Developer – Exiin, Fishing Cactus

Publisher – Modus Games

Platforms – PC, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, Playstation 4

Welcome everybody to this new feature I’m trying out. Long have I been a gamer, ever since I was 6 years old. IT was a very different time in the 80’s, and some of my first gaming experiences were Contra, Mortal Kombat, and Doom.

Now, the nature of rating systems back then compared to now was non-existent. Games such as those were sold and marketed to kids just as much as the latest Mario or Sonic game.

Fast forward to 2020, and most of those games depiction of blood and gore are laughable to think of as gruesome for children. In modern Doom and Mortal Kombat though, I’m not sure if a small child should be watching Ermac’s stomach fatality by any means.

Now, this subject isn’t one I much cared or thought about for most of my life. Now at the ripe age of 36, I’m a parent myself for the first time. Now, just having a child didn’t exactly change my perspective right away on the subject. Early on, my son wasn’t able to focus on the content at hand or pay much attention to what was on the screen in the room with him.

One day I was finishing up some Kombat League matches in MK11. Final set, my Geras easily mopped up another online Scorpion. I performed his skin rip fatality, which is absolutely brutal. (Google it, if you want to see it for yourself.)

I then looked over, and my son was dead eye, staring at the screen, mouth wide open. Now, I don’t believe he could even conceive or fathom the blobs of characters on a t.v and what was actually happening, but that image changed my perspective forever.

I immediately was thinking to myself….”Well, no more Mortal Kombat on the big screen.”

Then I had to change my approach, think of what to play when my son was hanging out in the same room as myself. Then came along a review opportunity for Modus Games latest title, Ary and the Secret of Seasons.

Now this isn’t a “review” of Ary in a traditional sense. In fact, Ary, even after several major updates and patches, is honestly a pretty mediocre title all around. What little promise it shows, is marred by lackluster combat and tons of bugs and glitches.

What Ary does excel at however, is the exact type of experience I wouldn’t mind playing in front of my son. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying this game is colorful so it’s good for kids to play. Kids are smart and more discerning than people realize, and they know a good game from a bad one if you put one in front of them.

As a game for my son to enjoy as a spectator, it’s far more successful. The game’s bright and colorful, it’s characters are well designed and the monsters are relatively harmless. The game, despite not being great, is adequate at changing the environments and has okay variety in it’s moment to moment gameplay.

It’s well meaning, and Ary as a character is pretty easy to root for during the games brief runtime. It’s not a game I can see replaying over and over again, but as something nice to throw on that my son can enjoy, I can suggest it to parents looking for something outside of the Lego titles as a child safe adventure.

As for this feature, I plan on taking a look at other games, some old, some new, and try games out I may never have played if I didn’t have a new, tiny, gaming fan to entertain. Next up, is Super Lucky’s Tail.