ItzaBitza is Child’s Play
Sabi,
a Seattle-based startup company, and Microsoft have announced the launch
of ItzaBitza. It’s an interactive drawing and reading game for children
age 4 and older. Sabi was created through the collaboration of the
Microsoft IP Ventures program and Sabi co-founder and CEO Margaret
Johnson.
Sabi's
ItzaBitza is the first in a series of new games from the company that
aims to inspire creativity, exercise minds and deliver fun experiences.
"Our
vision is to create a new gaming category that stimulates creative
thinking," Johnson said.
ItzaBitza's approach to interactive learning is based on design and
technology, conceived at Microsoft Research -- along with the support of
Craig Mundie, Microsoft's chief research and strategy officer -- and
licensed to Sabi through Microsoft's IP Ventures program.
"Game-based education is a very exciting concept, and one that we have
been interested in for many years," Mundie said. "The launch of Sabi's
game is a great example of our collaborative efforts to bootstrap young
companies by providing them with guidance and access to innovative
intellectual property."
The
game is built on a drawing recognition experience, called Living Ink,
which identifies the drawing of certain objects and brings them to life
so that the child's art becomes an integral part of the game. Children
then interact with the drawings, embark on different quests and create
their own stories using the characters in the game.
"We
wanted to take all we had learned while incubating our game designs at
Microsoft and create a game we felt was a fresh approach to children's
computer games," Johnson said. "We see ItzaBitza as the seed of an
effort in which the games children want to play provide crucial
creativity and reading skills they need to succeed."
ItzaBitza begins with play sets that include easy and basic words, and
then gets increasingly difficult as the child successfully completes the
challenges. It supports young readers with audio word help, so they
don't get frustrated if they get stuck on a word.
Photo courtesy: Sabi
