Snow White by Nosy Crow Review

It is always a treat to let readers know about new Nosy Crow apps, known for their modern take on fairy tales, brilliant non-fiction titles about animal lives, toddler favorites such as the Bizzy Bear series, and bringing the art of Axel Scheffler to life within children’s applications.

Snow White by Nosy Crow is their latest title - a new, nicely traditional Brother’s Grimm tale of the same name with a few changes along the way. As with their other titles, Snow White is strikingly beautiful, with a palette of lush colors and stylized good looks that I have come to expect from these eclectic developers. Children have option of listening to this story complete with narration and the use of child actors as they explore this app, looking for hotspots to interact with as well as tapping characters to hear them speak additional lines of text. One is also able to read this app to themselves, silencing the narration yet still benefiting from the lovely included background music - a nice touch.

I am fond of this app being a clear and linear tale that includes a beginning, middle, and end as I feel children can never get enough well-structured storytelling. It is nice to see the beginning of this tale intact from the original - how Snow White’s mother pricking her finger while sewing and seeing the red blood combined with the white snow and black window frames compels her to wish for a daughter of such coloring as well, also including the character of the huntsman who takes Snow White into the woods but refuses to kill her - details sometimes left out of some adaptations.

Children will quite enjoy the interactive moments found throughout Snow White by Nosy Crow, allowing one to be helpful as children will have a chance to help the dwarfs mine for jewels, help Snow White complete some much needed chores within the new house that she begins to call home, assist the evil step-mother in creating her poison spells, as well as other various smaller interactions one should also search for. Do tap on the characters to hear them say multiple lines of dialogue as well as enjoy the camera function that those with front-facing cameras will experience as their image can be seen within the iconic mirror on the wall - a nice touch children will have fun with.

It is worth noting that I have a hard time with an important interaction, as I did not know to lift the coffin up on my first read of Snow White by Nosy Crow, which is imperative as this leads to the dropping of the glass casket, shattering it and dislodging the poison apple from Snow White's throat.

I also think it would have been a nice moment for the witch to approach Snow White with a different disguise as when she attempts to do the princess harm, finally by dressing up like the farmer's wife and offering Snow White the apple, which the princess accepts in order to be polite to the old woman - a favorite element of mine from the Grimm’s classic. It is nice, however, that within this version Snow White and the prince who took her back to the palace get to know each other before marrying - a better tone for young girls than the myth of “love at first sight."

Snow White by Nosy Crow is full of polish, as are their other apps. The illustrations are divine, as are the interactions - including the ability to drag Snow White around the screen - but they are never distracting because they add richness to the story. The addition of a female dwarf is not lost on me - another detail that made me smile. The use of music is equally spot-on, with original classic music as grand as music that one may hear as the musical score to a period costume drama.

Snow White as well as their other apps such as Three Little Pigs, Red Riding Hood, and Cinderella, are delightful choices for keeping these classic tales alive in the minds of children. The quality of these apps is very well realized and obviously developed with a lot of love, making them apps that I highly recommend.