Parent's Guide: Cooking Mama 4 - Age rating, mature content and difficulty

Cooking Mama 4 is a cooking based mini-game collection, in which you join the titular Mama character in preparing various dishes through a series of simple, Touch Screen controlled mini-games. You'll be chopping, frying and measuring your way through some two hundred of the things, and the better you perform, the better the score and medal you receive at the end will be. On the plus side, there are also no consequences for failing, as "Mama will fix it", and you still unlock the next recipe, even if you do nothing whatsoever in the mini-games!

With young girls as its target market, the mini-games in question are self-explanatory, with blue arrows indicating the necessary actions, so even those that can't read yet aren't left out. For the most part, each game, or action, simply involves performing a pretty simple gesture on the Touch Screen, whether it's sliding to chop, or drawing circles to stir. And as a lot of the mini-games use very similar actions, once they've sussed out one chopping game, they've sussed out them all. With support for four player download play, up to four people with their own 3DSs can play together in cook off competitions, even if only one of you own a copy of the game, which makes it great for family play!

In terms of accessibility, there's very little that children will struggle with here. With easy to pick up and play appeal, and plenty of charm, this is one they'll love playing on their own. While a basic reading ability would be an advantage, as you do get a little written explanation before each mini-game, it's certainly not a necessity, and young kids will love what Mama's serving up here!

As a cooking themed mini game collection, there's nothing in the way of mature content here, with no violence, gore, sex or swearing in sight. Some boys may be put off by the pink girly-ness, though.

Age Ratings

Format Reviewed: Nintendo 3DS