Sophia is a girly girl. I stopped fighting long ago and embraced it. Sort of. She would love to wear make up outside the home, but I think 7 years old is way too young for anything besides clear lip gloss. She also loves accessorizing and putting together her own outfits. That’s why games like Ubisoft’s Imagine Fashion Life is great for Sophia.
She and I sat down for some mother daughter time to play with the game on our Nintendo 3DS. Little brother was hovering even though he had no idea what was going on. In Imagine Fashion Life, Sophia has a chance to try a new career: fashion designer, model, or mall owner.
When she played the game for the first time, Sophia was able to customize her own avatar. Not surprisingly, she chose a pink dress and pink make-up for Kimmy, her game avatar. (Yes, she named it after me.) There are options to change the hairstyle and hair color, though Sophia was disappointed that the black hair was really just black hair with a bunch of brown highlights.
Once we customized her avatar, the game offered a quiz to help us figure out our career path. Sophia chose fashion designer, again no surprise there. I only wished that my career counseling was that easy! As a budding fashion designer, Kimmy (played by Sophia) enters a contest for a chance to work at a design house. It’s kind of like Project Runway without the drama and backstabbing (whew!). Since it’s a game, there’s no actual sewing involved, but she gets a chance to create new designs by pairing fabrics/colors. For each garment she designs, she earns diamonds in which she can use to purchase clothing, accessories, or gifts.
So far, Sophia’s favorite part is hanging out with other characters in the game. Her game friends, so to speak. They go have coffee or tea and chat about fashion, trends, pop culture and more. When her friend is happy, she adds to her friendship meter. I like that there’s no talk about boys (so far).
As a parent, I’m impressed with the depth of play in Imagine Fashion Life. Sophia has to juggle friends, career, and shopping. She can also try out the other careers if she choose. The “fashion designing” part of the is a bit repetitive. For each design, she has activities she has to complete within a certain amount of time: tracing dotted lines to represent cutting or sewing and ironing. I can tell she gets bored at this because she asks me to play for her. Sometimes we go through the entire process and are told the design was not satisfactory. We have to choose a different combination of fabrics and repeat the process.
Overall, Ubisoft’s Imagine Fashion Life 3DS has been fun for Sophia. Sometimes we play together and design clothes for each other. I can see her returning to play the game again and again. If you have a young tween who loves fashion, the game would make a great gift.
Note: While the game is for the Nintendo 3DS, we didn’t play it in 3D. Both Sophia and I prefer it without 3D.