digidenki Japan Digital Lifestyle

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Bandai, the famous Japanese toy maker and Willcom Japan will start selling a Tamagotchi mobile phone for kids from mid July this year on.
What first sounded to me like a toy phone (Bandai is already producing several different toy phones for kids) is in fact a real phone!

Following a child friendly manner they gave this mobile a very simple and easy to remember name “PAPIPO”.

The device features a GPS location function (so parents know about the whereabouts of their kids) and a emergency button the child can press if her or she feels in danger. (a function most of the mobile kid phones in Japan now have)

Of course the new mobile also features games: 2 IQ tester games (a very popular genre in Japan), a fortune teller application and a colour game that uses the mobile phones built in camera.
(But NO Tamagotchi game. Something I don’t understand.)

It also contains a mail application with a vast amount of emoticons and a personal avatar generator that can then be stored online and sent to friends.

The phone comes in 3 different versions. One being a special Tamagotchi edition. The covers can be replaced by using different themed add-on covers.

Target group are kids aged 7 -12 years old and the phone will sell for around 15,000 Yen for new Willcom customers.

Of course Bandai is not the first company to enter the kids mobile phone market but it is the first time for a big toy manufacturer to take this step. It will be interesting to see how this will affect other companies. I am sure this will not the the last time that we see new “unconventional” players enter the mobile market in Japan.

And who knows what will be next? A real Transformers mobile phone? “Mobiles In Disguise!”