Simple fun to keep young kids busy on your phone or tablet
Older kids have no trouble finding the apps they want to download, but for younger ones it’s going to be you who’s doing the choosing – and you’d better get it right. Make the wrong choice and you may find yourself with an app that milks the freemium model to the max, with most of the game blocked off unless you make some fast in-app purchases. And explaining to a toddler that spending £10 of real money on a single new level of an app they’ll probably play twice…well, it’s never going to be easy. Not only will these apps keep your little ones busy, they’re also mercifully free of ads or further costs.
Lego Duplo Train
Toca Boca is a games publisher that only makes kids’ apps – and only good ones, at that. Toca Kitchen 2 is recently released and is one of its best. It enables kids to do absolutely anything they like in the kitchen – from deep frying lettuce to making a fish and carrot smoothie – and then serve up the results to their virtual ‘guests’. For kids, the fun of the game is in having free rein across all of the culinary gadgets they’re not allowed to touch in real life – and also in the crude and amusing reactions of their guests to the bizarre food that’s served up.
