Having seemingly missed out on the original game by 3 Blokes Studios I was always interested to know just how well Brainiversity 2 can compete amongst the Dr Kawashima & Big Brain Academy’s of this world. Given that Brainiversity just eclipses £12.00 it has certainly earned itself as a viable alternative, but is it as good if not better than two of Nintendo’s flagship neuron workouts?

Firstly the game is clean and crisp with an attractive menu system that doesn’t set itself out to be in your face with nice plain whites and an academic background. In the game you have a host called Edison whom guides you through the game for the first time. Edison is there for your daily test and the initial holding hands walkthrough is a nice added touch to both learn how to unlock new tests, earn trophies and how to play certain games. After awhile though, Edison turns into an annoying jabbing colleague who’d feel quite at home in Microsoft office with both the rover and the paperclip. So with my only real gripe out of the way, let’s continue.

Brainiversity has a plethora of 24 mini games that test your brain with categories ranging from Maths, Language, Memory and Analysis. These games are nicely presented with some of the language games arguably holding the most addiction factor. There are different types of games you’ll be testing your brain against some of which are solving proverbs, addition and subtraction, memorising shopping lists, completing anagrams and deciphering shapes. These are just a small amount of the games on offer. What is extremely clever by 3 Blokes Studios is that they’ve actually covered the main problem surrounding brain training games, the ability to make the gamer return back to the title again and again. How they have managed to achieve this is by having a monetary system that allows you to unlock new games and also providing a graph to track how well or badly you have been doing on a day to day basis. To earn money in the game you need to complete your daily test and break your personal records, to boot they’ve also added in their own trophy system where by achieving set goals will reward you by unlocking the silverware.

In terms of whether Brainiversity 2 has improved my own personal brain power the tests scores would certainly suggest so, though I haven’t really set myself any real life scenarios to put it into practice. One of the games that will really play with your mind is the shape Analysis game which had me personally cursing how I even managed to make fault. I noticed that the more I played the more my brain became used to focusing on just the shape and not the overlaying text trying to trick me into pressing the wrong button.

Brainiversity 2 also has a few quirky additions, I noticed that the game is built in to recognise the system clock and if anything particularly interesting fell on that day Edison would say something during idle time. It’s a welcome addition not personally seen since You Don’t Know Jack back in the 90’s. One other additional feature is the Avatar system where you can pick a character to represent yourself, I found myself wanting the option to browse my PC folder to add your own picture though.

Overall 3 Blokes Studio has done a great job with Brainiversity 2 and for its budget price it seems silly paying over £30.00 for some of Nintendo’s Wii alternatives. It’s easily accessible and has an unlock system to draw you in on a daily basis. The game isn’t demanding on hardware and doesn’t at any point try to be complicated. Brainiversity 2 is well polished and a recommended purchase. I wonder if Microsoft will try and buy Edison for Windows 7!

8/10