Furby
Originally released in 1998, it resembles a hamster or owl-like creature and went through a period of being a "must-have" toy following its holiday season launch.
[1] The updated Emoto-Tronic Furby, with voice recognition and more complex facial movements, was sold by Hasbro between 2005 and 2007.
After two attempts at licensing the concept, they invited fellow toy and game inventor Richard C. Levy to join their efforts to sell Furby.
Catapulting demand during the 1998 Christmas period drove the resale price over $100, and sometimes as high as several hundred dollars.
The significant aftermarket demand (and price) for the toy resulted in cases of fraud in which customers paid for Furbies that were never delivered.
[8] As of December 2012 there were sixteen colors: teal, white, black, purple, tangerine-tango, yellow, aqua, navy blue, plum, pink, pink/teal, orange/blue, black/pink, blue/yellow, teal/purple, and gray/teal.
[10] The main reason for their popularity[11] was because of apparent "intelligence", reflected in their ability to develop language skills.
According to the variant, it knew 9 languages (English, French, Spanish, German, Italian, Japanese, Swedish, Greek and Portuguese).
[12] A simple electric motor and a system of cams and gears close the Furby's eyes and mouth, raise its ears, and lift it off the ground in a faux display of mobility.
In particular, their advanced audio capabilities and various sensory interfaces make them popular with the circuit bending community.
[13][14] McDonald's Happy Meal toy Furby-Shelby was released in 2000 in the United Kingdom, there are 8 to collect in total (4 classic look and 4 clams).
Furby Babies are smaller than the original, have higher voices, and cannot dance, but they switch to speaking English more quickly.
Larger than the previous version, the new Furbies have been upgraded with a more emotional face and a voice recognition system, enabling them to communicate with humans.
They also have considerably fewer features than the "adult" Furby, with a very limited vocabulary and a lower level of interactivity.
It has new monochromatic LCD eyes, a wider range of motions and the ability to adapt its personality in reaction to user behavior.
[16] Compared to the first generation, variants with Russian, Chinese, Mandarin, Korean and Polish were also produced, increasing the number of languages to 14.
Instead of the screens that the full-size Furbies feature, their eyes are made out of transparent plastic with a backing that has a static pattern printed.
The eyes have an LED backlight and the printed image is stereoscopic so that it changes depending on the viewing angle.
[20] The release for Christmas 2014 was called the Furby Boom Crystal series, with a redesign of the ears, face and feet and new bright neon fur.
[23][24] The Furby Connect has a translucent plastic joystick on its head which lights up different colors when toggled and is used to control games played with Furblings in the app.
On June 22, 2023, Hasbro announced the return of the Furby line with "5 voice activated modes", and "over 600 responses".
[25] It comes in three varieties: purple, coral, and special edition tye-dye (only France, Great Britain and Ireland.)
The new Furby has glowing ears, responds to petting, shaking, and feeding, and also comes with bundled accessories (necklace with beads and comb).
The TSP50C04 chip from Texas Instruments, implementing the linear predictive coding codec, was used for voice synthesis.
[33] Roger Shiffman, the owner of Tiger Electronics, stated that "Furby has absolutely no ability to do any recording whatsoever," and that he would have gladly told the NSA this if he was asked by anyone from the spy agency.
