Robot Factory, The
© 2015 Tinybop, Inc.
This first app in Tinybop’s new Digital Toys series promises to let children "create, test, and collect anything they can imagine." This big promise is only partially met, however, because most of the imagining has already been done-- by a very good artist. After you create a child's account which automatically saves your robot creations, you mix-and-match 50 parts -- bodies, heads, arms, legs and faces, each snapping into place to contribute a different function. A rocket or helicopter rotor gives your robot the ability to fly, while thick legs, tank treads or wheels let you move over land. It's easy to toggle between pre-defined color patterns, and you can put your voice into your robot, with a set of easy to use recording tools. Once your robot is finished, you can visit the test track -- a side-scrolling fictional environment with rocks, pits, exotic plants and giant trees. If you touch an area of the screen, your robot will follow. If you fly too high, alarms sound and you might crash to the ground and weaken your robot (your health meter drops). No worries -- you fly over a health bubble, or take your robot back to the lab to snap on some new parts so it will work better. The implied goal is to see how far you can crawl, fly or hop before a breakdown. While the general idea is fun and the robots are playful, the overall experience feels random. You design your robot from the front view, but test it from the side view, making you think you might be missing some parts. You don't know what each part does, or why they might fail. We'd like to have some different test tracks that vary in difficulty, or let you try out such variables as heat or gravity; and at the very least, more information about what the parts do and why they work or fail. In addition, controlling your robot seems random -- the longer you touch the screen, the higher it flies through a world full of interesting things that invite a touch, but don't do anything. And because the track is endless, you don't know if your robot's design is functional, or not. In one robot we tested, the health meter stayed "full" despite high flying and frequent crashes. The bottom line? This app is based on a solid design-and-experiment process with a lot of playful, random elements that remove feelings of being in control.
$2.99, iPad, iPhone, iPod Touch (iOS 7.0 or later)
Teaches: creativity, robot-themed play
CTR Rating: 78%