I bought this for my daughter at Easter she was 5½ and was thrilled to get it, but within a couple of days she had totally exhausted it and went back to her Cooking Mama. However, my son who is 3 (and has only ever watched over his sisters shoulder whilst she played) picked up his sisters dsi & started playing this and soon got the hang of it, so Im rating it highly as I think its a great first game for young children to find their way around the ds/dsi - but by 5 (in our case) something more challenging is required. Having said this I'm not sure how many 3 years olds would own a DS/DSi but good for a young sibling of an older child who desperately wants to get involved like my son did.