Leapster L: Max Handheld

Handheld gaming systems for children are extremely popular so of course my 5 year old has been bugging me for a system like the best selling Gameboy by Nintendo. At his young age, I don’t want to start an addiction to video games. The LeapFrog Company has given parents an alternative choice to video games for children 4 to 10 years old. The L-Max Learning System is a handheld device that offers many educational products instead of video games that aren’t appropriate for children. My son fell in love with this as soon as he saw it. A bonus to this system is it comes with cables that hook up to your TV offering you a 2 in 1 system. This system will be a great alternative for keeping the kids busy in the car on long road trips!

The system comes preprogrammed with games so you don’t need to buy cartridges right away. One preprogrammed game is like the old video game called Frogger but used a bunny instead. The child is told to jump to a letter or number depending on which they choose. My son felt so proud of himself when he could get all the answers right. When we hooked it up to the TV, Wesley really enjoyed writing letters on the L-Max screen then watching his work appear on TV. The Leapster comes with a stylus like all other LeapFrog products but some games you can play by just touching the screen or using the directional pad.

A word of caution though: if you don’t purchase the AC adapter, use high quality batteries! I purchased “cheap” batteries and within a few hours (literally a few hours. Wesley played with this for 4 hours nonstop when we received it!), the batteries zonked out on us. I highly recommend Duracell or Energizer batteries with all LeapFrog products.

Awards
· Toy Wishes All Star, Education & Learning Category, 2003
· Oppenheim Toy Portfolio, Gold Seal Award, 2004
· Parents Magazine, Best Toys of the Year, 2003
· Parents' Choice, 2004 Parents' Choice Recommended Award winner
· Teachers Picks (Best New Tech), Scholastic Parent and Child Magazine, 2003
· Great American Toy Test/KTVU, Top Educational Award, 2004

Samples of available software for this system:



This following title isn’t available until the middle of October but we are looking forward to getting it!