Storybook Weaver
Encyclopedia
Storybook Weaver was a 1994 educational game
released on floppy disk
for the Apple Macintosh, aimed at children aged 6-12. An updated version, Storybook Weaver Deluxe, was released in 2004 on CD-ROM
for Windows
and Mac
computers, featuring much more content than the original. Both versions were released by MECC
who also created The Oregon Trail
, another educational game. The Deluxe version is available for both the home and school, with a Teacher Resource CD, including lesson plans and User guides.
features and so on. The characters which could be placed in a story included humans, animals and make-believe people from fairytales and classic mythology. There were many human characters of various nationalities, most of which had several positions to choose from, including standing, running, sitting and sleeping. Fantasy characters included fearsome dragons, hobbit
s, fairies, giants
, ghosts, Greek mythological creatures and magical beings such as sorcerers and witches such as Baba Yaga
. Any object could be creatively manipulated to produce various effects, through flipping objects through various angles or modifying colour, size and shape in a paintshop-type program. For example, a puddle of water could be turned red to represent a pool of blood.
It largely kept the original backgrounds, items and characters from the original game and added a large number of new objects and categories, such as a world landmark category, including The Statue of Liberty and The White House. The older objects are updated in higher textures to match the quality of the new objects. The game offers a lot more features in the real and modern in-door and out-door world, including streets, cities, a bedroom, a classroom, a shopping mall and much more. The game doesn't skimp, however, on aspects of the ancient or fantasy worlds. A noticeable feature of this learning program was its bilingual capacity. Users can now write stories in the English Language
or Spanish
, accompanied with a bilingual text-to-speech feature, an English/Spanish spell checker and a thesaurus
.
Deluxe also includes "story-starters" for children who find it more difficult to get into the creative mindset, a voice recording feature, friendly spoken tutorials and a library of object sounds and music.
The Deluxe Version of the program was re-released in a 2004 edition.
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...
released on floppy disk
Floppy disk
A floppy disk is a disk storage medium composed of a disk of thin and flexible magnetic storage medium, sealed in a rectangular plastic carrier lined with fabric that removes dust particles...
for the Apple Macintosh, aimed at children aged 6-12. An updated version, Storybook Weaver Deluxe, was released in 2004 on CD-ROM
CD-ROM
A CD-ROM is a pre-pressed compact disc that contains data accessible to, but not writable by, a computer for data storage and music playback. The 1985 “Yellow Book” standard developed by Sony and Philips adapted the format to hold any form of binary data....
for Windows
Microsoft Windows
Microsoft Windows is a series of operating systems produced by Microsoft.Microsoft introduced an operating environment named Windows on November 20, 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces . Microsoft Windows came to dominate the world's personal...
and Mac
Macintosh
The Macintosh , or Mac, is a series of several lines of personal computers designed, developed, and marketed by Apple Inc. The first Macintosh was introduced by Apple's then-chairman Steve Jobs on January 24, 1984; it was the first commercially successful personal computer to feature a mouse and a...
computers, featuring much more content than the original. Both versions were released by MECC
MECC
The Minnesota Educational Computing Consortium , most commonly known as MECC, was an organization founded in 1973. The goal of the organization was to coordinate and provide computer services to schools in the state of Minnesota; however, its software eventually became popular in schools around...
who also created The Oregon Trail
The Oregon Trail (computer game)
The Oregon Trail is a computer game originally developed by Don Rawitsch, Bill Heinemann, and Paul Dillenberger in 1971 and produced by the Minnesota Educational Computing Consortium in 1974. The original game was designed to teach school children about the realities of 19th century pioneer life...
, another educational game. The Deluxe version is available for both the home and school, with a Teacher Resource CD, including lesson plans and User guides.
Overview
As the title suggests, Storybook Weaver is a program that enables and motivates children to easily create their own stories on computer. The most noticeable feature of the game is the sizable space allowed for illustrations on each page of a story. The game offered hundreds of backgrounds, objects and characters that could be selected from easy-to-use categories and placed anywhere on the page through a simple click-and-drag process. Backgrounds in the original featured mostly natural, outdoor locations, with which players could switch between day, night, dawn and dusk effects on the landscape. However, piecing together items such as walls and floors created indoor settings for stories. Items ranged from food, furniture, vehicles, vegetation, housing, floors, doors, walls, weather effects, natural landscapeNatural landscape
A natural landscape is a landscape that is unaffected by human activity. A natural landscape is intact when all living and nonliving elements are free to move and change. The nonliving elements distinguish a natural landscape from a wilderness. A wilderness includes areas within which natural...
features and so on. The characters which could be placed in a story included humans, animals and make-believe people from fairytales and classic mythology. There were many human characters of various nationalities, most of which had several positions to choose from, including standing, running, sitting and sleeping. Fantasy characters included fearsome dragons, hobbit
Hobbit
Hobbits are a fictional diminutive race who inhabit the lands of Middle-earth in J. R. R. Tolkien's fiction.Hobbits first appeared in the novel The Hobbit, in which the main protagonist, Bilbo Baggins, is the titular hobbit...
s, fairies, giants
Giant (mythology)
The mythology and legends of many different cultures include monsters of human appearance but prodigious size and strength. "Giant" is the English word commonly used for such beings, derived from one of the most famed examples: the gigantes of Greek mythology.In various Indo-European mythologies,...
, ghosts, Greek mythological creatures and magical beings such as sorcerers and witches such as Baba Yaga
Baba Yaga
Baba Yaga or Baba Roga is a haggish or witchlike character in Slavic folklore. She flies around on a giant pestle, kidnaps small children, and lives in a hut that stands on chicken legs...
. Any object could be creatively manipulated to produce various effects, through flipping objects through various angles or modifying colour, size and shape in a paintshop-type program. For example, a puddle of water could be turned red to represent a pool of blood.
Deluxe Version
The Deluxe Version greatly expanded on the features of the original version with a completely updated user interface.English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
or Spanish
Spanish language
Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...
, accompanied with a bilingual text-to-speech feature, an English/Spanish spell checker and a thesaurus
Thesaurus
A thesaurus is a reference work that lists words grouped together according to similarity of meaning , in contrast to a dictionary, which contains definitions and pronunciations...
.
Deluxe also includes "story-starters" for children who find it more difficult to get into the creative mindset, a voice recording feature, friendly spoken tutorials and a library of object sounds and music.
The Deluxe Version of the program was re-released in a 2004 edition.
External links
- Storybook Weaver Deluxe at MobyGamesMobyGames-Platforms not yet included:- Further reading :* Rusel DeMaria, Johnny L. Wilson, High Score!: The Illustrated History of Electronic Games, McGraw-Hill/Osborne Media; 2 edition , ISBN 0-07-223172-6...