Hands on with Imagine: Teacher

Joining the illustrious ranks of baby care and fashion design, Imagine: Teacher is set to extend Ubisoft's line of games aimed at drawing a younger, female audience. While the appeal of infant care is questionable, there's a spirit of great potential in this portable classroom.

As a new teacher on the first day of a recently constructed school, it's up to you to shape young minds with lessons in everything from mathematics to art to writing. You start the year with a measly class of only four students, but talented teaching and a friendly atmosphere will quickly draw more students into your classroom. There's a lot of work to be done to encourage students to join your ranks though, as you need to lay out lessons in ten subjects and manage students so they excel.

Before stepping into the classroom, you first must schedule the week's lessons. A weekly calendar appears on the touch screen along with each of the game's ten subjects. Assigning a subject to a time slot is as simple as tapping it with the stylus. A seating diagram also must be drawn, as students can't randomly sit next to each other at the risk of stirring trouble. Descriptions on each student's profile inform you of who they get along with and who they don't so you can seat them in your class without issue.

Naturally, the subject determines the type of mini-game you play as your progress through the week. Writing instruction involves a straightforward word game. Spinning a wheel prompts an incomplete word to appear which you complete by filling in the missing letter. When the word "Rus_ia" was listed, we of course scribbled an "s" on the touch screen to create the word "Russia." Obviously the mini-games are geared toward a younger audience that can benefit from the simple educational format.

Not every mini-game is purely educational, though. During drawing, your stylus turns into a makeshift crayon complete with a touch-activated palette of colours lining the bottom of the screen. Earning a good mark means filling in a blank sketch with the correct colour scheme and without colouring outside the lines. A tall order, indeed.

When class ends, your job continues. Like any teacher, the pain you dish out in assigning homework comes back to haunt you in the guise of grading. Correcting schoolwork means uncapping your red pen (i.e. stylus) and marking up incorrect answers. Papers scroll on the touch screen and offer a yes/no option for whether an answer is correct. As a teacher, you're expected to excel at grading so doing well is critical in keeping your job.

While the game emphasizes the joys of teaching more than anything else, Imagine: Teacher gets an 'A' for its effort in translating the glamorous life of teachers. Unruly students never lashed out as us during the short demonstration, and there wasn't a need to take any disciplinary action. Granted this isn't Imagine: Inner City Teacher, but some way of representing the conflict-oriented side of teaching would certainly balance out the ideal scenario presented here. A 'time out' corner or the ability to cancel recess for bratty youngsters would been a welcome addition for wannabe teachers craving a power trip.

One feature that will be included in the final game that we weren't able to test out is the ability to plan a field trip. A jaunt to the park or an information day at the zoo should provide a nice break from the doldrums of class. Funny enough, you'll be able to embark on these trips and live your teaching fantasy right before school starts.

Imagine: Teacher will ship in North America in late August.