The story of Multiply

A child and her times tables

When my daughter was in CM1, the fourth year of primary school in France (fourth grade, for nine and ten year olds), she could not find the motivation to work on her times tables.

So I went looking for a game on the tablet that would help her learn them. And I had to admit that the ones I found were not fun.

Multiplication is not fun, even inside an app. A multiplication on a screen is still a multiplication: a question, then another one.

What is fun

A story that pulls you in is. And a multiplication that does something, that casts a spell, is a very different thing from a multiplication that is only there to be answered.

That was the whole idea: keep the multiplications, and give them a reason. A story to move forward, and magic to make.

A year of pixel art

So I made that game myself. The first Multiply was a 2D game, drawn in pixel art, and it took me a year.

When I had finished it, my daughter knew her times tables. I thought it might be useful to other children, so I published it, and for a while Multiply was on Google Play and on the App Store.

The long pause

Then the app grew old. For a few years I did not have the courage to pick it up again.

Multiply, again

Now I have. Multiply is back, in 3D, with more fun and more mini-games.

The idea has not changed. Every multiplication is still a spell. Naomi, or Swan if your child would rather play a boy, has just been given her father's magic amulet when dark forces capture her mother, and multiplication is the magic that will bring her home. The powers arrive one by one, from ×2 to ×9, as the story goes on.

Around the duels there are 29 riddles and 11 mini-games, characters who talk (every line is voiced, in English, French and Spanish), and a game that quietly brings back the operations a child finds hard, in both directions, 7 × 8 and 8 × 7, until they stick. How those mini-games work, and what each one practises, is the subject of the next post.

The adventure is free from beginning to end, with no ads and no account. There is a one-time purchase for parents who want to follow their child's progress, and the game does not need it.

The trailer

Watch the trailer

The video only loads from YouTube when you press play.

Nicolas, maker of Multiply