Learn with Pokémon Typing Adventure (Nintendo DS) Review

Typing games can be fun, as anyone that played Typing of the Dead can attest to. However, they can also be extremely mundane and repetitive. Fair play to Genius Sonority, though, as the team has attempted to ensure Learn with Pokémon Typing Adventure has adopters entertained for as long as possible with plenty of typing exercises. Sadly, though, the handy little wireless keyboard that comes bundled in the package will undoubtedly be returned to its box post haste.

The justification behind Typing Adventure is that players are enlisted to the Elite Typists' Club, under the guidance of Professor Q. Werty and his assistant, Paige Down. Overlooking the cheap typing-related puns, the mission is to work through automatically scrolling levels tapping certain letters, numbers, and symbols as quickly as possible, without making any mistakes, in the hope of catching as many specimens with Typing Balls as can be done in the time allotted.

Tap various amounts of letters of Pokémon names as they bounce on-screen, pick up bonuses by hitting certain keys are specific times, and take on boss battles, deflecting projectiles with more key depressions and going in for the kill by spelling their full name in the end. Repetition is indeed imperative to mastering the art of typing skilfully, but despite Genius Sonority's best efforts, the tasks at hand are anything but engaging. The most ardent of Pokémon fan is not going to be drawn in by the menial typing tasks available, and those hoping to brush up on their skills in the hope of bettering themselves in the workplace are not going to overlook the wealth of other, more serious, options out there (many of which are free online) that make use of a full-size keyboard, simply to do lessons with static Pokémon images leaping all over the place. Whilst the heart was there to make a worthwhile impact on the 'edutainment' scene, Genius Sonority's talent should have been put to better use than on Learn with Pokémon Typing Adventure.