Egg Baby app review: test your parenting skills and keep a virtual egg alive!

Introduction

Egg Baby by Nix Hydra Games is one of those apps where you can test your virtual parenting skills. See how well you can do yourself, or assign this game to your child and see how responsible he or she can be. 

What It's All About

Did you take that class where you were all assigned an egg to care for? You know, you got a hard-boiled egg, you got to name it and maybe draw a cute face on it, make a bed for it, and then take care of it for a set period of time – did you do that? I had to do that, and that’s what this game reminds me of.

This could potentially be a great test for parents to see if their child is ready for a pet that requires more maintenance than a fish.

There are six eggs from which to choose, and each one will hatch a different creature. You’ll get your first egg basket for free, but if you want more (you can raise up to six at a time), you’ll have to buy more. The more eggs you raise at one time, the more rewards you will receive.

You’ll see an egg tutorial at first to learn how to raise your egg baby: name your dummy egg and then learn about what it takes to keep it healthy! I named my dummy egg Irene.

 

Features

The four things you’ll have to do to keep your egg alive and well are to: feed it, keep it happy (tickle it), keep it clean, and make sure it sleeps. Keep an eye on the meters and make sure they stay green! If your egg gets sick, you can go buy some medicine to make it well, but it’s best to keep it healthy in the first place.

It’s not so simple as tickling your egg, either: you’ll need to figure out what kind of tickling and where on the egg tickles it the most. Just make sure you don’t overdo it and tickle it too much!

You’ll have to feed your egg – and it’s not so simple as picking a food and dropping it into the mouth. You have to make a circle around the egg with the food, much like you were playing food airplane. When the egg opens its mouth, drop the food in fast!

It’s probably best if you put your egg on your personal sleeping schedule: just rock it to sleep before you go to bed, and shake your device to wake it up in the morning. Don’t forget to wake it up, though!

When your egg is ready to hatch you’ll see a countdown timer appear. Then cracks will show up on your egg and you’ll get an announcement of what has hatched from your egg. Irene turned into a piñata! 

 

Pros and Cons

Pros

• Could be a fun game for a kid who wants to raise an egg or pretend to be a parent for a few days
• Easy to learn

 

Cons

• Won’t appeal to a lot of players
• Can’t hire a babysitter unless you want to give up your device 

 

Final Verdict

To be honest, I don’t have the attention span or interest to want to play this game, but I can see how it would be attractive to some people. I have a real daughter who takes up enough of my time; I don’t need a virtual egg to add to my responsibilities. Having said that, though, I think this is a fun enough game for someone who likes the genre and it could be great to use to teach a kid some responsibility. Maybe throw in a little extra incentive to sweeten the pot and see what happens.