Ninja Kidz Time Masters Review

Ninja Kidz Time Masters tells the story of the titular Ninja Kidz who have to navigate through different time periods as they hunt down the evil Dr. Disaster to stop his nefarious ways in order to bring peace back to the planet.

Ninja Kidz Time Masters is an action beat’em up where players can select one of four characters (or play with up to three friends) and tackle the game’s 16 levels by beating up every crony on your way to the boss at the end of the time period. Characters both have a normal and strong attacks that can be combined to create combos.

Along with the default weapon attack, characters can also pick up projectile items dropped by enemies. You’ll be able to pick up bombs, shurikens, or kunais. You can also carry one at a time, but they will accumulate if you pick up multiple of the same. You can also find health items but again, they’re in the same slot at the projectile weapon; so you can’t have one of each.

Under your health bar, you also have a power meter that fills up as you attack, beat enemies. It’s a special attack meter that allows you to unleash a damaging special move. If you wait until all three bars are filled, you’ll be able to morph into a black suit which allow for faster movement speed. Once you’ve completed the campaign, you can also unlock Boss Rush, Quick Play, 6 additional levels and Shane, the last grandmaster as a playable character.

The game looks fine for what it is; a colorful cartoon-ish beat’em up. There’s a surprisingly decent variety in terms of enemies and levels given it’s time travel theme. You’ll go through pirate and space themed levels for example. Each themed level is uniquely designed to provide a diverse experience. The soundtrack is the “epitome of lazyness”; as it sounds like the same tune is playing throughout the game. The voiceover work is absolutely ear-grating. It sounds like most voice actors are speaking with the microphone down their throats.

Unfortunately, there are a few issues that keep Ninja Kidz Time Masters from being a great game. Characters move like they’re walking through three feet of mud making things annoying when trying to reach enemies with projectiles before they attack you. There are also enemies that blocks everything when up close; your slow movement makes it a pain to get distance and shoot them with projectiles. A dodge button would’ve also been a great quality of life feature.

Also controls are often hit or miss. There’s a clearly in delay between the button press and the attack. Also, sometimes, my character would attack even if I didn’t press any buttons. Among your attacks, the game, in between levels, among its game tips, claims that you can pull out a charge attack by holding Y, but no matter how many times I tried, there was a never a single charge attack; so I guess the developers kinda forgot about that. The vibration is incredibly high and annoying. There’s an option to disable it, but it clearly does not work.

Ninja Kidz Time Masters is a surprisingly enjoyable gaming experience, despite the annoying flaws with the controls and slow movement. It’s the ideal game for parents wanting to play videogames with their younger children, especially if they are fans of the tv show. However, I can’t help but think of the potential of the game had it been placed in the hands of more apt/talented AA/AAA game developer; it could’ve been in my top 5 of 2024.