Welcome to Pixalate’s CTV & Mobile App Manual Reviews According to COPPA, a series containing the detailed factors the Trust & Safety Advisory Board educators used to assess an app’s child-directedness.
The educators manually review thousands of mobile apps available in the Google Play & Apple App Stores as well as connected TV (CTV) apps from the Roku Channel Store and Amazon Fire TV App Store using the COPPA Rule factors shown below & make those results available to the public at ratings.pixalate.com.
This post takes a look at a game which is available from the Google Play Store & Apple App Store. Our reviewer discusses how the subjective factors set forth in the COPPA Rule apply to the app and factor into the reviewer's determination as to whether the app is child-directed or general audience (i.e., it is not targeting children).
The teacher will indicate the factors they relied upon in their assessment using the 10 factors shown below that reflect the 10 child-directed factors in the COPPA Rule.
Masha and the Bear Pizza Maker is an interactive pizza-making game, where the player helps Masha bake a pizza and deliver it to customers. The straightforward steps of gathering ingredients, preparing and baking the pizza, and delivering pizzas to the various customers (both human and animal) are simple and easy to follow for young children. Each part of the pizza-making process is broken down into several short steps, ensuring kids with short attention spans stay engaged and entertained.
Some of the pizza combinations are pretty disgusting (shrimp, mandarin oranges, and olives?), but that gross factor can contribute to the appeal factor for kids.
Masha and the Bear is a popular animated show that is watched by kids worldwide. Masha and the other characters from the show could be considered celebrities to toddlers and young children. Although Masha is a fictional, animated character, she is meant to be a 4-year-old girl, reflective of the expected audience of the show and primary users of the app.
The animation and visual style of the game are reflective of the overall child-appealing style of the cartoon. The game features numerous characters from the show and is set in the same world, providing a familiar visual setting for children. The animations are very detailed, ensuring continuity between the app and the show and appealing to children of a variety of ages.
Verbal instructions are given using simple vocabulary and spoken slowly so that children can understand. These instructions are also accompanied by animations that show the user how to interact with the game. There are no written instructions, allowing even the youngest user to quickly figure out how to play the game and interact with the app.
Cheerful and childlike music plays in the background throughout gameplay. Plenty of sound effects are present to help encourage children to interact with the game. Each action has an accompanying sound effect, such as slicing veggies, grating cheese, and even driving the car to deliver the pizza.
While there is no broad incentive system, new ingredients and pizzas are unlocked as players continue to make and deliver pizzas. This allows for more variety in gameplay with several different types of ingredients to prepare, pizzas to bake, and customers to deliver to.
Video ads are played at transitions during the game, and banner ads are displayed at times across the bottom of the screen. Ads seem to be geared for different primary audiences depending on the operating system, with the advertising on iOS being a bit more child-directed and the Android advertising being mixed and a general audience.
Masha and the Bear Pizza Maker is rated 4+ in the Apple App Store, E for Everyone in the US Google Play Store, and PEGI 3 in the European Google Play Stores. While the descriptions in the different app stores vary slightly, they both contain language indicating a child-directed audience. The description in the Google Play store does specifically mention “kids” several times, and states, “Have fun in kids games for free, make friends and enjoy your adventure in 5-year-old games with pizza simulator!”
The reviews also reflect a child-directed audience, with reviews mentioning toddlers and younger children playing the game. There is a wide variety of reviews written by kids, parents, and grandparents.
Privacy
According to the privacy policy, which was last updated on April 1, 2018, the developers recognize that “most of DEVGAME's Services are for a kids audience and are directed to children under the age of 13.” They address children’s privacy specifically in their policy and indicate that they follow COPPA regulations. The policy indicates that they do collect information from children regarding device information (including mobile provider), IP addresses, and usage information. They indicate that parents would be notified if any additional information was collected, and they would obtain verifiable parental consent if needed.
Find Pixalate's full catalogue of reviews in our CTV and Mobile App Review Page
Screenshots of Masha and the Bear Pizza Maker
Pixalate’s Trust and Safety Advisory Board was created to bring in individuals with experience using child-directed apps in the classroom to review and assess which apps are child-directed. This manual review process serves to quality check Pixalate’s automated review process. See our full methodology for more information.
Disclaimer
This blog post published by Pixalate is available for informational purposes only and is not considered legal advice. By viewing this blog post, the reader understands and agrees that there is no attorney-client relationship between the reader and the blog publisher. The blog should not be used as a substitute for legal advice from a licensed professional attorney in the applicable jurisdiction(s), and readers are urged to consult their own legal counsel on any specific legal questions concerning any specific situation. The content of this blog post reflects Pixalate's opinions with respect to factors that Pixalate believes may be useful to the digital media industry. Pixalate's opinions are just that, opinions, which means that they are neither facts nor guarantees; and this blog post is not intended to impugn the standing or reputation of any entity, person or app, but instead, to report findings pertaining to mobile and Connected TV (CTV) apps.
