Science Games in this holiday season!

Slashdot has an interesting discussion of a science games, based on an article from Wired.  The Wired article has screen shots and age advice.  Slashdot's article just mines the list and doesn't seem to link back(!)

In this holiday season, it is great to have alternatives to yet another lego+movie game tie-in.  Also, perhaps it will give ideas as we begin to move into science festival season.

The original article lists:

• Kerbal Space Program (great reviews, $23, Mac or Windows)
• Minecraft  (many platforms, Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, in browser, etc.)
• World of Goo (many platforms, Windows, Mac, Wii, and others)
• Amazing Alex, (iOS, $0.99)
• Patterns (Windows and Mac, currently $10, regularly $20)
• Banjo Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts  (XBox 360)
• Fantastic Contraption (in browser but page is covered in ads)
• Orbiter 2010 (Windows, free) 
• Space Chem (iOS $6, Android $?, Windows, Mac, Linus are $10)
• The Codex of Alchemical Engineering (Flash & browser)

With kids that love science, I'm looking forward to the winter break and a chance to give a few more of these a try.  In particular, the Space Chem and the others from ZachtronicsIndustries.com look like a good match for my kids.  We have World of Goo on the Wii, it had their interest for a while but faded.

There is a long list of mathematical and logic games as well that are not about science.  I haven't started compiling a list of them yet.

What am I missing on the science side?  Thoughts on good math games?  (Especially beyond the variations of basic arithmetic practice.)

Google maps comes back to iOS 6

Google now has a maps available again on iOS 6 devices.  It is clear why Apple wanted to make their own maps app and this has been discussed elsewhere but it is unclear why it took Google so long to get their maps app approved.  Was it due to development time or approval delays?  Perhaps Google just wanted to let Apple's map problem fester for a little while before jumping in to help save the day.

In any case, Google's new map app seems to be working well.  I tested it on two locations that have given Apple's maps and some of the other maps apps problems.

The Portland Ballet was not found found in any other map app that I tried.  (Apple Maps, Waze, etc.)

Searching for "Ridgewood Elementary" on Apple Maps directed me to a New York City school with a different name instead of the school a half mile from my location.

I ran the new Google Maps apps on my 3rd generation iPad with iOS 6.0.  It is an iPhone app rather than a universal app but it runs fine and rescales nicely with the 2x button.  See the screen above.  I may download for my iPhone to test but now I feel comfortable enough with the mapping options to get an iPhone 5.