Take a glance at toys slated to hit the market later this year and it immediately becomes evident how wired toddlers have become.
From a walker that plays the piano to a teddy bear with voicemail, computer chips in toys have proliferated to the point that children today – no matter how young they are – expect their toys to talk and, literally, to play with them, one toy expert said.
"These kids are being born into a world where everything they do has some technology in them," said Chris Byrne, an independent toy consultant who runs the Toy Guy website. "Sixty percent of preschool toys have some sort of chip in them, whether it's an Elmo that talks to you or Sparkling (infant toys) from Fisher-Price."
Continuing that trend – actually, what's become a tradition since the Teddy Ruxpin talking teddy bear was first introduced in 1985, Byrne said – all the major toymakers are adding more computer intelligence to their products so that they interact more naturally with children. Even the executives that introduced Teddy Ruxpin almost 20 years ago have managed to come up with a radically new idea for a teddy bear.
Mark Bradlee and Denis Squeri, who, since their days working on Teddy Ruxpin have started a wireless technology company called Wabi, have taken the concept of the talking teddy bear and morphed it into a new product line: three plush toys (a teddy bear, a polar bear and a panda) with integrated one-way cordless phones that allow people to leave messages for a child. Once a message arrives to the bear, the toy makes a giggling sound. A child can then retrieve the message by pressing the bear's right paw.
Parents also can purchase stories for the bear by paying for them ahead of time through Wabi, which controls the backend infrastructure, including the delivery of all messages. To listen to the stories, the child would press the bear's left paw.
The bears, expected to sell for between $60 and $70, will hit toy stores in August. The stories could cost anywhere from $10 to $40, depending on the length of the stories and the time they are stored in the teddy bear.
"It wasn't about resurrecting Teddy (Ruxpin)," Squeri said, "but launching a whole new idea."
Other toy companies chimed in with similar ideas.
Mattel, the world's largest toymaker, plans to come out with two new versions of its talking Elmo doll. Hokey Pokey Elmo ($30), in toy stores by this July, can make a 360-degree turn. Limbo Elmo ($25), which is expected in stores later this month, can stretch back to the point that he may fall. But he is smart enough to know it and will tell his playmate, "Oops, Elmo fell down! Can you help me up?"
Baby dolls have apparently smartened up, too. Mattel's Miracle Baby ($50), which is already in stores, is apparently so lifelike that its sensory technology will make the doll squirm and readjust itself, depending on how it is held. The doll also cries, demanding to be fed and changed.
"It even blinks at random like a normal baby would," a Mattel spokeswoman said. "This is very high tech."
Mattel also has redefined the walker for the baby by including in its latest Step & Play Piano ($90) a flat, life-size piano keyboard at the foot of the walker. The baby, which is restricted to a certain area with the piano, can create music simply by walking back and forth on the keys of the piano. The baby has access to other instruments – maracas, an electronic drum and a bell – on the top of the walker.
LeapFrog Enterprises (LF), the toymaker responsible for bringing computerized interactive books to preschool-age children, is bringing its LeapPad books to tykes as young as 6 months old. The Little Touch LeapPad learning system ($40), expected to hit toy stores this November, allows parents to read stories to their infants and either push or guide their children's fingers to push buttons on certain images to listen to music and rhyming words. The stories, which are written and recorded by LeapFrog employees, are meant to aid infants in reading comprehension and introduce them to the concept of numbers, shapes and colors.
Mattel plans to release a similar product called the PowerTouch Learning System ($50) in August. But this interactive book, which utilizes a sensory technology that allows children to press the words on the page at the lightest touch, is for kids between the ages of 3 and 8.
As for older children, LeapFrog is hoping to cash in on the Gameboy market by releasing its own gaming device for children between the ages of 4 and 8. The Leapster portable learning game system ($80) is an 8-by-5-inch device with a full-color liquid crystal display screen. The 1-pound device, slated to arrive in stores by November, teaches children reading and math skills through a series of games and tutorials they can navigate with familiar game controls or touch-screen navigation.
"Half a million Gameboys are sold to children between the ages of 3 and 5 each year," said Michelle Fitts, senior marketing manager for the preschool division of LeapFrog. Leapster "is for parents looking for a product that will occupy their child, but they want more for their child than what Gameboy is giving them."
Byrne said the use of technology in toys could be fun and entertaining for children, but sometimes it could be overwhelming. In the case of Mattel's Miracle Baby, for instance, the technology may be intrusive to the point it dictates how a child plays with the toy.
"What if the baby wants milk and the little girl doesn't want to feed it at that time?" asked Byrne. "Maybe she wants to play dress up and go to the party."
