MY ANIMAL SAFARI

In this elementally simple app, over 50 cartoon animals pose in succession on a daisy-strewn hillside and respond in silly ways to successive touches.

Arranged in an endless loop that picks up at a seemingly random spot when the app is loaded (after a title page that disappears with a touch), the animal figures slide into view with taps on prominent arrows pointing left and right. They proceed with further taps to bulge, hop, loop the loop and sound off with a (human-made) gurgle, chirp or other noise. The animals appear in roughly geographical sequences—kangaroo is followed by platypus, echidna and koala, for instance—and each comes with a large, one-word label that is pronounced by a narrator in a British accent. There is no menu or index, and both the sunny background scene and the sprightly background music remain the same throughout.

A one-trick pony—but it’s a good trick, likely to keep toddlers entertained for an extended period as it adds lots of new animals to their mental menageries.