Even considering the fact this was, shockingly enough, not the first Care Bears game reviewed for this website, it was near-on impossible to know what to expect from yet another title in the franchise just landing onto my lap one given day. But I can tell you for sure, I did not expect to play what is essentially baby’s first Mario Party. While this is only a Mario Party-esque clone to the extent of being based around a library of multiplayer-centric minigames, Care Bears: Unlock The Magic did lean itself well into that minigame rollercoaster kind of gameplay loop. Let’s check this colorful beast out.

Less of a minigame rollercoaster, more of a minigame sidewalk.

Care Bears: Unlock The Magic, while not totally dishonest, isn’t completely honest in the way it advertises itself. Are there literally more than 200 levels? Maybe, I didn’t count them to be honest. Are there 200 DIFFERENT levels though? No, there are essentially twelve different minigames with just a handful of different variations to their layout. There is also a very liberal use of calling these minigames “unique” because yes, technically speaking, they’re different from each other without a doubt.

That said though, one is the Care Bears version of making a conga line, that is literally just clone version of the cellphone classic Snake. Another one is a Care Bear on a pogo stick, which is a really tame version of Frogger. There’s also Bubble Shooter, Brick Break, and believe it or not, even Flappy Bird. I guess you get the jist of what to expect from the minigames in the collection, right?

It’s all fun and games until a conga line breaks out!

There is absolutely nothing wrong with using these various different games as influence to put together a whole game that’s fun for the family to play together. It’s actually a pretty solid idea overall, although it does get a bit boring after you play the same minigames a few times back to back.

The level variety and “difficulty progression” isn’t very impressive; for instance, the variations of the Snake knockoff are based around the amount of bears you need to add to your conga line before you are deemed the winner. That being said, I do fully understand the appeal and the mentality behind this lack of difficulty and urgency, given the target demographic for this game is newcomers and non-gamers; for example, my wife had plenty of fun playing these minigames for a bit as someone that isn’t a gamer.

Unlock The Magic looks pretty fine. Each character is clear and obvious, although textures are reused a lot. Sometimes the game doesn’t feel properly responsive, I played both docked and handheld with joycons, and a pro controller, and unfortunately lost a couple times because the game decided it didn’t want my character to turn when I told it to. The music kind of goes the same way as the actual gameplay, it’s fine to start with but quickly becomes repetitive. I felt weird switching my sound off and turning on some aggressive metal while playing a game about Care Bears.

I always thought this was called Bubble Bobble or Bust-a-Move.

Overall, Care Bears: Unlock the Magic is a neat little game if the purpose is to introduce a very young audience, or non-gamers, to the world of multiplayer minigames, as the ones seen in Mario Party. If you are even just vaguely adept at gaming, you will likely want to fall asleep after a little bit, but let me reiterate: you are not the audience this game was made for. It is a great way to encourage those around you to play games with you, but you might want to push them onto other games pretty quickly after that.

Care Bears: Unlock The Magic is available now on PS4, PS5 and Switch.

Reviewed on Nintendo Switch.

A copy of Care Bears: Unlock The Magic was provided by the publisher.