Gadgetory

the iconic 80 storytelling bear of my childhood has come crashing back into my life but this isn't the same teddy ruxpin I fell in love with 30 years ago his mouth still moves but his brown plastic eyes are now blue and animated on LCD screens gone are the cassette tapes now his stories are downloadable on an app for 5 dollars a piece there are no more printed picture books kids now read along with every word synced to an app the parents will need a fiddle a bit with the bluetooth pairing his push button pause cycle through stories a button on his vest skips ahead sections oh and about that vest he looks hipper now and he's more squishy but he still sounds the same he has the original voice recordings just slightly tweaked from the 1985 version and hearing his songs after all these years prop X so many memories rushing back into my brain the tug of nostalgia is strong but if they want to win over today's young parents with nostalgia why did they change so much about him to get some answers I visited Kari Volpone the designer of the new teddy for wicked cool toys which bought the rights to bring back the bear it took a little over a year to make Teddy 2.0 and in that time designers cycled through a number of outfits snouts and fur we looked at you know possibly having it wear glasses like it could have been a hipster teddy it could've been a hipster teddy we didn't go that way then yeah yeah you could have been sort of a surfer teddy in a t-shirt as well the company mission was to make the old bear trendy for today's iPad toting toddlers his new price tag $100 all the old book art is used for the app which of course does not match with Teddy's new threads we've had a lot of fans ask us why we changed teddy at all why don't we go back to the original design of Teddy Ruxpin and it was sort of tried in 1994 didn't really work at the time we think that we needed to update the technology and make him speak to a modern kid who didn't have the experience in 1985 there are more than 40 AI animations that pair with what he says in the books giving him a cartoonish personality it's not the first time the company has tinkered with screen eyes as revealed in this prototype for last year's Cabbage Patch Kids baby so real doll the Cabbage Patch dolls eyes were pretty far back protected by moving eyelids wind turned off but teddy has no eyelids when he's inactive and turns off his eyes become empty nothings parents may find it a bit creepy but she says kids don't see it that way I think kids are so open to things like that does your TV creeped you out when it's turned off does your iPad creep you out when it's turned off the more I played with him the more the eyes grew on me but this isn't really about me or my memories of his clothes not looking the same or his books not being real books in the end the whole reason to get him is to pass down Teddy's adventures to your child and we live that joy you had through their eyes Christina I'm Bridget Carey you