Mini Ninjas

Mini Ninjas is a great start to what could well become a staple franchise for Eidos and IO. If you're hunting for collectibles, you'll easily spend eight to 10 hours on your journey. Even on the hardest setting, the game is never unbearably difficult. The bosses all follow predictable patterns, and fighting enemies is often optional, so most of your frustrations will come at the hands of the poor camera. But Mini Ninjas makes it easy to see past these issues and have a great time.

However, besides this slight issue Mini Ninjas is a fun and enjoyable game. The visual style is fairly cartoony but is perfect for the audience it is targeting and has nice cuteness at every turn. Although you'll spend much of your time in the game swinging weapons at enemies, the violence is very tame, especially considering that most of the enemies you'll face look like enlarged Jawas wearing samurai outfits that once defeated turn into a harmless little animals, similar to the enemies in the Sonic the Hedgehog series.

Although the combat is fun and grows as the game progresses, Mini Ninjas is still a little on the simple side and that will throw some gamers off (also, the boss fights are giant quick time events/button prompts, which is disappointing). With that said, this is the perfect game to introduce younger siblings or your own children to the classic Japanese tales and ninja quests so many of us love. I consider Mini Ninjas to be an extremely pleasant surprise.