Art Academy: Lessons for Everyone! is another one of those titles that falls into the “not a video game” category and is more an interactive application that happens to be on a dedicated gaming handheld. Before I get into my review, I’m going to make it clear that I am no artist, and in fact I’m not even going to share my “art” with you. These are stock PR screens from Nintendo.
Now that we’ve got that out of the way, I actually had a lot of fun with Art Academy on 3DS. The game starts off with a pretty robust tutorial program to get you acquainted with the stylus controls and some basic technique (which is great for non-artists like me).
The tutorials were very easy to follow and taught many techniques such as how to sketch, how to add layers, and how to add shading. The nice thing about the tutorials is that you can save at any time and come back later, which makes it very easy to pick up and resume if you only have a few spare minutes.
I managed to make it through the entire introduction for this review, and I walked away impressed. But I actually had the most fun with the “Free Paint” mode. The game has a few built in images that let you practice lighting techniques and such, but probably the coolest feature is the ability to take pictures with the 3DS camera and then use the Free Paint tools to draw what you see.
The presentation is fantastic. Everything feels earthy and organic, exactly what I would imagine it would be like to be an artist. Navigating the menus, I can almost smell the wood, paper, and paints. The game has fantastic music to set the mood. Those little touches make a world of difference in what could have just been a lame art tutorial.
The game also has tools that allow you to share your work with friends online via spotpass, and you can even create your own lessons to send to friends. It would have been nice to have an online gallery to upload your work to, so that other non-3DS owners could view your work (ala Colors 3D)
Note: I did not download the additional lessons for this review.
Overall
Will it turn you into an artist? Maybe, maybe not. But it is certainly a fun little app on the 3DS. My one and only complaint is that the initial asking price is a little steep for an art program, although to be fair, the lessons are very nice, and you’d pay far more for private lessons or an actual art class.
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Title: Crosswords Plus Publisher: Nintendo Developer: Nintendo Platform: 3DS Release Date: October 1, 2012 Genre: Puzzle MSRP: $29.99 ESRB: E |
