I was sitting with my son Jake playing Pokémon Ranger the other day when I realized that most of our games we play are of the Pokémon series.  A few months back, I spoke with Nintendo’s resident Pokémon expert, Seth McMahill and we talked about the benefits of playing the role playing games with our children.  You can read more about our conversation here and since our conversation, have experienced some of the games available for the Wii and DS Lite.

When we’re on the go (especially when we’re flying to NY) and I need to keep Jake occupied, I always bring Pokémon Ranger: Shadows of Almia and Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Time.  Since Jake is only 3 and can’t exactly read, the Pokémon series are games we can play together and encourage reading and creativity.

Pokémon Ranger: Shadows of Almia is a unique action-adventure series that features a fun, different way to capture Pokémon with the Nintendo DS stylus, which controls an item called the Capture Styler in the game. Players circle the Pokémon they want to catch by drawing circles around them on the touch screen. When you complete certain Quests, the Ranger Union awards you with power-ups, which add new upgrades and functions to your Capture Styler, allowing you to advance as you work to eventually become a Top Ranger (the most revered Ranger of all).

The journey to become a Top Ranger takes you to the new region of Almia. This game has a larger world, more Missions, more adventure and more to do than the previous Pokémon Ranger game. It has a storyline full of adventure and the ability to travel to and explore many exciting new areas in Almia, including oceans, forests, deserts and more with the help of your Partner Pokémon.

Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Time and it’s DS Lite counterpart, Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Darkness, invites players to become Pokémon, returning to a fantastic land untouched by humans and inhabited only by Pokémon. Players must join a Pokémon guild and start a journey to find out why they’ve been turned into Pokémon, all the while trying to stop a misguided thief bent on stopping time and plunging the world into darkness.

It’s a game Jake and I have fun playing now, but I know it will grow with him.  When he gets older, he’ll be able use Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection to rescue friends in trouble, or send out an SOS Mail if they are in need of rescue.  Another neat this is that the dungeons are randomly generated, so make every mission is unique and players never see the same dungeon twice.

If you have a Wii (which I do and so obviously am in love with), you may be aware that you can download games using Wii Ware.  WiiWare is Nintendo’s new downloadable game service for the Wii console, giving Wii owners access to a constantly growing library of the latest video games from both established developers and independent up-and-comers.

We recently heard about and downloaded My Pokémon Ranch, because of all the Pokémon games, it looks most suitable for a child Jake’s age.  When I talked to Seth, he told me that it was a great game to start off as a person who hadn’t played much of the game before.

It was cute because we got to play it using the Jake ‘Mii’ we made for him and his Mii got to interact with the Pokémon, checking out the Ranch and taking pictures of the Pokémon.  My Pokémon Ranch can be linked with the Nintendo DSâ„¢ Pokémon Diamond and Pokémon®Pearl Game Cards to deposit the Pokémon you’ve caught in these games in your ranch (You can deposit a maximum of 1,000 Pokémon from up to eight different game cards).

There is a lot of reading in all of these games.  They’re roll playing games, so you’re becoming a part of the story.  It reminds me of the ‘choose your own ending’ books we read as a kid, only it’s on screen instead of in a book.  Jake and I enjoy influencing game as we read the story.  He’s still quite young to fully enbrace the games for what they are, but just a few minutes ago I heard Ryan ask him if he wanted to play the Pokémon Ranger game and Jake started jumping up and down shouting, ‘Yes! Yes!’, and sat right down to play and explore with his father.

If your child likes navigating through mazes, go ahead and print this Pokémon Ranger maze out and play it with your child.  I printed out a couple copies for Jake and explained how to get through the maze.  He still obviously needs a hand, but it’s nice having these fun activities to do together.

Click here for larger image