Ben 10: Power Trip on Stadia

It’s been a long while since I took a Ben 10 game for a spin, but thanks to our friends at Google, we had that opportunity over the weekend. And while it’s not the longest game available on the platform, it probably fits nicely with the audience the game is targeting – kids!

And my kids had a blast. First, it cannot be stated enough how versatile Google Stadia really is, especially in a home where multiple people are reviewing different video games on different devices. With a few TVs already claimed, Logan logged into Google Chrome on the iMac, selected Ben 10 from the list, and began playing. It really was that easy.

And while the experience wasn’t as good as we had hoped – may be an Internet issue on our end? – it was never unplayable or so broken that things looked wrong. There were minor issues here and there, but nothing that “broke” the game. And in 2021, that seems to be par for the course on most releases, as more and more titles hit the market with minor issues that get cleaned up later. And we fully expect Ben 10 to be completely cleaned up within a few weeks.

But ultimately it’s about the fun the player has, not necessarily the length of the game. And while Logan was able to the beat the game relatively quickly, about 5 hours (in terms of how long the average game is), he had fun doing it which is all you can ask for. The conversation around price versus time is a tough one to have. I can take two of my kids to the movie theatre for an hour and a half movie and spend 50 bucks easily, so is a short game for the same price bad? I think not, but others think so. And that’s OK.