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A long time ago, when a kid walked into a grocery store, pharmacy, or what used to be called the five and dime, one of the first displays that greeted him was a spinner rack. This wire display stand, always seemingly just taller than your outstretched-arms-when-standing-on-tippy-toes height, held all kinds of great comics for kids. In addition to traditional superhero fare, there were Archie, Beetle Bailey, Richie Rich, and many, many more. The spinner rack was a treasure trove of funny stories, great escapes, and ads that promised everything from Sea Monkeys to x-ray glasses.
Fast-forward to the present day and the ubiquitous spinner rack has long since disappeared from stores, along with most traces of comic books for kids. Granted, there are still a lot of decent all ages books out there, but they are just a little harder to find. Walk into many bookstores and their collections of comic books for kids are limited to one or two titles. Venture into the back of most comic book stores and there's just a single shelf dedicated to all-ages books – and it's mostly movie tie-ins and a few very out-of-date issues. Unless you know exactly what you are looking for, finding age appropriate comics can be a huge pain ... until now.
Today, Comixology announced a new and improved version of Comics4Kids, a comics app for iOS. Comics4Kids has been around for a while now, although never as useful and feature-rich as this newest version. In its latest iteration, Comics4Kids is a completely redesigned app and one that will be very familiar to current Comixology users. In fact, the interface is nearly identical to the regular app.
Comics4Kids is compatible with Comixology's CMX-HD, which takes advantage of iOS retina displays for a crystal clear reading experience. The app will use Comixology's patent-pending Guided View technology that adds a whole new perspective to reading, jumping from frame to frame and really utilizing the CMX-HD to highlight story details. Speeds have also been improved for faster loading and searching, and, perhaps the best new feature, is the Parent-Friendly Sync.
Using this sync feature, parents who have an existing Comixology account can log in to the Comics4Kids app and all of the kid friendly content that they may have previously purchased on the Comixology Digital Comics Platform will automatically move over to the Comics4Kids app. Titles that will sync must be rated 9 and under or for all ages by their respective publishers.
Plus, Comics4Kids has expanded their library to include content from publishers like Abrams ComicArts , Archaia Archie, Bongo, Boom! Studios, Cartoon Books, DC, Dynamite, IDW, Image Comics, MonkeyBrain, NBM, Oni Press, Papercutz Red 5, Studio 407, Teshkeel, Th3rd World Studios, Titan, Top Shelf, and Zenescope. Of special and exciting note is the inclusion of a publisher category for creator-owned comics, like on the Comixology Digital Comics Platform. This is meaningful because some of the best, most inventive comics for kids are being developed in this space.
Comics4Kids is a free download, available today, from the iTunes store.
Disclosure: GeekDad had access to a beta version of this app.
