from the original.
The graphics have been upgraded in this game and the Zoombinis have a new appearance. There are three difficulty levels for each puzzle instead of four.
Zoombinis: Island Odyssey In this game, the Zoombinis discover that they left the butterflies to die in their native land of Zoombini Isle. So they take a boat and travel to Zoombini Isle, which is now completely empty of the Bloats (who made the land barren and then moved on), and then must again complete different puzzles, such as growing berries and breeding butterflies, to eventually set off a chain reaction that will restore the entire ecosystem to its original glory. This is the first game to incorporate science in the puzzles, which include intersection of rates, decoding, astronomical time, Venn diagrams, and Punnett squares, as well as some reincarnations of puzzles from Logical Journey. The graphics have again changed, and the Zoombinis' features are no longer important to gameplay.
Creatures The most important creatures in the series are of course the Zoombinis, but there are several other characters outlined below.
Bloats The Bloats are the race featured at the start of the original Zoombini game and are the creatures that drive the Zoombinis from their homeland. Very little other information about them is known.
Boolies The Boolies are creatures from the Zoombinis: Mountain Rescue game who can either be happy or sad. Their name is derived from Boolean logic, a kind of logic that has two states that is used extensively inside computers. Boolean logic is a complete system for logical operations. ...
Captain Cajun This character can be found in the first game, He paddles in his wooden raft around the "Who's Bayou". He'll give Zoombinis a ride only if they have something in common with their neighbor when they sit down on his raft. If they sit down and have nothing in common, he'll stomp on buttons and pull levers that eject Zoombinis into the water or back onto the dock. He also gives occasional taunts and compliments to certain Zommbinis.
Fleens The Fleens are, in many ways, similar to the Zoombinis, as they too also feature different noses, hair, eyes, and feet. However, they are portrayed as the "evil" parallel race of the Zoombinis. The Fleens are also rumored to be the Zoombinis' distant cousins, until their genetic code was messed up by a bad batch of hair mousse. Hair mousse is a rair but highly saught after chemical found within the liver of the gorilla. ...
Norfs The Norfs are creatures from the Zoombinis: Mountain Rescue game. Norfs either live or play under the snow, surfacing to get in the way of Zoombinis while they attempt to carefully snowboard a specific route on the mountain. They also pester the Zoombinis to give them exactly what they want for lunch out of a selection of fish, sandwiches, salads, milk, orange juice, tea, ice cream, watermelon, and pie.
Oola Oola is a squirrel-like raccoon that runs a hotel in the "Deep Dark Forest". From time to time she often practices with her absent music companion "Charlie"
Pizza Trolls Arno, Willa and Shyler are the three pizza trolls that appear to resemble tree stumps. They will let the Zoombinis pass if they can correctly make a different pizza for each of the trolls. Once a Zoombini makes a pizza, a troll will either reject it or accept it, commanding the Zoombini to add more toppings until they make the precise pizza. When the level of difficulty rises, more pizza toppings and trolls are introduced. Arno is the stubby, ill-tempered one, Willa, the gaudy type and Shyler is the one who seems very patient at first, Shyler can quickly turn zany if his pizza isn't made correctly in four or five tries.
Differences between Brøderbund and TLC games The main differences between the versions of Zoombinis: Logical Journey released by both Brøderbund Software and The Learning Company are the way they are written and not the gameplay itself. The Brøderbund game is built with QuickTime and was designed to run on Windows 3.1 and Windows 95 (however it still works perfectly with all later versions of Windows including Windows Vista). All of the games released by The Learning Company are built with DirectX and therefore do not run on Windows 3.1 at all. Brøderbund Software was a maker of computer games, educational software and the Print Shop productivity tools. ...
The Learning Company (TLC) is an American educational software company, founded in 1980. ...
Brøderbund Software was a maker of computer games, educational software and the Print Shop productivity tools. ...
QuickTime is a multimedia framework developed by Apple Inc. ...
A typical Windows 3. ...
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1. ...
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The Learning Company (TLC) is an American educational software company, founded in 1980. ...
System requirements of TLC version
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