JumpStart Adventures 5th Grade: Jo Hammet, Kid Detective
Encyclopedia
JumpStart Adventures 5th Grade: Jo Hammet, Kid Detective is an educational
/adventure
computer game in the JumpStart
series, created by Knowledge Adventure
in 1997 and intended for fifth grade
students. Throughout the course of the game, which is set in the fictional city
of Hooverville, the user must (while playing the role of a female, fifth grade detective by the name of Jo Hammet) thwart the schemes of the evil Dr. X, who is planning to destroy factories
and power plants to get revenge
on them for cutting his research
funding
.
Though the game itself has never been significantly updated (beyond the addition of a printable workbook and assessment test when the game was released with new packaging circa 1998), it has been repackaged several times; once with the addition of the Adventure Challenge (later called Extreme Field Trips) bonus disc (circa 2000), once as JumpStart Advanced 5th & 6th Grade (together with Extreme Field Trips and JumpStart Adventures 6th Grade: Mission Earthquest
) in 2003, and once more in 2007 as JumpStart Advanced 4th-6th Grade School Essentials (Together with JumpStart Adventures 4th Grade: Sapphire Falls
, JumpStart Adventures 6th Grade: Mission Earthquest, Math & Science Challenge, and Language Arts Challenge).
of JumpStart 5h Grade. Jo seems to love skateboarding
and has a rather sarcastic attitude. She is presumably named for the daughter of detective writer Dashiell Hammett.
Jo also appears in JumpStart Adventure Challenge, JumpStart SpyMasters: Unmask the Prankster
and JumpStart SpyMasters: Max Strikes Back, though she is barely recognizable as the same character in these since she is drawn in a more realistic style and has few, if any, of the personality traits she had in JumpStart 5th Grade.
styling himself "Dr. X" is the game's villain
. Once a brilliant scientist in the field of animal behavior, he has recently lost his marbles and decided to get "revenge" on his former sponsors. His name was mentioned in the credits of JumpStart SpyMasters: Unmask the Prankster
.
and JumpStart Adventures 4th Grade: Haunted Island
); however, unlike the aforementioned games, it has a relatively small amount of missions (only 6). Also, unlike most main characters in JumpStart games, Jo Hammet rarely mentions the player's existence, making it seem as if, unlike most other games, in which the player seems to be guided through the game by a virtual host, the player is actually playing Jo Hammet rather than merely "working" with her. In each mission, the games are played in a certain order. Each mission starts with the Hooverville Museum of Art and Geography.
named B. F. Skinny (named after B. F. Skinner
) shows up with a crossword. The crossword asks various questions relating to art and geography. The user is enabled to, if they wish, look throughout the museum to find the answers necessary to complete the crossword. Once the crossword puzzle is completed, Jo decodes it and finds the address that she must go to in the next activity.
of a place that has been sabotaged
. Naturally, the door is locked. The user must solve a math puzzle in order to open it. On the first mission, Martin (the person kidnapped by thugs in the art museum) is chained here. He explains that the glasses can be used to read the minds of the thugs. The user then plays a grammar game where they find the correct word to go into the thugs' dialog. Their thoughts reveal the way to get to the bomb.
if the user helps him make drinks for patrons. In this game, the user is given several recipes for drinks in succession. Each recipe calls for different fractional quantities of various juices, as well as several measuring containers that each can hold a certain fractional amount. On the second and third levels, the user must also help serve the drinks.
that runs the junkyard. The game in the junkyard game is a tangram
s game. The junk must be moved and rotated until it matches the diagram.
bones. The middle layer has Native American
artifacts. The uppermost layer has artifacts from early America
.
. In the first level, the of boxes are four. In level 2, it 5, & in level 3, it's 7.
, informs the user that this can't happen in an educational product and the game resets.
Once the bomb has been successfully disarmed, Jo Hammet returns to the museum and gets a new crossword from B.F. Skinny, and the next mission begins.
Dam
. Dr. X has blown up the pumping station, raising the water pressure substantially so that when he blows up the dam, the water will destroy the entire city. Jo Hammet then travels to the bomb where the user is supposed to click a small switch
near Jo that will move a gate, which will divert the water away from the city. Dr. X, who is only shown in silhouette until that point, is finally seen. When arriving at the dam, the user actually has two places to click on: the switch and the dam itself. Clicking on the dam causes the water to flood and destroy the city, automatically ending the game. Though Jo Hammet saves the city, Dr. X disappears, never to be heard from again. It is possible that Dr. X was killed by the water.
, Nevada
and Hoover Dam
. When the names are switched, "Boulder City" becomes "Hooverville" and "Hoover Dam" becomes "Boulder Canyon Dam." Also note there is a character named Maggie Mead, after Lake Mead
or possibly Margaret Mead
.
Educational game
Educational games are games that have been designed to teach people about a certain subject, expand concepts, reinforce development, understand an historical event or culture, or assist them in learning a skill as they play...
/adventure
Adventure game
An adventure game is a video game in which the player assumes the role of protagonist in an interactive story driven by exploration and puzzle-solving instead of physical challenge. The genre's focus on story allows it to draw heavily from other narrative-based media such as literature and film,...
computer game in the JumpStart
JumpStart
JumpStart is an educational media franchise for children, consisting mostly of educational games, produced by Knowledge Adventure. The series is distributed as Jump Ahead in the United Kingdom...
series, created by Knowledge Adventure
Knowledge Adventure
Knowledge Adventure, Inc. is a maker of educational software including the Adiboo and JumpStart series of grade-based and subject-based titles, such as My First Encyclopedia. It was established in the late 1980s in Los Angeles, then later merged with another large education software firm, Davidson...
in 1997 and intended for fifth grade
Fifth grade
Fifth grade is a year of education in the United States and many other nations. The fifth grade is the fifth school year after kindergarten. Students are usually 10 – 11 years old, and are preteens...
students. Throughout the course of the game, which is set in the fictional city
City
A city is a relatively large and permanent settlement. Although there is no agreement on how a city is distinguished from a town within general English language meanings, many cities have a particular administrative, legal, or historical status based on local law.For example, in the U.S...
of Hooverville, the user must (while playing the role of a female, fifth grade detective by the name of Jo Hammet) thwart the schemes of the evil Dr. X, who is planning to destroy factories
Factory
A factory or manufacturing plant is an industrial building where laborers manufacture goods or supervise machines processing one product into another. Most modern factories have large warehouses or warehouse-like facilities that contain heavy equipment used for assembly line production...
and power plants to get revenge
Revenge
Revenge is a harmful action against a person or group in response to a grievance, be it real or perceived. It is also called payback, retribution, retaliation or vengeance; it may be characterized, justly or unjustly, as a form of justice.-Function in society:Some societies believe that the...
on them for cutting his research
Research
Research can be defined as the scientific search for knowledge, or as any systematic investigation, to establish novel facts, solve new or existing problems, prove new ideas, or develop new theories, usually using a scientific method...
funding
Funding
Funding is the act of providing resources, usually in form of money , or other values such as effort or time , for a project, a person, a business or any other private or public institutions...
.
Though the game itself has never been significantly updated (beyond the addition of a printable workbook and assessment test when the game was released with new packaging circa 1998), it has been repackaged several times; once with the addition of the Adventure Challenge (later called Extreme Field Trips) bonus disc (circa 2000), once as JumpStart Advanced 5th & 6th Grade (together with Extreme Field Trips and JumpStart Adventures 6th Grade: Mission Earthquest
JumpStart Adventures 6th Grade: Mission Earthquest
JumpStart Adventures 6th Grade: Mission Earthquest is a game created by Knowledge Adventure in the JumpStart series. In this game A.R.T., a computer with artificial intelligence, has gone haywire, and now wants to "redesign the chaotic system that is Earth"...
) in 2003, and once more in 2007 as JumpStart Advanced 4th-6th Grade School Essentials (Together with JumpStart Adventures 4th Grade: Sapphire Falls
JumpStart Adventures 4th Grade: Sapphire Falls
JumpStart Adventures 4th Grade: Sapphire Falls is a personal computer game released by Knowledge Adventure in 2000 to replace their earlier JumpStart Adventures 4th Grade: Haunted Island released in 1996. Despite the name being the same, this product contains no characters or storyline elements in...
, JumpStart Adventures 6th Grade: Mission Earthquest, Math & Science Challenge, and Language Arts Challenge).
Jo Hammet
Jo Hammet is a fifth grade tomboy and the protagonistProtagonist
A protagonist is the main character of a literary, theatrical, cinematic, or musical narrative, around whom the events of the narrative's plot revolve and with whom the audience is intended to most identify...
of JumpStart 5h Grade. Jo seems to love skateboarding
Skateboarding
Skateboarding is an action sport which involves riding and performing tricks using a skateboard.Skateboarding can be a recreational activity, an art form, a job, or a method of transportation. Skateboarding has been shaped and influenced by many skateboarders throughout the years. A 2002 report...
and has a rather sarcastic attitude. She is presumably named for the daughter of detective writer Dashiell Hammett.
Jo also appears in JumpStart Adventure Challenge, JumpStart SpyMasters: Unmask the Prankster
JumpStart SpyMasters: Unmask the Prankster
JumpStart SpyMasters: Unmask the Prankster is a personal computer game made by Knowledge Adventure where the user must stop the Prankster. As in other JumpStart games, one has to solve educational problems to complete the game.-HQ:...
and JumpStart SpyMasters: Max Strikes Back, though she is barely recognizable as the same character in these since she is drawn in a more realistic style and has few, if any, of the personality traits she had in JumpStart 5th Grade.
Dr. X
The mad scientistMad scientist
A mad scientist is a stock character of popular fiction, specifically science fiction. The mad scientist may be villainous or antagonistic, benign or neutral, and whether insane, eccentric, or simply bumbling, mad scientists often work with fictional technology in order to forward their schemes, if...
styling himself "Dr. X" is the game's villain
Villain
A villain is an "evil" character in a story, whether a historical narrative or, especially, a work of fiction. The villain usually is the antagonist, the character who tends to have a negative effect on other characters...
. Once a brilliant scientist in the field of animal behavior, he has recently lost his marbles and decided to get "revenge" on his former sponsors. His name was mentioned in the credits of JumpStart SpyMasters: Unmask the Prankster
JumpStart SpyMasters: Unmask the Prankster
JumpStart SpyMasters: Unmask the Prankster is a personal computer game made by Knowledge Adventure where the user must stop the Prankster. As in other JumpStart games, one has to solve educational problems to complete the game.-HQ:...
.
Course of a Mission
JumpStart 5th Grade is set up as a series of missions (similar to JumpStart Adventures 3rd Grade: Mystery MountainJumpStart Adventures 3rd Grade: Mystery Mountain
JumpStart Adventures 3rd Grade: Mystery Mountain is a personal computer game in Knowledge Adventure's JumpStart series of educational software. As the title suggests, the game is intended to teach a third grade curriculum. This is the only version of this game created and, unusually for Knowledge...
and JumpStart Adventures 4th Grade: Haunted Island
JumpStart Adventures 4th Grade: Haunted Island
JumpStart Adventures 4th Grade: Haunted Island was a personal computer game in Knowledge Adventure's JumpStart series of educational software intended, as the title indicates, to teach a fourth grade curriculum...
); however, unlike the aforementioned games, it has a relatively small amount of missions (only 6). Also, unlike most main characters in JumpStart games, Jo Hammet rarely mentions the player's existence, making it seem as if, unlike most other games, in which the player seems to be guided through the game by a virtual host, the player is actually playing Jo Hammet rather than merely "working" with her. In each mission, the games are played in a certain order. Each mission starts with the Hooverville Museum of Art and Geography.
The Hooverville Museum of Art and Geography
When Jo Hammet was on a field trip with her class, she literally bumped into a man (later revealed to be named Martin). Martin was then carried away by a bunch of thugs. However, he left a mysterious pair of dark glasses behind. Later a talking ratRat
Rats are various medium-sized, long-tailed rodents of the superfamily Muroidea. "True rats" are members of the genus Rattus, the most important of which to humans are the black rat, Rattus rattus, and the brown rat, Rattus norvegicus...
named B. F. Skinny (named after B. F. Skinner
B. F. Skinner
Burrhus Frederic Skinner was an American behaviorist, author, inventor, baseball enthusiast, social philosopher and poet...
) shows up with a crossword. The crossword asks various questions relating to art and geography. The user is enabled to, if they wish, look throughout the museum to find the answers necessary to complete the crossword. Once the crossword puzzle is completed, Jo decodes it and finds the address that she must go to in the next activity.
First Visit to the Sabotaged Site
It turns out the crossword reveals the addressAddress (geography)
An address is a collection of information, presented in a mostly fixed format, used for describing the location of a building, apartment, or other structure or a plot of land, generally using political boundaries and street names as references, along with other identifiers such as house or...
of a place that has been sabotaged
Sabotage
Sabotage is a deliberate action aimed at weakening another entity through subversion, obstruction, disruption, or destruction. In a workplace setting, sabotage is the conscious withdrawal of efficiency generally directed at causing some change in workplace conditions. One who engages in sabotage is...
. Naturally, the door is locked. The user must solve a math puzzle in order to open it. On the first mission, Martin (the person kidnapped by thugs in the art museum) is chained here. He explains that the glasses can be used to read the minds of the thugs. The user then plays a grammar game where they find the correct word to go into the thugs' dialog. Their thoughts reveal the way to get to the bomb.
Searching for Items
It turns out that Jo Hammet needs three items in order to get the bomb. She must visit three different places in town to get them.The Squishy Juice Bar
The person serving the drinks here is really an undercover reporter named Bernie that Jo seems to be acquainted with. Bernie will give Jo Hammet one of the things needed to get to the bombBomb
A bomb is any of a range of explosive weapons that only rely on the exothermic reaction of an explosive material to provide an extremely sudden and violent release of energy...
if the user helps him make drinks for patrons. In this game, the user is given several recipes for drinks in succession. Each recipe calls for different fractional quantities of various juices, as well as several measuring containers that each can hold a certain fractional amount. On the second and third levels, the user must also help serve the drinks.
The Junkyard
Jimmy is the recluseRecluse
A recluse is a person who lives in voluntary seclusion from the public and society, often close to nature. The word is from the Latin recludere, which means "shut up" or "sequester." There are many potential reasons for becoming a recluse: a personal philosophy that rejects consumer society; a...
that runs the junkyard. The game in the junkyard game is a tangram
Tangram
The tangram is a dissection puzzle consisting of seven flat shapes, called tans, which are put together to form shapes. The objective of the puzzle is to form a specific shape using all seven pieces, which may not overlap...
s game. The junk must be moved and rotated until it matches the diagram.
Boulder Canyon Mine Shaft
The Boulder Canyon Mine Shaft was closed by the Park Service due to falling rocks. Maggie Mead hasn't any visitors but Jo Hammet since then. Maggie Mead needs three items retrieved from the mineshaft. The further down the user goes, the older the objects are. Maggie needs one object from each layer. The lowest layer has natural artifacts such as dinosaurDinosaur
Dinosaurs are a diverse group of animals of the clade and superorder Dinosauria. They were the dominant terrestrial vertebrates for over 160 million years, from the late Triassic period until the end of the Cretaceous , when the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event led to the extinction of...
bones. The middle layer has Native American
Native Americans in the United States
Native Americans in the United States are the indigenous peoples in North America within the boundaries of the present-day continental United States, parts of Alaska, and the island state of Hawaii. They are composed of numerous, distinct tribes, states, and ethnic groups, many of which survive as...
artifacts. The uppermost layer has artifacts from early America
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
.
The Dungeon
Sometimes before going to a place, the user must skateboard Jo to that place. If one of the thugs catch Jo (which are in later challenges), Jo is sent to a dungeon where the user must help her escape by placing boxes from bottom to top in the style of Tower of HanoiTower of Hanoi
The Tower of Hanoi or Towers of Hanoi, also called the Tower of Brahma or Towers of Brahma, is a mathematical game or puzzle. It consists of three rods, and a number of disks of different sizes which can slide onto any rod...
. In the first level, the of boxes are four. In level 2, it 5, & in level 3, it's 7.
Second Visit to the Sabotaged Site
Upon the second visit to sabotaged site, Jo Hammet uses the items to get to the bomb without getting hurt. To disable the bomb, the user must play a decimal game where they attempt to make the number in one box equal to the number in the target box using a little android. Naturally, there are some defense androids that try to stop the user. If the user's android runs into one of the defense androids, the bomb is shown to go off, but Jo then appears on the screen and, breaking the fourth wallFourth wall
The fourth wall is the imaginary "wall" at the front of the stage in a traditional three-walled box set in a proscenium theatre, through which the audience sees the action in the world of the play...
, informs the user that this can't happen in an educational product and the game resets.
Once the bomb has been successfully disarmed, Jo Hammet returns to the museum and gets a new crossword from B.F. Skinny, and the next mission begins.
The game's conclusion
The game concludes at Boulder CanyonCanyon
A canyon or gorge is a deep ravine between cliffs often carved from the landscape by a river. Rivers have a natural tendency to reach a baseline elevation, which is the same elevation as the body of water it will eventually drain into. This forms a canyon. Most canyons were formed by a process of...
Dam
Dam
A dam is a barrier that impounds water or underground streams. Dams generally serve the primary purpose of retaining water, while other structures such as floodgates or levees are used to manage or prevent water flow into specific land regions. Hydropower and pumped-storage hydroelectricity are...
. Dr. X has blown up the pumping station, raising the water pressure substantially so that when he blows up the dam, the water will destroy the entire city. Jo Hammet then travels to the bomb where the user is supposed to click a small switch
Switch
In electronics, a switch is an electrical component that can break an electrical circuit, interrupting the current or diverting it from one conductor to another....
near Jo that will move a gate, which will divert the water away from the city. Dr. X, who is only shown in silhouette until that point, is finally seen. When arriving at the dam, the user actually has two places to click on: the switch and the dam itself. Clicking on the dam causes the water to flood and destroy the city, automatically ending the game. Though Jo Hammet saves the city, Dr. X disappears, never to be heard from again. It is possible that Dr. X was killed by the water.
A Note about Names in this Program
It is likely that Hooverville was inspired by Boulder CityBoulder City, Nevada
Boulder City is a city in Clark County, Nevada, United States. It is approximately from the City of Las Vegas. As of the 2010 census the population of Boulder City was 15,023.Boulder City is one of only two cities in Nevada that prohibit gambling....
, Nevada
Nevada
Nevada is a state in the western, mountain west, and southwestern regions of the United States. With an area of and a population of about 2.7 million, it is the 7th-largest and 35th-most populous state. Over two-thirds of Nevada's people live in the Las Vegas metropolitan area, which contains its...
and Hoover Dam
Hoover Dam
Hoover Dam, once known as Boulder Dam, is a concrete arch-gravity dam in the Black Canyon of the Colorado River, on the border between the US states of Arizona and Nevada. It was constructed between 1931 and 1936 during the Great Depression and was dedicated on September 30, 1935, by President...
. When the names are switched, "Boulder City" becomes "Hooverville" and "Hoover Dam" becomes "Boulder Canyon Dam." Also note there is a character named Maggie Mead, after Lake Mead
Lake Mead
Lake Mead is the largest reservoir in the United States. It is located on the Colorado River about southeast of Las Vegas, Nevada, in the states of Nevada and Arizona. Formed by water impounded by the Hoover Dam, it extends behind the dam, holding approximately of water.-History:The lake was...
or possibly Margaret Mead
Margaret Mead
Margaret Mead was an American cultural anthropologist, who was frequently a featured writer and speaker in the mass media throughout the 1960s and 1970s....
.