The creators of Pleo the dinosaur are declining to issue any sales data for their robot, which went on sale three months ago, but they have released its first software update today.
Ugobe has enjoyed plenty of good press and reviews for its innovative creature, including this article in today’s San Francisco Chronicle, which shows grown-ups and the elderly can be fans.
However, at $349, it is a pricey toy and my children soon got bored with it when we were loaned a review Pleo. It didn’t do enough stuff, they said.
Ugobe seems to have addressed this criticism in its update. It says Pleo can now be more animated, interactive and expressive through a wider range of responses, motions and sounds.
Pleo will explore its environment a lot more and has been retrained to see objects better and navigate around them. If you can afford two Pleos, they should now be able to sing a duet.
While Pleo represents major advances in robotics, only 8,000 people are signed up to PleoWorld, Pleo’s online community, suggesting this is only a niche product at present, unlike its mass-market forebear, the Furby.

March 3rd, 2008 in Consumer Electronics | Permalink