Developer Nosy Crow utilizes a choose-your-own-adventure narrative structure, which has recently become a trend in children’s digital applications, to encourage interactivity and nonlinear story exploration. As Red sets out to deliver a basket of goodies to Grandma, she encounters a hungry wolf and several forks in the road along the way. A combination of three paths (out of eight total) leads to the final destination, each path featuring a mini activity that Red must complete in order to obtain items that she will ultimately use to battle the Big Bad Wolf in the denouement at Grandma’s house. Each time you play, you can try a different combination of paths and activities, thus changing the final outcome. An easily navigable map in the upper right corner allows you to backtrack and try different paths if you don’t like the way things are going.

Mini activities include simple tasks such as picking flowers, collecting jars of water, and pouring honey, to name a few. Each activity employs an interactive element: tilting the device from side to side, blowing into the microphone, and dragging items here and there using the touch screen technology.

No matter which paths you take, the story concludes with a no-holds-barred, girl vs. canine showdown that ends with the inevitable butt-kicking of the maniacal Big Bad Wolf, wherein he gets his just deserts through a variety of humorously humiliating defeat sequences, while the victors, Red and Grandma, just get desserts — the only things devoured in this version of Little Red are the treats from the picnic basket.

Available for iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad; $4.99. Requires iOS 4.3 or later.

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• Tiny, bad-tempered gnomes are ubiquitous in the illustrations and animations, but never mentioned in the text until they eat Hansel’s breadcrumb trail.
• After the children’s wicked stepmother takes them deep into the forest, she gets lost there herself and is never seen again — although her complaining can still be heard.
• Hansel shoots the witch with his slingshot, pitching her forward into her own cauldron, which propels her up the chimney and out of the house.
• A garden full of modern-day sweets (e.g., fizzy lemonade, gummies, and cotton candy) surrounds the witch’s house. The enchanted gummy animals are returned to their true forms after the witch’s defeat. A formerly-gummy swan offers to fly the children home.
• Hansel, much heavier after his ordeal, is magically restored to his previous skinny state.

The richly colored illustrations are pleasantly reminiscent of Saturday morning cartoons and well suited to the story’s light tone. An impressive amount of animation is seamlessly integrated into the illustrations, humorously extending the story.

The main menu offers three options for experiencing the app. “Read to me” mode plays the narration without displaying the text. Interactivities on each screen are disabled while the narration plays; tapping a “sparkle” icon in the upper right-hand corner interrupts the narrator and skips straight to allowing users to access the interactive elements. In “read by myself” mode, the narration is off, and the text displays on a scrolling pane across the bottom of the screen. “Play around” mode forgoes the story entirely so that users may explore Hansel and Gretel’s world.

The navigation is well-designed and simple, with self-explanatory icons and a thumbnail chapter that’s accessible from any screen. The cheerful music and sound effects have separate on/off controls. English and Dutch language options are provided.

A caveat: as the Kirkus review points out, the characters of Gretel and the children’s father are “largely relegate[d] . . . to passive roles.” In the father’s case this passivity minimizes his complicity in the wicked stepmother’s machinations, rendering him innocent. In Gretel’s case, however, it makes her a mere tag-along to the story’s star, “clever” Hansel. (And another thing — we’re repeatedly told Hansel is clever, but his behavior isn’t consistent with this characterization.) Most of the app’s changes to the plot are innocuous, if unnecessary, but one change I find troubling is the revised denouement. Instead of Gretel saving the day by pushing the witch into her own oven, here Hansel defeats the witch alone. This version is more Hansel’s story than that of Hansel and Gretel.

More Epic Tales fairy tales narrated by Silvertongue are on the way.

Available for iPad and iPhone (requires iOS 5.1 or later); $3.99. Rated age 9 and up.

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