User:Coin945/The ClueFinders

I'm trimmed down this article, and hope to collab with you on adding some sources to buff it up. :)
The ClueFinders is a series of educational software aimed at children aged eight to twelve. The series is produced by The Learning Company as a counterpart to their "Reader Rabbit" series for older elementary-aged students.

The ClueFinders include Joni Savage, Santiago Rivera, Owen Lam and Leslie Clark. The kids are accompanied on all their adventures by LapTrap, an anthropomorphic laptop computer who floats in the air. Although it is often spelled as "Clue Finders", "Cluefinders" or "Clue-Finders", even by sources such as the Internet Movie Database, the series' main title is properly spelled as one word with the "F" capitalized.

History
Cluefinders was conceived as a continuation of the Reader Rabbit series, appealing to the 3rd–6th grade level.

The first ClueFinders title was released in 1998 and most of the subsequent games were released within the next two years.

In 1998 The Learning Company used Cluefinders ' 4th Grade Adventures as the prototype for Internet Applet technology that allowed users to download supplementary activities from the ClueFinders website.

2000 and 2001 each saw one new ClueFinders game, both followed by a different noneducational bonus disc, but no new games have been released since that time.

Cluefinders held a writing competition in 2001. Sponsored by The Learning Company, the competition was open to 2rd–6th grade classrooms in the United States. The winning essay—a new adventure for the ClueFinders crew—won an iMac.

After Riverdeep acquired many of The Learning Company's properties in 2001 from Gores Technology Group $40 million in stock, Carmen Sandiego, ClueFinders, and Reader Rabbit were licensed to the KidsEdge Web site in 2002 where they were available to play among 170 games and activities.

The 2004  RCN InterACTION service allowed parents to stream over 35 games in series such as Carmen Sandiego, Clifford the Big Red Dog and ClueFinders over a broadband connection.

Bundles including multiple previously released titles, such as The ClueFinders Math Learning System 2007, have since been created.

As of 2017, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt was offering the Cluefinders brand as a licensing opportunity on its website.

Plot
The ClueFinders' adventures takes place in the contemporary real world incorporating some elements of fantasy and science fiction, with merely the continued presence of LapTrap pushing the series into the realm of science fiction. Nevertheless, the opening titles from The ClueFinders 5th Grade Adventures place the series in the present day. The main characters include ClueFinders founder and tomboy Joni, skater dude Owen, mechanically-minded Santiago, literary-minded Leslie, artificial intelligence LapTrap, and intelligent dog Socrates. The four human kids each come from one of the four major ethnic groups.

Game play
The player can choose to play the adventure mode or to play the game's activities outside the adventure in "practice mode." Choosing to play the adventure will lead to a follow-up sequence which further establishes the premise as well as the overall goal of the game.

The bulk of each game involves traveling between different screens in a predetermined area which has various educational activities. The user will have to play these games to advance. Most of the time, each area will have one activity that needs to be completed to advance onward, but which can only be played by collecting items from all the other activities in the area.

In all the games except for The ClueFinders 4th Grade Adventures, the ClueFinders are split into two teams at the start. A portable red videophone allows the two teams to make contact with each other and clicking on the phone provides the user with game hints from the other team. The other team will typically either be serving as backup, looking for clues, or else be captured and in need of rescue.

Graphics
During the game play, 2D computer graphics are used in the style of hand-drawn animated cartoons with animations that use thick outlines and solid colors on two-dimensional backgrounds. For this reason, the series is often  described as imitating the look of a Saturday morning cartoon Scooby-Doo being repeatedly cited by reviewers. Cut scenes, however, use pre-rendered 3D graphics.

Reception
Teach thought the Search and Solve Adventures mystery was engaging, and that the game successfully combined storytelling with problem-solving activities. Computer Shopper described 3rd Grade Adventures as the "educational equivalent of the Indiana Jones trilogy".

In 2002, The Boston Herald commented the series had "come a long way", and noted the decision to include a Caucasian, Asian, Black, and Latino in its main cast smelt of interference from the California School Board standard. The paper praised the series' "television-quality animation, broad educational focus and lively situations", though thought the early games were uneven in difficulty

Children's Software Review managing editor Ellen Wolock criticized The Learning Company for focusing too much of its resources on repackaging its old software, commenting that she received the impression the company was "just throw[ing] together" entries in its newer ClueFinders series.

Books and fan fiction
Two ClueFinders books, The Mystery of Microsneezia and The Mystery of the Backlot Banshee, were written by Ellen Weiss and illustrated by Mel Friedman.

FanFiction.Net currently has exactly sixteen stories featuring the ClueFinders, and a ClueFinders section was added to Games in 2010.