Parents' Guide to The Lion's Song

The term "pixel art" probably conjures images of blocky Minecraft-style artwork, but this visually sophisticated app blows that idea out of the water like a World War I tank. Done in nostalgic sepia tone, it succeeds in building a vibrant, emotionally charged interactive experience through the simplest of means: compelling characters and a great story. Each of the four chapters is an intimate peek into the life of one person: a composer, an artist, a mathematician, and a journalist, each in personal crisis. The composer's got writer's block, the artist has blackouts, the mathematician isn't taken seriously because she's a woman, and the journalist has family issues. As thematically complex as The Lion's Song is, gameplay is simple. With limited exploration and forgiving puzzles, this is more interactive novel than traditional adventure game. That said, the choices you make aren't easy ones and may lead to a bad end. The good news is, if things play out in a way you don't like, chapters can be quickly and easily replayed for a better (or at least different) result. Players will marvel as serious ideas about love, loss, duty, and aspiration are poetically illustrated inside the framework of the First World War. Really, as far as an adventure game raising important ethical questions goes, you can't do better than this.