I grew up with the Mr Men: not just Roger Hargreaves’ books, but an educational times tables cassette album blending stories with a maddeningly-catchy song – “Once three is three, two threes are six…”
It’s ricocheting around my head now, thanks to the news that book publisher Egmont UK has launched a brand new Mr Men app for iPad: Mr Tickle Storybook App.
What’s more, he has a celebrity chum along for the ride: comedian and author David Walliams, who provides voice narration for this new, interactive version of the classic book.
The app stays faithful to that book, although children can tap words to hear them read aloud, while interacting with more than 60 sounds and 70 animations throughout the story. Neatly, a highlight runs along the words as they’re read out, so children can follow.
“The Mr. Men series is practically a British institution with pride of place on children’s bookshelves up and down the country, so it’s been great fun to provide the new voice of Mr. Tickle for the app,” said Walliams – who has previously popped up as a narrator in Penguin’s Roald Dahl Audiobooks app, as well as for his own The Slightly Annoying Elephant e-book on Apple’s iBooks store.
Extras include the ability to turn several other Mr Man and Little Miss characters into “funny faces” with digital stickers; spruce them up in a separate colouring section; and play a mini-game called Whack-a-Worm. This won’t end well for the worm, mark my words.
Mr Tickle Storybook App costs £2.49 for iPad from Apple’s App Store. And if that’s not enough Roger Hargreaves action on your iOS device, Egmont has also released six Mr Men and six Little Miss e-books on the iBooks store already.
Expect to pay £1.99 each for Mr Tickle, Mr Bump, Mr Sneeze, Mr Nosey, Mr Greedy, Mr Happy, Little Miss Naughty, Little Miss Sunshine, Little Miss Chatterbox, Little Miss Birthday, Little Miss Princess or Little Miss Giggles. You can find them all using this link.
Read about more storybook apps for kids on Apps Playground, and check out our 100 Best iPad Apps of 2013 e-book – £1.99 from Apple’s iBooks Store