Reader Rabbit

Did You Know?

• By 2003, the Reader Rabbit series had been sold in over 40 countries and translated into 13 different languages, including Chinese (titled 瑞德小兔 / Reid Bunny) and Russian (titled Школа Кролика / School Rabbit).
• There is a Reader Rabbit themed attraction at Parken Zoo in Eskilstuna, Sweden, which replaced the longstanding and successful Phantom Land.

History

The first Reader Rabbit computer game, Reader Rabbit and the Fabulous Word Factory, was conceived by the Grimm sisters and released in 1984; it appeared in the 1983 holiday special The Computer Chronicles. In 1986, Reader Rabbit 2.0 and Math Rabbit were released. Writer Rabbit followed in 1987 as part of an intended Rabbit series covering different academic subjects, but developers later decided to have a Reader Rabbit series that explored subjects beyond reading, renaming Math Rabbit to Reader Rabbit's Math. Many critics and gaming historians erroneously assert that the Reader Rabbit series officially began in 1986. The 1990s saw an audio cassette release of popular game music titled Reader Rabbit's Sing Along Favorites, and by 1996 the series included titles such as Reader Rabbit's Reading Development Library, which let players experience fairy tales via animated storybooks. In 1995, The Learning Company was bought by SoftKey after a hostile takeover; SoftKey adopted the name The Learning Company and cut costs, introducing the Platinum line of budget titles at $12.99 in the US. SoftKey founder Kevin O'Leary recalled receiving a $12 million order for Reader Rabbit that strained logistics, leading him to give Mike Perik half his equity to solve the problem. In 1998, Mattel acquired The Learning Company for $3.6 billion and planned to expand Reader Rabbit into interactive electronic plush toys that could download content from the Internet, but Mattel sold off its properties the following year to avoid bankruptcy, and the Reader Rabbit brand was sold to Riverdeep. From 1998 to 2002, The ClueFinders series was released for older students. The Reader Rabbit Workbook Series was released in 2003, consisting of three 320-page comprehensive workbooks and five 32-page single-subject workbooks for children ages three to seven.

Design

The adventures of Reader Rabbit, alongside pals like Sam the Lion and Matilda the Mouse, are the core of this series. Most games are point-and-click adventures where players solve puzzles by using items in their inventory and talking to characters. These puzzles started with reading skills but later branched into math and spelling. The game worlds are made of static screens; players move between them by clicking travel hot spots, while other hot spots trigger character interactions, songs, or mini-games. In the early 1990s, artist Shaowei Liu hand-painted backgrounds and animations that were later digitized. By the mid-1990s, Frank Cirocco drew characters and foregrounds in pencil, with Mick Gray adding ink. For Reader Rabbit Toddler in 1997, Tracy Reynolds of Class 6 Entertainment redesigned the characters, and some art came from Chester Aldridge's company US Equity Holdings. Later games had Fred Dianda as Lead Artist, with Gerald Broas using a 2B pencil on 12 field animation paper for line art. For story books in interactive journey and library games, Marc Diamond sketched pictures on a LeapPad tablet before coloring and shading. The most recent iOS game art was by concept artist Federico Miniaci. Songs in each game guide the story and give characters internal monologues. Composer Scott Lloyd Shelly was especially proud of his music for Reader Rabbit: 1st Grade in 1998. Many games were translated into other languages for global appeal, including one song from Reader Rabbit Preschool that was translated into French, German, Portuguese, Russian, and Swedish. A VHS video, Reader Rabbit Sing-A-Song Adventures, came out in 2000, collecting the series' best songs.

Reception

Reader Rabbit first appeared on the education software charts in May 1985, when its debut game, Reader Rabbit and the Fabulous Word Factory, landed at number six on the Billboard list for educational computer software. It climbed back to number ten two weeks later and kept appearing on the charts for several more weeks. By 1989, that first title had moved 250,000 units. The series as a whole sold half a million copies by 1991. The Learning Company, which published the games, reported $27.5 million in gross revenue at the close of its 1993 fiscal year, with a 41 percent revenue jump from the previous year driven largely by Reader Rabbit. Between 1993 and 2001, another six million copies were sold, though around 2001 prices began to drop and European sales started to slide. By 2002, total sales had passed 25 million copies. As of 2017, the series had collected more than 175 awards, including a 1991 Language Arts Program of the Decade honor from Technology & Learning Magazine for Reader Rabbit 1, and several awards for Reader Rabbit 2 in 1991 and 1992, such as a Parents' Choice Foundation Award, a Software Publishers Association prize for best elementary education product, a CODiE Award for best elementary education program, and a Technology & Learning Magazine Award of Excellence.

Critics and commentators noted the series' impact. In 1991, the Chicago Sun-Times called it one of the most effective edutainment franchises and said it had taught many children to read. Computer Shopper pointed out that it filled a gap by offering reading comprehension games for preschoolers when most such titles targeted older kids. The New York Times observed in 1995 that the Learning Company's flagship was unusual because it moved from home use into school curricula, and in 2002 described the series as an educational staple with a long history of quality software. The Boston Herald argued that the games were replayable and enjoyable enough to justify their price. Krystina Madej, writing in Physical Play and Children's Digital Games, highlighted the series as an innovator in the 1980s edutainment genre, following MECC's The Oregon Trail in making play-based learning games for young children. In 2012, PC Mag listed the debut title among the ten best educational PC games of the 1980s and noted that new Reader Rabbit games were still being released.