My son Xavier is four, and he was playing Baldi’s Basics. It looks like an old-school learning game, but it’s really a horror game: get a math problem wrong and the teacher comes after you. For a four-year-old, that’s a lot more creepy than educational.
So I decided to make him a better one: a game that teaches math, reading and critical thinking, feels right for his age, and rewards him constantly for trying. I called it Xavier Land.
I build interactive experiences for a living, so this was the fun kind of homework. With AI coding tools doing a lot of the heavy lifting, the first playable version came together in an afternoon, and it’s been on his tablet ever since. I keep adding to it based on how he plays.
A world built around one kid
Xavier Land is a bright 3D adventure where the hero is a little cartoon version of him. He starts on his home farm and heads out in three directions: up Math Mountain, into the Story Forest and across Rainbow Canyon. Each adventure has three lands, and each land gets a little harder than the last.
He moves by sliding a finger across the screen, so there’s nothing to learn before the fun starts.
Math Mountain
Friendly frogs guard the bridges between lands. Answer their questions and the bridge builds itself, one plank for every right answer. On Math Mountain the frogs ask him to count, add, take away and find the missing number, with numbers up to 12 on the higher peaks.
Questions are made fresh every time, so he can’t just memorize the answers.
Story Forest
In the Story Forest it’s letters and words: first and last letters, matching words to pictures, and filling in the missing vowel. A friendly narrator reads every question and every word out loud, so he can play before he can read, and hearing each word while he sees it helps him learn to read.
Rainbow Canyon
Rainbow Canyon is the critical thinking branch: colors, shapes, sizes, patterns, matching a shape to its shadow, and spotting the odd one out. In the Shape Desert he can tap a giant cube or cone to hear its name and watch it spin.
21 kinds of questions in all, and the same kind never comes up twice in a row.
Getting it wrong isn’t scary here
This was the whole point. In Xavier Land, nothing chases you. When he picks a wrong answer, that button turns grey, the narrator gently explains, and he tries again. The frogs let one mistake slide, and if he wanders off, a yellow arrow points him to what’s next.
Rewards every few seconds
Four-year-olds run on rewards, so the game is packed with them. Shiny stars hide in every land. Bridges grow with each right answer. The narrator cheers him on by name. He wins toys to play with: a soccer ball, a beach ball, a xylophone, a pinwheel, fireworks and a paper airplane. Animals he meets move to his farm, his pet follows him everywhere, and a tap on his character sets off a spin, a big jump or a silly dizzy wobble.
Things that grow while he sleeps
Seed bags hide around the lands. Back home he plants them in his garden, and they grow over real days: carrots in one, strawberries and corn in two, pumpkins and watermelons in three. When a plant is ready he picks it, eats it and hears a quick healthy-eating fact.
It gives him a reason to come back tomorrow.
The big prize: Fun Land
At the end of each adventure a magic key floats over a stone pedestal. Collect all three and the bridge to Fun Land opens: bounce pads, a carousel, balloons to pop, and every toy he has won, all in one place.
A better game for a four-year-old
Xavier Land is still growing. Next up: more lands, more toys, more words as he learns to read, and narration recorded in a family voice.
A personal project, built for an audience of one.
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