Epic! – Kids’ Books and Videos - Epic Creations, Inc

App Review

This review of Epic! – Kids’ Books and Videos was completed by the Australian Council on Children and the Media (ACCM) on 8 September 2020.

About the app

This section contains details about the app provided by an ACCM Reviewer.

ACCM review

This review of Epic! – Kids’ Books and Videos contains the following information:

• The level to which the game was reviewed
• App description
• Reviewers comments
• In App purchasing
• Online information
• Gambling
• Advertising and product placement
• Gender stereotypes and sexual references
• Coarse language
• Game playing behaviour which may be of concern to some parents
• Other

The level to which the game was reviewed

Reviewer created four children’s profiles (maximum for single account holder) for ages 4, 6, 10 and 12. A variety of material was sampled from each age category and the app was explored for several hours.

App description

Epic! is a subscription service which gives children access to an extensive collection (thousands!) of e-books, audio books and educational videos that have been curated by teachers and librarians to be safe for kids. The app is very easy to navigate and once a child is familiar with the layout, it is intuitive enough for them to use independently. When a child opens the app, they choose their profile and then they have six categories available in tabs along the top: For You (suggestions based on previous choices and interests); Favourites (you can keep favourites saved here for later); Comics; Read to me; Videos; and Audiobooks. The ‘read to me’ option has a large selection of books that are narrated, and the words are subtly highlighted so that children can read along with the narration. For a lot of the material, there is the option to do a short comprehension quiz after you have finished watching, listening or reading. There are points and badges that can be collected for motivation, and children (and their parents) can also see a detailed breakdown of all the materials accessed, completed and hours spent. Other very useful features are the ability to download material onto your device so that you can continue watching even without internet access, and also ‘quests’ which are guided goals that prompt children to explore a theme (eg – Adventure!) through literature. There is some content (although not as much) in Spanish, Chinese and French. Furthermore, although it went beyond the scope of this review, there is an ‘educator’ section which allows teachers to select and curate collections of reading material and share it with their students.

Reviewers comments

This is quite an impressive resource, and for families that are much more digitally inclined and prefer to do their reading that way, this would be a worthwhile subscription to have. I really love that this feels so much safer and more controlled than just letting your kids loose on apps with similar content like YouTube, Amazon, or even library apps. This collection feels well-picked, is free from dodgy material and has no ads or pop ups. There is one significant catch, however, which has been commented on in many parent reviews of this app; if you have multiple profiles (e.g. one for your 5-year-old and one for your 11-year-old) - there is nothing to stop your younger child accessing the older child’s profile, which certainly opens up the possibility of your younger child seeing or hearing things that they might find scary or inappropriate (for example a Goosebumps book read aloud). Therefore, it is important that younger children are guided to the correct profile for their age and that some supervision happens. This could easily be fixed with a simple password, and I hope that the developers make this happen for future versions. I was impressed with the range and scope of material available here and I would feel very comfortable letting my own children (8 and 10) explore the content independently. It is also worth noting that for all the material that I sampled, the narration was in American English, and I couldn’t help wishing that there was some Australian content! I loved that you could download content to your device, and I thought it would be amazing if you had to take a long road trip and wanted to occupy your kids easily.

In App purchasing

This is a subscription service. There are no In-App purchases in this game, but you will need to pay a monthly or annual fee to access the content once the one-month free trial has ended.

Online information

There is no online information required to play this game.

Gambling

At the time of review, the reviewer found no simulated gambling content. If you discover simulated gambling content in this app, please contact us with the details so we can update our review.

Advertising and product placement

There is no advertising or product placement in this game.

As there is an enormous amount of material available through this app, the reviewer can only comment on the content that was sampled and that was available on the app at this time. Please be aware that, as is the case with many apps, content changes all the time. If you notice material that contains any product placement/advertising please contact us and let us know.

Gender stereotypes and sexual references

None noted.

As there is an enormous amount of material available through this app, the reviewer can only comment on the content that was sampled and that was available on the app at this time. Please be aware that, as is the case with many apps, content changes all the time. If you notice material that contains any gender stereotypes or sexual references please contact us and let us know.

Coarse language

None noted.

As there is an enormous amount of material available through this app, the reviewer can only comment on the content that was sampled and that was available on the app at this time. Please be aware that, as is the case with many apps, content changes all the time. If you notice material that contains any coarse language please contact us and let us know.

Game playing behaviour which may be of concern to some parents

None noted.

Other

Epic! is a curated collection of children’s materials that the developers have selected to be safe for children. However, in an app like this which contains literally 100,000s of resources and is changing regularly, it is advised that parents keep a close eye on the content that their children are accessing (thankfully this is made very easy on this app!) and make decisions about whether it is appropriate for their children. Reviews like this can give a brief overview but due to the quantity of material it is impossible for us to guarantee that all content is suitable.

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