It's Alive!

Now, put Electro-mechanic devices, Radio/Sound control devices, programming and micro-processing together and what does one get?

Toys that come alive aren't as new an 'invention' as we might think. While it is true that the Furby is probably one of the most advanced, commercially available toys sold today, toys that fulfill the above three criteria have existed as early as the 1980s.

One of the more popular 'it's alive' type of toys would be the Teddy Ruxpin, which first came out in 1985. Ruxpin was a sort of learning toy, which could 'read' stories via inserting a tape into him. He could also move, of course.

Terribad 80s advertisement 

However, one of the most advanced toys made in the 1980s could arguably be Playmate's 'Animated Jill'. Playmates had released several dolls that could 'sing' (eg. Corky and Cricket) before, but Jill, released in 1987, and although her 'audio tracks' ran on different tapes, she could move her arms, head, mouth, and could 'interact' with its owner (based on set options, of course). However, Jill cost almost USD$200 back then and nearly set the Playmates company bankrupt. What is interesting is that Animated Jill seems to have a microprocessor that was built by intel. So it was truly quite advanced for its time.
(Update: Found the patent for Jill. She uses a " INTEL 8051 microprocessor with 4 K-bytes of ROM and 128 bytes of RAM Processor ". Link below)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7Ja1dxOGhA

This video shows the microprocessor and a little on how the doll in general works.

Teddy Ruxpin and Animated Jill can be said to be the precursor to the Furby, which was released in 1998 by Tiger. In a way, the orginal Furby and the Furby of today fulfill the same function; they were furry beings (some people call them a mix between a hamster and an owl) who could respond to humans as well as other Furbies (through infrared). The Furby starts by speaking 'Furbish' but as time goes on it will 'learn' to speak more and more English. It could also 'move' by rocking band forth, moving their eyes and wagging their ears up and down.

In the early 2000s Mattel released their answer to the Furby - Diva Starz. Much like the Furby, these toys could speak, and will become more familiar with you the more you played with them by revealing their secrets, etc. They could also communicate with one another. Unlike the Furby, though, the Diva Starz was obviously marketed to girls, because they were fashion dolls and revolved around things like clothes and pets (typical). The Diva Starz were wildly popular in the 2000s and even had a MacDonalds happy meal figurine line. However, for some reason they fell into decline after just two years, and Mattel went on on develop other projects.

In 1999, Japanese company Sony released a robot-pet called the AIBO. This toy-dog robot, which was quite advanced for its time, could 'see live video' and 'hear' and react to human commands. The AIBO could cost anywhere from USD$1.5k - USD$2k so it was certainly a 'novelty' product and could not be owned by everyone.The AIBO seemed quite complex, it worked using both a memory stick and a program called AIBOware, on top of its multiple sensors and mechanical engineering. In 2005, the line was discontinued. Nevertheless, the AIBO was a showcase of the possibilities of Japanese technology, and a direction which interactive toys could take- although admittedly it would make a toy way to expensive.  Is it just me or does the AIBO seem cuter and more applicable to a Japanese household? (also it seems like the English version doesn't 'speak' but make sounds instead - the Japanese one seems more endearing, if you understood Japanese of course)

In the 2005 Tiger Electronics released a new Furby, and this model was bigger and furrier than the first. It was not until 2012 however, when Hasbro bought over the Furby empire that major updates to the Furby were made - its response time was fast, for example, and the Furby had more reaction patterns.

The Furby seems not only to have captured the imagination of children, but geeky adults alike. Many a project has been dedicated to find out what exactly goes on behind the head of this zany furry friend. There are two main components of the Furby: The Mechanics and the Electronics. The Furby seems to run on dual microcontrollers to function. And while people have made attempts to break and/or rewrite Furby's function coding, Hasbro's chips still remain remain largely a mystery. Although, Michael Coppola does give us some fascinating insight and images of the Epoxy covered chips when he decided to corrode the epoxy and take some high-res pictures of the chips (using school facilities, of course!)

These interactive toys are mostly made for children, who more often than not do not think beyond the outward function of the toy. A look into what goes on inside these toys, however, even in the seemingly simple Tamagotchi, proves truly entertaining for the discerning adult as well.

Now that we have come this far in our examination of toys, what's next? What are some some of the issues that are pertinent to this study?


Further Readings:
AIBO- http://www.theverge.com/2014/2/4/5378874/sonys-new-aibo-is-a-french-bulldog-named-boss

Diva Starz- http://www.guymacon.com/divastarz.html

Coppola's Revers Engineering Furby -http://poppopret.org/2013/12/18/reverse-engineering-a-furby/

Jill Patent: http://www.google.com/patents/US4923428