What is 4 plus 8? Did you find that fun? If you did then this is a piece of software made for you. I’m pretty sure most of us don’t find doing this kind of sum fun. And yet Nintendo in their wisdom have given us a game called Maths Training! Of course, arithmetic is a skill that we all use regularly, so this software can certainly be called useful if it improves our ability to do simple arithmetic quickly and accurately.

Maths Training follows the pattern set by earlier games in the Training series – it tries to get you to do a little bit of training each day. When you start up the software it gives you three exercises to complete with each exercise being a variation on adding or subtracting, and later multiplying and dividing. After five days of doing the current set of three exercises (assuming you get all the answers correct) you go up a level and get a new set of exercises. All the exercises involve simple arithmetic, the only variation being how the sums are formed.

The majority of the exercises involve filling in a table of sums – the Kageyama method, named after the inventor of the method. The main thing that seems to have been invented by Kageyama is to decrease the amount of writing involved in doing simple maths sums, effectively increasing the intensity of the actual work done in terms of sums per minute. To use the Kageyama method on paper draw up a 10x10 grid of squares (or use a photocopied one), and write the numbers 0 to 9 down the side in random order and the same along the top in random order. Now fill in each cell by adding the number in the row to the number in the column and writing the result in the cell at the intersection of that row and column. Fill in all 100 squares and you’ve just added every single digit number to every other single digit number in the metric system. Do this once a day and you’ll soon find you know what 8 plus 6 is without thinking. The method can also be used to practice subtraction – simply write the numbers 10 to 19 along the top and then fill in each square by subtracting the number in the row from the number in the column.

In the beginning the game doesn’t require you to do 100 sums at a time, so it does try to ease you into the training. At level 1 you only need to fill in the top row of the grid. It is also very forgiving of errors: if you write the correct answer it immediately moves on to the next sum, but if you write the wrong answer it waits a number of seconds before marking it wrong, giving you a chance to erase what you’ve written and write the correct answer. This is a good design idea for the goal of training people in maths because affirmation is a far better method of encouragement than approbation, or the hated red pen.

You are not limited to only doing the daily exercise routines – at any time you can use the Kageyama method to practice your addition, subtraction, multiplication or division, and you can choose between a grid comprised of 10, 30, 50 or 100 squares. There are also a large number of different practice exercises, some to practice your times tables, some to practice repetitively adding a number, all to practice your arithmetic. In each one the goal is to earn a gold medal by getting all the sums right. A secondary goal is to beat the goal time earning you a place on the top 3 for the exercise. If you’re exceptionally fast you can get a platinum medal, but for a lot the exercises this is almost impossible. Other than the medals, the leveling up every five days and the recording of times there is very little in the way of progress recorded – no graphs, no “maths age,” no unlocking of more exciting exercises.

The game is played in the same manner as the Brain Training games – you hold the DS sideways like a book and write your answers on the touch screen using the stylus. The normal Nintendo polish is evident in everything, but this is a very workmanlike production – the software is built around Kageyama’s 100 cell method and doesn’t offer much more than that. The upgrading of levels every five days is a good idea, but it would be better if your performance affected the speed at which you level – I would have liked to have reached the “harder” stuff quicker, or at least graduated on to 100 cells quicker than the 20 days it took.

Maths Training is a piece of software that would be very useful for a primary school child to practice their times tables and bonds. It would be even more useful in a class situation if every child had a DS because the game allows up to 16 people to download it wirelessly and do sums together. It would also be useful for adults who consider their arithmetic a little rusty or never really got good at it while in school. There is no real game in it though – no testing of your ability, no score other than time taken (with the goal times not being very difficult at all). This makes sense for software that is trying to encourage people to improve their maths, but makes for a game without reward or challenge, and without much in the way of fun either unless you find adding 9 and 7 a fun activity.

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