Stories & Games by the Alexander Family
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Kalley’s machine is riveting to explore, ingenious in its creative engineering and fascinating to use because it has multiple interactive hotspots that interrelate on each page. This app showcases some of the most elegant interactions ever placed inside of a kids’ book app.
Jinny Gudmundsen, USA Today
This storybook app invites kids to tap and explore and discover — it’s a delight for all ages. Kalley’s Machine Plus Cats is a delightful interactive book that kids will want to read, or at least explore, over and over.
Amanda Bindel, Common Sense Media
It’s not often that I find a storybook app that stands out like Kalley’s Machine Plus Cats. It is, in my opinion, an intelligent and must have app. I highly recommend this book, this machine, this book machine to anyone with kids because I am certain that they will love reading and operating it as much as my children do.
the iMums
I am so very impressed with the wonderful and witty machines found in Kalley’s Machine Plus Cats as well as the overall quality of this app. This app gives me a renewed interest in testing children’s applications and is a very easy application to recommend.
Amy Solomon, 148Apps
Kalley’s Machine is dear to our family because it is based on the true story of how we started making apps together.
When our daughter Kalley was 4 years old, she drew a picture of a machine. She was super-excited about it and took it everywhere she went. It took us a while to catch on to the fact that she had drawn it in answer to a new development in our family.
We had explained that daddy had taken a job downtown and soon would be commuting everyday. She was not cool with this. She was used to daddy working from a home office. But we explained that grown-ups need to work for money so we can trade the money for things our family needs – like food.
Kalley’s answer was to draw up plans for a machine – a machine that could make food – thereby eliminating the need for money and for daddy to go away to work.
And while building the machine Kalley drew was a no-go for several reasons, we loved the heart behind her drawing. And we decided it could make a great interactive story that we could build together and sell as an app – so maybe someday daddy wouldn’t have to go away to work.
If you’re wondering whether that makes a good kids story or not, we’ve included every single page of the story in the screenshots:
PRO TIP: Print them all out for a free storybook!
Kalley’s Machine was crafted with interactivity as the first priority. More than 60 satisfyingly touchable controls put kids in charge of each twist and smash of the machine. Controls come in a wide machiney variety:
With control of the machines, kids can make stuff smash, inflate, explode, shrink, burn, get painted, light up, get grabbed, drop, change shape and do a few other things like:
Kalley’s Machine is a story based on a 4 year-old girl’s drawing. As such, it includes cats. They are completely irrelevant to the story. However, they are way fun to harass.
Tease them. Scare them. Puzzle them. Adore them. We think you’ll love the cats.
Cuz it’s a story, right? Of course, you can read the story the old-fashioned way. But, to aid new readers, we’ve also included two helpful interactive story features:
Kalley and her dad narrate the story with highlighted words so kids can follow along.
Words are spoken when kids touch them.
Honestly, this app is not designed to be educational. It is designed to be fun.
However, we’d get an ‘F’ in marketing if we didn’t point out that the interactive medium offers kids great chances to explore some basic concepts which are both safer and less messy than their real-world alternatives.
Creative parents may recognize the opportunity to discuss:
We have made this app super-safe for children by having:
We do not collect, store, or share any personal identifiable information or location data in our apps. All our third party networks are configured to be used in a COPPA compliant fashion. You can review more privacy-related information at http://rocketwagon.com/kalleys-machine-privacy-policy/