Humongous Entertainment - Press News

Humongous Entertainment's Putt-Putt Fatty Bear and Buzzy the Knowledge Bug Pack Unprecedented Adventure and Learning Into Award-Winning Collections

Woodinville, WA, July 1, 1997 -- Humongous Entertainment, world-renowned creator of award-winning interactive games for kids, will deliver its Humongous Classics Collection and Junior Field Trips Collection today. Shipping to stores for an incredibly low street price of $19.95, each collection offers three previously released award-winning products together on one CD-ROM. These titles deliver an unbeatable combination of lovable characters and memorable experiences that further develop reading comprehension, problem-solving and critical-thinking skills.

The collections star kids' favorite friends from Humongous Entertainment: Putt-Putt, Fatty Bear; and Buzzy the Knowledge Bug. Collectively having won more than 30 awards of excellence, the games in the two compilations reflect Humongous Entertainment's commitment to creating enduring characters for children and high-quality software that encourages interactive exploration, discovery and fun.

"Our goal is to introduce kids to a variety of Humongous Entertainment titles and our lovable, original characters through one software purchase," said Ralph Giuffre, Humongous Entertainment executive vice president of marketing and licensing. "Our characters have evolved over the past five years, and their worlds continue to grow and flourish. The Humongous Classics Collection and Junior Field Trips Collection allow families to experience the earliest worlds of Putt-Putt, Fatty Bear and Buzzy the Knowledge Bug at an amazing price."

Humongous Classics Collection

Putt-Putt, the world's favorite talking purple roadster, and Fatty Bear team up in the Humongous Classics Collection, which contains three award-winning titles: Putt-Putt Joins the Parade, Fatty Bear's Birthday Surprise and Putt- Putt Goes to the Moon. The Humongous Classics Collection contains the original games in the Junior Adventure series for children ages 3 to 8 that challenge and inspire kids to think for themselves in creative and flexible ways. Children play with faithful, lovable characters as they discover captivating worlds where they direct the journey and overcome challenges at their own pace.

The three classic Junior Adventure games have individually won numerous awards, including the Parent's Choice Award, Parenting Magazine's Software Magic Award, National Parenting Center Seal of Approval, Home PC Best Educational Program, Family PC Tested and Recommended, C/Net Top 100 CD-ROMs, MacUser Five Mouse Award, and Family Fun's Software of the Year Award.

In Putt-Putt Joins the Parade, Putt-Putt needs to find Pep in order to join the annual Cartown Pet Parade. Kids meet the local "carfolk", explore a toy shop, and tool down the road in preparation for the big event. Along the way, they learn to think ahead, deal with unexpected problems, and give others a hand.
In Fatty Bear's Birthday Surprise, kids are challenged to help Fatty Bear prepare the best birthday party ever while Kayla sleeps the night away. Find ingredients for the cake, decorate it, and stop a pesky puppy who keeps running off with the goods - success is only a few clicks away!
In Putt-Putt Goes to the Moon, Putt-Putt lands in a strange place and has to get home. He and his pals must rebuild a rocket, but first, they must find all its parts. An incredible cast of characters, including Governor Moonbeam, captivates kids and helps them on their journey.

Junior Field Trips Collection

Buzzy the Knowledge Bug is the star of the new Junior Field Trips Collection, which contains the award-winning software titles Let's Explore the Farm, Let's Explore the Airport and Let's Explore the Jungle. In the Junior Field Trips games, kids ages 3 to 8 discover some of the most exciting places in the world and learn about the things that interest them most. With hundreds of animated click-points and Buzzy's commentary, kids learn about plants, animals and machines as they explore, investigate, read, create and just have fun. Every picture tells a story, and hundreds of illustrated information pages can be read aloud, so even prereaders can increase their comprehension skills.

The three titles in the Junior Field Trips Collection have individually won several awards, including Child Magazine's 1996 Best of the Year Award, Parenting Magazine Software Magic Award, Family PC Tested and Recommended Award, Family Channel Seal of Quality Award, KIDS FIRST! Coalition for Quality Children's Media Award, and the National Parenting Center Seal of Approval.

Let's Explore the Farm provides firsthand opportunities to explore a real working farm. While investigating the farm, kids can check out the big red barn and see a cow being milked, help harvest the corn, and feed the pigs. Spelling and trivia games give kids a chance to practice their reading and letter skills, and Eggs Away provides a fun way to sharpen mouse skills.
Let's Explore the Airport captures all the fun, energy and excitement of a real working airport. Kids can check out the ticket counter in the main terminal, work the controls in the cockpit of the Concorde, and see how a ground crew prepares the planes. Fun exploration and learning are enhanced with exciting facts, word matching and reading comprehension activities, and Lost Luggage provides 100 levels of puzzling action.
Let's Explore the Jungle offers children a lifelike environment in which to explore and learn about the jungles of Asia, Africa and the Amazon. From the depths of the Nile to the jungle canopy high above, kids can learn things such as why the giant anteater walks on its knuckles or how the flying snake flies. Kids have a blast as they read and hear all about the jungle in illustrated information pages, improve their spelling in the Jungle Jumble, test their knowledge in Jungle Trivia, and laugh as they settle in for a game of Anteater Feeder.

Product Availability and System Requirements

Humongous Classics Collection and Junior Field Trips Collection is available on hybrid CD-ROM for Windows 95, Windows 3.1 and Macintosh for $19.95 at retail stores, through secure online transactions at www.humongous.com, or by phone at (800) 499-8386.

For Windows systems, Humongous Classics Collection and Junior Field Trips Collection require a personal computer with a 33MHz 386 or higher processor, the Windows 3.1 or Windows 95 operating system or later, 4MB of RAM, a double-speed CD-ROM drive, an SVGA (640 x 480, 256-color) graphics monitor, and a sound card. For a Macintosh computer, Humongous Classics Collection requires a Macintosh with a 25MHz 68040 or higher processor or a PowerPC, Macintosh system 7.0 or later, 8 MB of RAM, a double-speed CD-ROM drive, and an SVGA (640 x 480, 256-color) graphics monitor.

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Established in 1992 by Shelley Day and Ron Gilbert, Humongous Entertainment is recognized for pushing the edge in interactive storytelling and delivering high-quality, hand-animated CD-ROMs starring endearing original characters including Putt-Putt, Freddi Fish, Pajama Sam, Fatty Bear, Buzzy the Knowledge Bug, SPY Fox and Ben and Becky Brightly. Humongous Entertainment creates interactive Junior Adventure, Junior Field Trips, Junior Arcade, Big Thinkers and Junior Sports games that encourage kids to explore, discover and have fun. Humongous Entertainment is a subsidiary of GT Interactive Software Corp. (NASDAQ: GTIS).

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