Super Spy Ryan

"HOW MANY TIMES DO WE HAVE TO TEACH YOU THIS LESSON, OLD MAN?!"— Harold (SpongeBob SquarePants)

### Platform(s)

Android
iOS

### Country

United States
United Kingdom
Ireland

### Predecessor

*Ryan's Rescue Squad* (console game)
*Ryan's Dart Tag* (mobile game)

***Super Spy Ryan*** was a 2022 action-video game developed by Amber Studio and published by Amazon Mobile for Android and iOS, based on the Amazon Kids+ animated/live-action special of the same name, which in turn is based on the YouTube channel *Ryan's World*. The app was then retired on April 27, 2023, with the game's servers also being shut down, almost exactly 1 year and 2 weeks after the game released.

## Why It's Not a Super Spy

1. It inevitably rips off two other mobile games: *Brawl Stars* and *Piggy Hunt*, in which the latter already died in popularity before the game was even released. *Brawl Stars* for the general concept, similar elements, the starting animation before each round/match, and even similar looking UI and fonts. *Piggy Hunt* for the similar looking animations and controls, making the game feel like a reskin.
2. Very bland and simplistic looking graphics, especially for that of 2022 3D mobile game standards, which is common in a lot of shovelware mobile games these days, with the models looking like they were simply made using a bunch of shapes mashed together, and they also look very plastic-like due to the game being based on toys, which is, while faithful to the *Ryan's World* brand, still not an excuse for the game to have poor-looking graphics.
	* Ryan himself on the game's promotional artwork (as shown on the right) looks uncanny, with his head looking like it was stretched out a bit and him having an emotionless face unlike the other characters.
	* A majority of the characters do not translate well to 3D at all, especially Gus who looks absolutely creepy and weird compared to his animated counterpart.
		+ Moe the Monster is the worst offender of this, as he looks even more like a *Yo Gabba Gabba!* reject than he already is.
3. Speaking of Ryan, he himself is still annoying in this game, as a majority of his voice clips are literally recycled from *Race with Ryan*, a game that came out almost three years prior to this, and Ryan's voice may have changed a bit within that time. The voice clips themselves are also of course, poor quality, which is quite unacceptable.
4. Lazily-made cutscenes, literally just being ripped from straight from the special this game is based on. But the sad part is, the animated cutscenes have more effort put into them than the actual game, in which they were animated by Shin-Ei Animation, the same company known for producing anime like *Doraemon*.
5. Speaking of the special, it came out in **November 2020**, almost a year-and-a-half before the game was even released, which doesn't really make sense for a "tie-in" game.
6. Poor hitboxes and collision detection that are outright broken at times. It is very possible to get hit by an opponent, a robot, or Packrat's shockwaves without even touching them. Further showing that the game was most likely rushed despite it being released almost two years after the special came out.
7. Like the special this game is based on, the story is incredibly generic, cliche, and overall uninteresting, as the meat of the plot is about all of the birthday presents being stolen by Packrat and Ryan and friends having to retrieve them. That's it.
8. Only 7 characters, though this is understandable as the YouTube channel the game is based on does not have a lot of distinct characters.
9. Much like *Tag with Ryan*, the game seems to be putting more effort in adding cosmetics than actual gameplay, as there seems to be more of the former than the latter.
10. Only two main modes: Team vs. Team or Free for All, unlike *Brawl Stars* which has tons of modes.
11. In order to play the Local Multiplayer mode, you have to solve very basic multiplication problems (such as 4 x 4) as it's for "parents only", even though it's likely that even a young kid can solve these problems.
12. This, in addition to *Race with Ryan*, *Ryan's Rescue Squad*, and all of the other Ryan's world games are just shallow and cynical cash grabs aimed at promoting the Ryan's World brand, and presenting the overall problem with child exploitation in video games.

## Redeeming Qualities

1. The game can actually be considered an improvement over *Tag with Ryan*, despite still being a rip-off.
2. Each character has their own power-up, and some might actually be useful such as Ryan's powerup that allows him to dash, making it easier to dodge enemy attacks.
3. Surprisingly, rather than being a game that tries and trick the player into thinking they're playing online when in reality they're just playing against bots, the game is (or was) actually online, as trying to play the game without Internet will result in an error, and sometimes matches can end early.

## Trivia

* On April 27, 2023, the game's servers were shut down by Amazon Mobile, thus making the game impossible to play as of said date.