10: This Is Your Slime

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It is August 5th, 2025, and this is not a collectible, pocket-sized world of cute little guys.

It's Side Story, a podcast about games and the stories we tell about them, presented by Friends of the Table and supported by our patrons.

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Hi, Boston.

Thank you.

Welcoming you back.

Thank you.

Our Allie and Janine.

How y'all doing?

How's this beautiful Sunday afternoon for you?

It's going.

Yeah,

I recently did a big garden project.

Ooh.

And now it's like kind of done and in the stage where the people who are good at it are gone, and it's just me.

That's when you're returning to pick up.

They should put

that sort of farming sim, where it's like, you know, you get the little push from bringing in the people who are good at it.

And then it's like, all right, try to maintain it.

It's good luck.

It's like ironic because, like, it's my favorite part of the farming sim is when you get the shitty farm full of garbage and you have to fix it.

And once it's like good, that's when I kind of lose interest.

Because I'm not really good at, I'm not, I don't find as much joy in taking care of things as I do usually in like

polishing a dirty thing or something like that, you know?

Right.

This is the thing that always sticks in my head from when I worked at Giant Bomb.

Vinny used to always say that he liked to build the machine, but once it worked, he lost his interest in it a little bit.

Yeah, I relate to that so much.

Yeah, that was both for games like Factorio, but also like building a production studio, you know.

Plumbing.

Plumbing.

Yeah, exactly.

Yeah, once it works, like, who cares?

At least with plumbing, like, yeah, that's the scope.

Yeah.

You make it work and then you leave it alone.

Guy who makes new plumbing fixtures his hobby is a wild one.

Bluff City character for sure.

There's someone who does that.

Oh, for sure.

Allie, have you added a new garden to your life in any sort of way recently?

No, I actually tried to walk to the local plant store that I like going to, and they were closed, even though they were open on on Sundays.

What's going on?

Is it closing?

Like a season or a Sunday betrayal.

I think, I don't know, maybe it's a slow season and it's hot out.

So the woman who owns it doesn't want to be there on Sundays.

I don't blame her for that.

She really loves her store.

She like won't let me leave without a plant without like seeing me touch the leaves and explaining to me like this is how it should feel when you want her and this is how you should feel when you don't want her.

So

she could go by whatever schedule she wants to go by.

Wow, I would love center my life like that.

Speaking of uh little gardens that we keep out

of cute

and tending and tending.

I think the tending is really that's the key.

I was trying to build that segue for you, and then you pivoted to little gardens, and I was like, Okay, they're not exactly gardens, but I think gardens, I had a moment today.

I was walking down the street on the way, in fact, to the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, and I said, you know,

this whole area is kind of a garden.

Like, outs, a city is a type of garden.

You know, once you get rid of the idea that a garden is an unstructured natural space, which is like one of the first things they teach you about like the history of gardens, if you study gardens at all, like in high school, um, and you understand that they're like produced spaces, suddenly a city could be a garden too, you know?

So, uh,

over here, yeah, uh-huh.

Yeah, absolutely.

And so, Allie, when you messaged us a couple of days ago,

can I just read you the two messages

that you sent because i think they were 1 a.m by the way

was it what a baby must have been 1 a.m

this is this was

i'm gonna make sure i get both of these right because there's two balance thoughts at different times of day there's still balance

you gotta take yeah this was it was 12 52 a.m you said no one there was no conversation happening the last thing that happened was seven hours ago in this channel um and maybe days actually yeah it was it was seven hours three minutes

and you i appreciate it i appreciate it i do you said i want to talk about

Paradise and Laboo Boo on Side Story.

And I said, Lol, okay, give me more.

We need to record this for next week, this weekend or Monday.

And you said, I need to get a paradise.

So this will be a few weeks off.

It wasn't.

Listener, it wasn't.

It was today.

But the train of thought was

Tamagotchi Paradise,

Virtual Pets' Fashion Accessories, Bag Charm,

Blind Boxes, and the Bizarre Gamification of Chance of Chance via PopMart's in-app hints system.

And I said, okay, yes, this makes perfect sense.

And then Dre asked a question that I didn't know, which was, are Laboo Boos blind boxes?

And you said, yes.

And then Dre said, like, ooh,

12 O's in a row.

And that's where I'll stop reading our internal chat.

Yeah.

So yeah,

bring us on a journey.

Also, I have to say for the listener, Janine and I are being given a gift right now, which is

a live video feed of two different Tamagotchis in front of Alley on a different camera.

Yeah,

I have a Tamagotchi and a Tamagotchi uni here, and we're going to talk about them and the differences between the devices and the

recent release of the paradise, which happened like a couple days ago, a couple weeks ago, depending on the

place you're in.

And yeah, I have been kind of taken by a spirit.

I'll talk about my onboarding process for virtual pets and how I kind of got pulled into the hobby here.

And then we're going to talk about a brief history of Tamagotchi in general, just so we can get on the same page.

I would love that.

Because I'm, you know, I think many of our listeners are probably like me, which is, oh yeah, Tamagotchis, those existed when I was 10, 30 years ago.

And they were kind of big for a minute and then they disappeared.

And then I think a lot of our listeners are like, oh, yeah, I heard about those.

And then a lot of us.

Because I was a fetus when they were.

Like, I was in a fetus, right?

And then my parents got one before they decided to have me.

Right.

And then they were really relieved that I didn't shit everywhere as much.

Right.

I was not like that.

And then a different subset, I think probably a smaller subset are saying, oh, yeah, I've also been following this.

So

for those first two groups,

I would love to, after you give us your journey, your onboarding, I would love to be able to get away from that.

Yeah, yeah.

So

yeah, I am in your similar boat where my memory of Tamagotchi is: I had one when I was a kid, and it was okay.

I think it was blue.

I wasn't really like,

I have not been a lifelong fan of Tamagotchi.

I think like my memorable childhood virtual pet experiences were more in

the Sonic Adventure Chow Garden,

which Lee that having having that and then like the VMU

was, you know, that was that that was a sort of,

what's the opposite of a precursor?

Post-cursor.

Right, a follow-on.

Yeah, a follow-on.

Like, that's a doom clock.

You know, you get that because of Tamagotchi and its ilk.

Yeah, I mean, the whole VMU.

feels like a response to Tamagotchi blowing up four years previously or three years previously or whatever.

The VMU was the Dreamcast, the special Dreamcast memory card that you put into your controller that had a little L C D screen, like one of these Tamagotchi.

Which, by the way, if you don't know what a Tamagotchi is, Alec, can you just explain the highest of high levels what these are?

Doesn't matter.

Yeah, highest of high levels is that the Tamagotchi is an egg-shaped keychain.

The original generation was about an inch and a half tall with a black and white LCD screen with three buttons beneath it.

I let me just go into the history because we're kind of there.

It's a pun, it's a Japanese pun.

Yeah, Tamago egg and Tamadachi is friend.

So

my egg friend.

Many such cases.

Right.

So it was originally released by Bandai in 1996.

The basic gameplay loop for virtual pet is to care for a creature from its birth to its eventual passing on by feeding it, cleaning its habitat, and playing mini games to keep it in a good mood.

Semicolon.

Game day decisions.

Gameplay decisions in RNG will affect the type of adult pet that you get.

So it encourages multiple runs of the device to see the, to unlock the different designs, basically.

So in Digimon was also one of these, right?

Like at the time.

Yeah, absolutely.

Yeah, the Digimon

Digivice, DigiDevice, or whatever.

I mean,

like, for me, the virtual pet that I really remember being attached to and putting like effort into raising was the Pikachu one, which was a tie-in to, I I believe, Pokemon Yellow, and it was like a basic pedometer where you were like charging Pikachu sparks.

And I don't even know if it had like an in-game tie-in with like an infrared or something.

I don't even know if we were there yet, but it was just like a Pikachu device for people who like Pikachu.

Who's me?

It might have been like a link cable there's something.

I want to say that the step part, I vaguely remember thinking like that the step part, you could like

transfer it to your Pikachu for XP or something, but I might be wrong.

The technology was definitely in a different state back then.

Yeah, uh-huh.

So like with the development of Tamagotchi over time, you would get gameplay advancements like being able to buy accessories and furniture for your pet or communication between devices or like spaces set up in retail spaces that would like give you special gifts or you would be able to have your Tamagotchi meet someone and breed.

Um, and then eventually, some devices would have like gene mixing.

So, offspring eggs would inherit the traits of their parents.

Oh, I want the wings from this one, but the

little funny face from this other one.

Yeah, so for the paradise specifically, that is a device that is actually bringing back that mechanic that hasn't been in one since like the early 2000s.

Um, I think it was an unlocalized device called the Tamagotchi Mix or the Tamagotchi Mix Party, would have that sort of you link two parents up and then the genes would continue.

I just found a picture of this happening that I'm going to put in the side story tab.

Please, I'll put these in the show notes.

It kind of shocked me a little bit because I've seen ones that have the little infrared things on top, but it looked like a remote control where you just like point them at each other.

This one, this one,

something about this really, I don't know.

I don't know.

Oh, yeah, that's the paradise.

They're like locked.

They're like, they're in.

It is is very interesting.

And it's like, like, I, the paradise is such a weird device to me.

And the thought that they went back to something like this,

that is like the only other time they used like a feature like this is like in one of the like

very first generation Tamagotchis, they released like gendered versions with the assumptions that couples or a pair of friends would get like a pink and a blue version and they would literally do that and link them up.

Whereas like, you know, you go into the early 2000s and they have infrared connections or they switch NFTs.

They don't literally physically connect.

I know what you mean.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I see.

So they didn't drop connectivity, but they did move away from this literal physical interlocking thing, which is special.

That experience, I am such a big believer in the way you touch a game, like changes how the game feels.

I think I've talked a lot about how important it was that when I was playing Netrunner for the first time and I learned that you could reach across the table and take a card from someone else, like from their deck or their hand or their discard pile, that it changed how I thought about games.

So I think the difference between infrared, you know, placing two devices on the, on the, your high school desk or whatever, and like making them face each other and their IR connects is way different than I'm going to put my Tamagotchi interlinked with yours so that our little guys, you know, get an egg.

That's, that's different.

It's really weird and the the the like the the part of why i think the paradise is interesting in it being in this sort of time in bandai's history that they're doing this is because bandai has already been able to make like a reinvestment in retail spaces because

they're producing a bunch of card games that they're running tournaments from they're selling merchandise or doing gashapon in like bandai cross stores did you go to the bandai store for this in new york is that where you picked up i literally did Yeah, yeah.

I actually, so I bought these Friday because that was the technical release date of the Paradise.

And the, like,

the online release was kind of borked with this in a weird way.

So extremely.

I see.

So it technically released in other

regions on the 12th.

But for America, it was a little bit delayed.

And people kind of think that that's because of tariff reasons.

And then on the actual release date.

also was true here, though.

So, yeah.

But, like, on the release date, like people are calling

like Barnes and Noble on GameStops to employees who are like, we don't even have this in our system

to

like Amazon sort of getting like

really weird pockets of like just a couple of devices and then you know the Bandai ad being replaced with scalpers and saying that it's $100 the way that Amazon works.

I see.

So the

fandom word right now is that traditional retail spaces

should be getting these in like October.

But I've been in a really unique position because I have the Bandai store near me, which has the well, it has like every generation that is available right now, sort of in stock.

So they've been doing the Tamagoti original, which is reproductions of the like first generation Tamagotchi, the Tamagotchi Nano, which is both physical smaller design and a simpler game designed because they're all licensed properties.

I feel like I see the R2D2 one of these literally everywhere.

How do you not have an R2D2 one of these, Allie?

You're the biggest R2D2 guy I know.

I feel like I've even linked that one at some point when I saw it like a couple years ago to be like, look, it's that guy.

I know, yeah, but the one.

Star Wars.

It's the Star Wars.

Yeah, I think they just, for Star Wars celebration, they like released a special Darth Vader one.

But the one time I got to nano.

We can't have.

I get you could do it if you want.

The one that I have is the Ava Unit 1 one, which I bought.

Oh, well.

Yeah.

So, you know,

I can't say anything.

It's the one that I have.

And I was like, this is neat.

And it just kind of hangs up on my art wall now because I don't, you know, the gameplay is so stripped down in a loop that I'm already not always super invested in to begin with.

So it's just kind of like a piece of art for me more than it is a game.

Yeah.

Then they have the Tamagotchi Connections, which is like the 2000s-era fan favorite that they're also reproducing.

The Tamagotchi Uni, which is a

smartwatch-inspired device that comes with a piece of like rubber that you wear like a watch

and has a touchscreen and has Wi-Fi connection and like downloadable DLC and live events.

And then now the new Tamagotchi paradise, which is

a really weird thing.

It's bigger.

So you have a uni and then the left one is the paradise.

Is that right?

Yeah, so this is the uni here and this is the paradise.

It is bigger, it is chunkier.

It has like for the first time this sort of like not the first time ever, but like a new engagement tactic with this

the spin wheel here.

It's like a stop watch spin.

Yeah, it makes it look more watch-like than the watch one, which is I know.

And it's actually funny that you mentioned that because the thing that I like about the uni, if it goes back, or what if you saw it when it came on, is that this one, when it turns on, will have the time and the date on it.

The parallel.

Yeah, whereas uni is supposed to be a watch, but if I was walking around and I brought this out from sleep, it isn't, it doesn't give a show.

You just little baby in the sunroom with a couch and TV just hanging out.

So the

basic, I want to say story conceits with both of these devices, which is the Tamagotchi Uni,

God, really feels like a post-COVID device.

It's

released.

Is it post-COVID?

Yeah, it's 2023.

And the basic thing is that you're raising your Tamagotchi into what's basically an apartment.

You can switch between rooms.

Okay, this is the app thing.

But you can switch between rooms.

there's a kitchen yeah there's a bedroom

had a mouth i don't like that

oh mouth

yeah yeah there's a bedroom and there's like a little yard um oh look at that little bush guy yeah and has a pet which is very nice yeah um and then the like the the options that you have are to

buy more food for your tamagotchi you use a food delivery service you can play games by bringing your Tamagotchi to the mall or to the

to the arcade.

And then there is also a, if we go to our little apps, the couch has a face too.

So many things just have a face too.

Many things have a face.

It all has faces.

Yeah.

If you go to the middle device here that looks like the World Wide Web, and you go to the Tomaverse, your guy literally puts on like a VR screen thing.

And this is how you connect to the internet.

Oh my gosh.

This is wild.

This is like the internet from like Futurama.

This is like virtual space.

This is a big brightness.

This virtual space immediately reminds me of,

oh my God, what was what was the

oh my god, I've played so many fucking stupid fashion games that I can't get the right one in my head.

The Switch one.

It was like

the

I can only remember the Japanese, I can only remember girls' mode, which is not what it's called here.

Style savvy, but it wasn't called style savvy.

It was like

a street or fashion dreamer.

Thank you.

Fashion Dreamer.

The version of the virtual space here in color palette and kind of styling reminds me of Fashion Dreamer, where it's like there's like this sort of neon and pastel combo, like grid, and then

like these

structures, these like destinations.

destinations.

What's going on in the Tama arena?

I don't know.

Is there a live concert?

There's a couple things that I don't have access to because both of these are still teens.

I've only been, quote-unquote, running them for

a few days.

Right, they're not adults.

They can't get into the bar.

Exactly.

But the basic thing when you connect to Tomiverse is that you see other users' Tamagotchis and you can

compliment them.

I think there's a store thing where you can buy

like cosmetic items, but only cosmetic items based off of outfits that people have already made.

The Fashion Dreamer call out is actually a really good one because the DLC for this device, which has DLC, there's a bunch of expansions that are like five bucks.

Are

they

battle pass?

Like, what's going on?

What are we doing?

It's more like Splatoon Splatfest.

So, yeah, so you okay, so you have have the DLC, which will bring you to different Tamaverse.

I don't know what this is downloading.

I am just going to leave this here, so tell it to you.

It brings you to other Tamaverse locations.

So, there's a free one called like Berry Garden, and it's dessert decorations.

There's like a school one.

There's a San Rio one that's like a kind of recreation of what the okay, you are.

It says the event was finished.

Look forward to the next.

Okay, so that's you out of the arena.

Well, worth the download.

That's right.

Well, now I know where to go because I know what that actually does.

So there's other DLCs, what I was saying.

But the events, like what I was talking about and why I was comparing it to Splatoon, is because they will do monthly events for a week where you kind of pick the team that you're representing.

And there's a mini-game that you can continually play to get limited-run items.

So for July, the one that I just missed, it was like a surfing thing where you could get like, I think like a fish hat and like a like a thing that looked like you were running through a goal line because it was like a race sort of game.

So that's what's happening with the Tamagotchi uni.

If you if you want a device, if you've been like casually curious in Tamagotchi or whatever and live events or something that appeal to you the way that it appealed to me, which is why I eventually wanted a uni,

that's out there for you.

I guess

I didn't go through the whole onboarding thing, and I can make it pretty quick, which is that

in the recent, I believe it was the Nintendo Direct for the Switch 2, or the one right before it,

the Tamagotchi Plaza game for the Switch was released or was announced.

And that's a Switch game with franchise characters where you're like doing little mini games in little stores in the plaza.

And I

was just like watching a playthrough of that game because I was curious about it.

And it was like really weird to see the characters moving around in 3D.

Right, because they're, I guess, for people who don't, who haven't seen these, you should go look up Tamagotchi characters just to get a vibe.

They are very doodle-y.

They're blobby.

They're like, you know, if you drew like a slightly off-kilter circle and then put like a couple dots in and then a line for a mouth, you've gotten towards a Tamagotchi character design.

And then like if you give it like a little weird asymmetrical hat or big lips or like a very simple line line work

Yeah, I'm putting it in the middle.

They're very iconic, but like they are very simple

The modern ones are like full color, but the early generations, it's like calculator screen type.

Like very big pixels, just black on gray functionally with a with a backlight sometimes.

And like less detailed because of that than like early gen Pokemon or something.

Like they're they are very simple, very iconic,

you know, closer to even simpler than Hello Kitty San Rio style thing.

Think of the

icons for Pokemon when they were in storage in your box.

Yeah, that's a great touchstone, actually.

Yeah, totally.

But you're right, Allie, watching the Tamagotchi Plaza version of these characters running around the

guard or the park or getting dental work done.

Is this a Flash game collection?

Yeah.

Oh my God, they're pulling little guys out of cavities.

Gross.

I'm going to link this concept.

I think that the basic gameplay loop for that game is that you

do repeated mini-games at a single store until you can unlock other ones in the plaza.

And there are some

code-to-code communications between the uni and the plaza as well.

So if I had a plaza now, I would unlock game stuff in both devices, I think.

It is wild to just think about these devices as having online connections, as having DLC, as having, because they come from an era where that was just not happening generally.

You know, where the first time we got to see is like 97 or something, right?

And obviously, the promise of the internet, quote unquote, is pretty clear if you're if you're locked in, but like standalone devices getting digital, getting updates, getting, you know, new content, getting even bug fixes, just not a thing at that point yet, you know?

And so to think about something so like this, getting it is wild.

This also, so Allie, I know you're going to get to this, but the paradise does not have these online features.

It does not have DLC, as far as I know.

It does not have like an online space, right?

It is back to that,

I mean, not normally how we use the phrase walled garden, but like kind of literally a walled garden

like environment, which I, I, you know, I know a lot of people online, uh, including myself, had the thought of like, well, that's sort of weird.

Why would you go backwards like that?

But when you explain it like that, it like kind of makes sense to me

in the sense of like

it's very complicated.

And I can imagine someone who's buying this for their kid, who just wants their kid to have like one thing that will keep them quiet in the car or something

or on the bus or whatever, like having all of the connectivity to other video games and other stuff they have to buy.

They're going to get nagged about like the DLC and like all of this stuff.

I can imagine them getting the uni for their kid and being like, this is too fucking much.

I just want them to have an egg, and there's a little guy in the egg who needs to be fed.

That's all I want them to deal with.

Yeah, it is such a weird thing.

And that's why I think like understanding the history of Tamagotch is what makes understanding why the paradise such an interesting device, especially post-the-uni,

is

like part of that conversation.

Because

like when you think about the gene mixing mechanics being something that like fans have sort of chased and are really excited for or didn't get to experience if they, you know, aren't the type of person who are going to

you know, import a device that isn't in their own language and things like that.

Or,

you know, it's not that Tamagotch devices didn't have DLC in the past, it's that they had really weird experimentations with how to do that.

Um, so you would either like there's somewhere you would like buy a little charm for your device and you would stick it into it and then it would stand gameplay that way, or you would, um, the same way the paradise kind of works, you would go to this retail space, right?

Again, like a Pokemon event where you would go to get your Mew or whatever

us.

Yeah, like that.

You would like scan a thing at a store.

The way that the Paradise works actually, is that they now have Atomicachi Lab set up in retail devices or retail spaces, like the Bandai store.

And right now, they're actually doing monthly items that they're going out.

Like today, I went to the Bandai store to get like the funny tree and the Meerkat like hot dogs.

So I can eventually buy it for my guy later on.

But yeah, and then I, on the, on the like live service versus closed service like tip on the the uni and the the paradise like yeah, it is true that the paradise, I mean, the uni is going to be a really fun and a really good device for as long as those things are supported, which they are now, and they are not always going to be.

That's also true of physical location drop things, though.

Sure, for sure, for sure.

But

an interesting thing that I've seen through the Tamagotchi fandom is that

previous attempts at this technology have been restored through fandom efforts.

So previous things were like Atomagachi would have like an in like a companion app that you would get codes from, or like a flash game website that you would play minigames on to get a code to unlock a thing that you know you're not downloading onto the device, it's already in there, but you need the code to access it.

Like, those codes are still available, or in some cases, those flash games are actually still available and being hosted on a private server, and you can still kind of have your experience of this sort of paired gameplay the way that you would have in like 2008 or whatever it was.

So there's interesting stuff there.

I mean, like, I think that people have even like figured out how to communicate infrared stuff to get some of those retail things.

Like, I've actually already seen with the paradise, like in the Tamagotchi collector's discord, it was like a photo of somebody who took the like these little three connectors where the data transfer is on them.

Yeah, it's kind of top of the device, yeah.

And it was a photo of those with like three metal pins against it, and each of those pins having a wire.

I was like, What the fuck is going on?

We should say that the device to expose those, there's like a little egg top thing.

Yeah,

and when you talk about wires going in there, my first thought is like, oh, sure, it's like brain surgery.

Yeah,

that's how it feels, 100%.

Yeah, I don't know where like the data is moving and like, you know, but I'm just like so impressed by people who are like, I am already going to pull this shit as wide open as I can because I know at a certain point I'm going to want to or I'm going to need to.

Yeah.

Or like now we have to start those efforts right now so that if we need to down the road, we have done that work already.

Right.

Yeah.

Exactly.

I will say it's interesting to go back to your COVID metaphor for the uni, how much

you go from one where it's like, okay, this is a game about being in the apartment and connecting to the virtual world and

literally downloading updates to it and stuff like that versus one that's insisting on or increasing obstacles to that sort of online connectivity and insisting on in-person meetups, you know, connecting physically from one device to another by clicking them together, like locking them together.

There does seem like a mid-end post-COVID difference in the experience.

Like, you know, we don't, I don't need to start quoting Walter Benjamin here, but there is something about like, there's an aura to this object.

They want the object itself to be where the game is.

You know, and yes, you can take it physically places to get those extensions again.

I'm curious what the loop is, if the loop is the same on the game itself, or is it has it changed?

So, a thing that I a thing that I find really appealing about the

paradise and the

like this addition is this sort of zoom in thing.

So, if the if the uni is about raising a child in an apartment, um, the paradise is that you are literally a representation of the Tamagotchi lab.

The actual like

manual

explanation for this is that Tamagotchi have been so loved by the world since the 90s that another Tamagotchi world was born.

And what you're actually doing is caring for the world Tamagotchi, which is this like sort of

home screen little world guy.

I love him because he reminds me of a sunfish.

And the like cosmetics and stuff that I am eventually going to unlock are going to be for this guy and not the one on the microcenter

that I'm like just doing the care of.

Yeah.

There's a star field with a little Tamagotchi with a world, like an earth that has a face on it with the big lips and the little eyes.

The thing about this is like there's a there's a zoom wheel when you zoom all the way out is space.

When you zoom all the way in, it's guts.

Yeah.

Another interesting thing, just before we zoom in,

there's a planet level that you can access.

And when you go to that menu, it gives you a goal.

Like, it tells me what I should be doing next in the game.

And right now, it's to keep raising my guy.

It'll eventually encourage me to, like, breathe them off.

And yada, yada, as we go on.

But yeah, so you

scroll through the thing.

It makes a great noise when you do it.

It makes a great noise.

When you zoom out.

Another thing that I kind of like about the wheel is that it really wants to go back to default point of view.

Yeah, I see that.

I have to give it like a full spin to make you connect.

Yeah.

There's a field view.

There's a poop to clean up.

There's a poop to clean up.

I know.

I know.

It's really funny.

So there's a field view, which I don't know.

It got pushed away.

Oh my God.

Why?

Oh, that's the poop.

Are you saving that poop for something?

Yeah, it's like biofuel.

Eventually, once the tank fills, I'm going to be able to visit another planet just to unlock some more cosmetics.

Cool.

Hey, I'm not mad at that.

But yeah, so here's my field view of my little guy.

And another interesting thing about the loop about this, that it's not like you're taking care of a pet on within a pet.

So there's like already an explosion of sort of the loop there, that there's like this permanent thing, but also this sort of ground level thing that you eventually have to like move on from.

But because the sort of conceit is what you're doing is you're nurturing the world by nurturing the creatures on it, when this uh little octopus guy or whatever um becomes a parent and moves on he's still gonna be like wiggling around in my world

my worldview because it exists in the world

that's cool

yeah paradise it's a it's a place does that yeah so they don't do they not age and die I don't know about that.

I know that there's some encouragement of changing fields and the Tamagotchi that you leave behind behind will stay on their field.

And I don't know, like, if they, if you go back, if they'll still be there.

Um, but yeah, uh,

so

that's a little bit of a weirdness there.

Um, the field in this question, again, it's just to contrast it with the apartment on the uni is like a oh my god, the expression it just made is so cute.

Sorry, uh, is like a underwater, this, this particular field is an underwater space.

It's a sea edition, right?

Starts out in an underwater.

There's also land and sky.

Yeah, there's land and sky, which are the little squid guy is the guy here versus the little

blob that you had on the other one.

Yeah, so this is my little guy.

So cute.

It's really good.

And then, yeah, there is this cell view, which is

what the fuck, you're inside.

This is your cell.

And then another thing that I find interesting about these field of views is that each of them have their own menu system.

So the cell view is how you view hunger and happiness.

I see.

When you zoom out on the guy, when you're on him, it's basic care for the little guy.

And then you can kind of zoom in on the fields, and this is how you clean things or how you set furniture.

Or do an egg hunt.

Egg hunt is the way that you get food in this game.

Instead of a delivery guy, you

like

go and like

dig.

You like literally literally, dig for eggs and crack the moment, and there's food inside.

A funny comment that I saw about some of the

comparisons between these devices is somebody saying, like, I find the paradise really weird because in devices like the uni or the

Tamagotch pics, like, my Tamagotchi was like an adult who got a job and got married, and now I'm like feeding it things that I found on the ground because, like, this game does sort of make them more like animalistic.

Whereas, like, the end point in the Tamagotchi uni, like

your

pet leaves the apartment because you marry off.

Oh, my gosh, yeah, so much different, much different.

Yeah, so it's an interesting thing, but yeah, depending on the device that you get is the field, quote unquote, that you start off,

start out on, but then you unlock them through play.

So, when I get, when I get my second pet is when I'll be able to move fields.

Um,

I'm actually now also looking at this.

The Tamagotchi Paradise is bigger.

It's like a chunkier plastic.

It's like

very toy-like.

It's very.

When you compare it to the Ooni, the Uni is still like toy-like.

It's still brightly colored, still plastic.

But there is like a subtlety to it.

Like the buttons seem a little smaller and things like that.

And the way you're describing the loop makes me think, like,

is the uni also a bit for adults?

Because it has that thing of,

there was, you remember that, that, that, uh, mobile game where there was like a little frog and you take care of the frog and you send him on adventures, and then he sends you postcards, and then you.

Karu something, something?

Is that what it was like?

Yeah, um,

I

don't remember.

Yeah, it's fine.

Um, but yes, it's travel frog.

So, yeah,

it was yeah, yeah, yeah.

It was, it was essentially called travel frog, and they did a study about it, and they found that, like, um,

the the demographics playing, they did a study in like Japan, Korea, and China, I think.

And in China, I might be getting this very wrong.

They saw the frog, like women who were playing the game often saw the frog as their son, I think.

And in Japan, women who were playing the game often saw the frog as like their husband who was like going on work trips.

And it was like, it was like a taking, taking care of them and them going on adventures kind of like the way that they, it was it was like a weird sort of thing and it so it made me what you're saying made me think of that where like oh right you're raising a little guy

who gets married and moves out and then you're gonna raise another little guy who's gonna get married and move out

um

it just feels it feels it feels like it's kind of doing that that same thing where it's like okay this is ostensibly for children but there is there also like a thing here that they're looking at with

i don't know it feels a little targeted i guess it feels like not just post-COVID, but like of a certain moment.

Yeah, I mean, yeah, there's definitely, you know, when you think about it, of like, because there's a mothering aspect of all of these, right?

Like, you have a baby, it cries, you feed it milk, it gets bigger, like you're cleaning up its poop and stuff.

Like,

and, you know, the Tamagotchi paradise does feel really clinical because you are literally this representation of like a scientist or whatever.

Like when they they were doing

cross-promotional events on the uni to like be like, hey, the paradise is coming out soon.

You should get it.

The like, the cosmetics that you were getting were like a lab coat and like

a little hat that looks like a bald head with like fluffy like uh scientist hair.

So they're like leading into like,

you know,

you know, the uni is definitely so much more of a like parenting, a this is a device that you're going to want to take out in the world with you kind of thing.

A thing that I didn't even get into here is that the

uni, because it has like Wi-Fi connectivity, it has some like basic features where if I go out, I can do a quote-unquote Tama search and based on Wi-Fi pings that it finds in the area,

I will find Tamagotchi friends and friend passing.

Yeah, basically.

Yeah, it's kind of like a street pass, but it isn't street pass device, which I think is weird.

Um, and then also, there's like sort of like a basic sort of pedometer aspect where there's the thing called the Tamigoti walk, and it counts your steps on a 20-minute timer, and you unlock like a um

a crafting recipe that's in-game for part of the crafting mechanics.

Um,

whereas, you know, the paradise is not that, it is this, like, you are nurturing the earth, and like the, you know, the thought of

I don't know, like, it is the expansion of gameplay that I find really interesting.

That there's like a, there's now a two-pet level system happening here where like,

like I said, the, the, the, the play of care is happening on like an individual basis with the thing.

And the, they're up, they're actually separate mini-games that you can play.

Like, the mini-games that you can play on the quote-unquote pet level are just games that you are playing with your pet to increase its mood whereas there is a lab functionality i actually miss this because you plug in the thing um but it actually has like a whole separate ui and there are different games that you can play there that oh wow earn you money right and this ui feels like you're looking at the lab ui instead of the pet control you are yeah uh-huh and it literally

stopped and yeah and it has like an open it actually looks more like the ui from the uni it does That's really funny.

Yeah.

Whereas the uni is trying to be an iPhone.

You know what I mean?

Like that is an half screen.

Yeah.

No doubt about it.

Yeah.

I have a fandom question that can maybe move us on to the next part of this conversation, which is like

the Tomagachi Discord or the Reddit or those sorts of fandom spaces that you've been perusing as you've been going on this journey.

Are these people who are generally engaged with the overall holistic Tamagotchi experience, raising pets, games,

you know, exploring the different fields on the paradise?

Or is it a mix of that?

And then also people who are like only interested in one part of it.

Like, oh, I want to collect all the pets or I want to see all the pets.

I want to collect all the different models.

I want these as bag charms versus I want these as games to play?

Yeah, 100%.

I think it's a fair mix.

I think that what you'll find, especially because of the

vintage quality of a lot of these devices, and the fact that

a lot of the supported devices right now are reprints of other sorts of devices.

I said devices,

like the classic, right?

Yeah, like you can.

Like, they're still making the old school, you know,

uh, L C D screen or whatever ones, like right, 100% and marketing them as such.

Yeah, uh-huh.

And, like, you know, if

I go to the PlayStation network store to go pre-order Resident Evil 9, Capcom sure as hell wants to sell me Resident Evil 2 as well while I'm doing that transaction.

But it's not, it's also not the same as like, I'm going to the store to get the Switch 2 and the Switch, and the Switch is on the shelf, and then right next to it is the Game Boy and also a 3DS.

Right.

And you're sort of getting like a mix of those experiences when you're going to the Bandai store, at least.

The online retailers are kind of weird there.

But that's kind of like what Bandai is supporting and producing, and yada yada.

So, yes, there's definitely the collector's aspect of it.

And what I think is interesting is that

there are ways that these devices obviously encourage that sort of collector spirit.

So, the Tamagotchi Paradise has each of the three color devices have like a secret pet that is exclusive to those devices.

And the way that you unlock those pets is by plugging in the device that you have into

both of the other devices.

So if you have access to all three and you are a guy who really cares about collecting all of the adults and you have that collector spirit and you are buying all three of them, you are rewarded in that way.

The Tamagotchi uni did something interesting where

there's the base level designs and then they would have special editions which were like Angel

Festival,

Monster Carnival, just looking at this, and the San Rio one.

And those are additional DLC that even though I have the baseline, I can access those with the just by paying $5.

But if I, for instance, bought a if I owned this and they released the San Rio one, I was like, fuck, I really want the San Rio one.

And I bought it, the code that it comes with, it can be used three times.

So

if I'm like, oh, but I already have one, but I still want that one, I would know that I would be able to download the shit to my old device.

Or if I had a friend who had a Tamagotchi uni in this whole time, I was like, gosh, I kind of really want one, but I didn't get one, you know, enough chance.

I would get the San Rio one, give the code to her, and then it would, you know, it would kind of enhance this sort of community experience.

Other things that I, you know, there is obviously the gameplay interest in the game in the community.

What I've seen in the Tamagotchi Collector's Discord is they'll do like hatch events with each other.

So, like, it'll be like, hey, on this day, everybody in this community is going to start an egg on the same day and we're all going to hatch it together and we're going to post about it and we're going to laugh.

And, you know, they're kind of all going to be the same timeline and age, and we're going to experience this together.

Obviously, the Tamagotchi uni live events support that sort of thing because, like, even if I'm not logging into my uni every day,

i'm probably going to on the weeks where there's an event and because it's that sort of splat fest i'm either choosing team a b or c

i want to i want team b to win like you know you're gonna want team so like so there's there's you know the the way that communities have been built

and have been encouraged by the the the developers in that way is something really interesting to me that I've seen through

digging into these spaces.

You know what I mean?

I guess I do want to call out the one creator who, like,

I initially watched her Tamagotchi Plaza and then her Tamagotchi uni video.

And that's the first time that I saw a full-color Tamagotchi.

And that's why I really wanted one because I was like, these animations are beautiful.

Like, the pixel art is really good.

Like, if you are somebody who like come a long way.

Yeah, if you like the general design of Tamagotchi without like being in the fandom space at all, like coming to see this and being like, wow, that actually looks really clean was something that convinced me.

So her YouTube channel is The Force Mori.

And I think she has a good mix of enthusiasm and like

gameplay explanation that

I appreciated seeing in a YouTube video.

Yeah.

When I was just searching for stuff before we started recording, I ran into a bunch of her stuff.

I was like, oh, this seems like the person to follow for this stuff if that's where we're at.

That's fair to say.

And then then also, I guess you would mention the customization keychain thing, which is a big,

part of why I even decided to buy one of these devices at all, is that I was initially not moved by the design of the uni very much.

Like, it, it, um, it's a little utilitarian, like, it is, it is, um, yeah, it's bright and colorful.

It's, you, you know, Jeannie, I think you were just saying, like, you wouldn't be, you wouldn't say it isn't a toy, but it has a phony, a phone-ish, you know, quality

if it was like silver

it would kind of look like a diabetes blood tracking thing right right and you know when you compare some of these older devices which would have these like a big part of the collection of the older devices is the variation in shell that i don't think that we've mentioned here where they would have a lot of different colors and a lot of different like design philosophies so if you were like the goth girly who wanted like a purple one with like bat wings on it or whatever you would have that or you would have these like really bright pop art situations where like it was bright blue and it looked like a clock and like you know there was this sort of like choose the one that's yours and wear it and you know match it with your outfit and things like that that

make Tomagotchi really interesting and why I was like the uni just kind of doesn't it like barely looks like an egg you know what I mean like it's really flat because it wants to be you know it's like have you ever seen a the the apple watch without the strap on?

Like, it's like a weird little, it's like a little thing.

It's like a, it's like a

weird little token.

I don't know.

I don't even know.

It's like feels alien.

But like, because they're going for that watch kind of profile, they have to get rid of some of the egginess of it, and it shows.

Well, it does literally even have a watch strap you can get for it.

Yeah, it comes with strap.

Yeah, it comes with it.

And that makes it just look like it just looks like an e-watch or whatever.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And the thing that ended up talking with

an e-watch, e-watch, an eyewatch.

Every time.

It's made me think you were going to say Ewok.

That's an E-walk.

It kind of looks like an Ewok.

Some of the Tamagotchis look kind of like a little Ewok.

Actually,

we could talk about it.

Laboo-boos are just knockoff Ewoks as far as I'm concerned.

That is fair to say.

That is fair to say.

Yeah, so I mean, I guess the last point on some of the aesthetics of the Tamagotchi uni that is going to pull us into this next segment is the thing that ended up coming making me come around and really wanting a Tamagotchi uni was seeing how people customized it.

If you see, if you look at the picture that Austin is going to post of this,

there is like this purple shell, and then there's these two colors around the screen, and that is a piece of paper under a faceplate.

And people have figured out ways to either unscrew it on the back or just kind of clock that thing off.

So change the

you can see your sponger out yes right yes but the green and pink under the glass under the plastic where it says tamagotchi uni that can change that can be whatever you want it to be um and i've also seen like

people using like little keychains to carry it around either through like little silicon cases that go around it or through crocheting things

um and the way that the device kind of encourages you to want to take it out to want to, you know, I'm about to get off the bus and I'm going to activate the Tamagotchi watch and I'm going to be walking for 20 or the Tamagotchi walk and I'm going to be getting these points while I'm walking for the next 20 minutes because, you know, me and my Tamagotchi are going out together.

Like that sort of like, oh, it's going to be a device that both lives with me and is encouraged to live with me and also.

Doesn't take a ton of care, but will have these sort of like

the sort of like live events that I'm used to as somebody who is a gamer and is used to sort of the battle passy sort of things of like yeah

right yeah yeah right

and like the older ones did take a lot of care is is a thing to note like these ones feel like they're a little more able to be an accessory that like kind of has some some fun things to do yeah with the other ones it was very much like okay you got to wake up to feed this thing

100 the funny thing about the tamagotchi paradise is at like seven o'clock yesterday i just kind of turned it on to see what was going on and my tamagotchi was like should i go to sleep and i was like yeah man and i just knew i didn't have to touch it for the rest of the night whereas with the yudi like uh the tamagachi was like brushing its teeth and it was like hanging out in his bedroom and i was like i'm getting signs that you want to go to bed so i'm just not going to pay attention to you and that's kind of how that went um

and like the paradise sleeps in longer than the devices

So both of these have babysitting mechanics in them.

You do have to pay in-game currency to do it.

But like if you know that you're in finals week or you're going to be on a plane or you're, you know,

a couple hours, you are absolutely not going to be responding to care calls or you're like running.

for a specific pet and you know that you're not like going to hit the the the

uh like achievements that you're going to need to to unlock the special guy um

you will have the the babysitter will kind of be alleviate some of that back in my day you had to i've told i think i've told this story on something before but like when i was in grade school and virtual pets were like the thing first of all i don't think anyone i knew had an actual tamagotchi we all had like the knockoff ones i had a nanopet

um

A lot of people had giga pets,

which were,

a lot of people had like just like weird third-party ones where it's like, yeah, there's 16 kinds of dinosaur in this one.

You get to pick at the start which dinosaur you want to raise.

Lots of like weird shit.

And my racket for a little while in grade school was

everyone was, everyone for some reason had gotten really into touch football.

Except for me.

Okay.

So

all of these, like, all of these like French immersion kids are in the back of the schoolyard playing touch football.

Everyone gives me a quarter.

I have a necklace with like these little like compartments.

It was like a necklace with like a heart shape with like rose vines and stuff.

And I would use it to clip all of the different virtual pets to.

And then while everyone was playing touch football, I would make sure their pets were fed and stuff.

Right, yes, of course.

That was my racket.

And now fucking Tamagotchi is coming for the intrepid, industrious little schoolyard babysitters who are just trying to make a little bit of extra candy money on the side.

The 11-year-old entrepreneurs out there get a new gig.

Wow.

God, maybe they can start hawking

fake labubus now.

That seems to be

where it's all going.

Yes, indeed.

Which was your other connection here, right?

Was like

little guys you can put on your necklace bag, whatever.

Yeah, and that is what I want Tamagashi.

to be for me and like the laboo boo culture even though you know i

i have been able to avoid laboo boo personally because I'm going to ask you to define laboo boo.

This is what I do on the show.

And also, what is a laboo boo versus a lefufu?

It's a fake, right?

A laboobu is a fake.

Yeah, a lefufu is a knockoff.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Wow.

So

the labo-boo is when people talk about it, or they're referring to a like little plush keychain

produced by a company called PopMart

that comes in a variety of colors and sets that I will get into for a second.

First, I want to say that the designer of the character is Kai Sing Long,

a Hong Kong artist who now lives in Belgium.

The like Laboobu existed in this thing called the Monsters,

which he was like inspired by fairy tales and stuff.

He was eventually licensed by Pop Mart, which is a

toy

producing company that

you get like a vinyl figurines but also

yeah they're not only vinyls you know with the with the population of uh luboo boo there's a ton more of these sort of plush things um there's like little keychains there's austin you have some pop mart stuff i believe in because yeah pop mart is is yeah uh pop mart blind boxes were a were a bit of a gateway drug for me for black boxes

yeah um and yeah i i guess i want to start that at the same because like I

we are going to be dismissive of some of the like business decisions as we go on.

But Pomart is something that I originally interacted with because

there is an artist, Nori, that I really liked who was a like a Japanese

designer of figures who would do this just a girl line.

And he would have these really limited releases that were only released in Japan, sold out super quickly.

And they were basically just a girl.

It would be like a girl with a certain type of haircut, wearing a shirt with a certain color or different color pants, and it's just sort of the like customization of the outfit and just the simpleness of the design, and her being just somebody you would see on the street was kind of interesting.

I really, really, really wanted one for a long time.

And Pop Mart ended up doing one of similarly, one of these licensing deals and doing a blind box with him, where it was just like a little

limited run of figures in that sort of design aspect um that you could that were really accessible like you know pop mart for me is a opportunity for me to buy a piece of art from an artist that i admired for a really long time i see

previously stuff from those folks would have been harder to get before the pop mart deal is that is that right well i mean

they just weren't available in that sort of product form it's as much as you have access to an independent artist right so if i for instance lived in tokyo and was going to the same toy shows that that guy was going to sure I could have picked one up.

But as an American and, you know, you know, things happening there.

And I feel like people kind of feel the same way.

But like, you know, when you go to the Popmart store, you kind of have to scroll down a little bit on the, on the website, of course, but it does, it does tell you who the artist is and kind of gives you a little bit of profile for there.

There's like some attempt to focus on that that's where that stuff is coming from.

Obviously, they also do a pun of license stuff.

Mentioning that Austin has some PopMart stuff is going going to lead me to

why this demon app is kind of still on my phone.

The thing that I've been chasing right now is that they are doing a run of alloy

figurines of Dragon Ball vehicles.

Oh, that's so yeah, so they're like four to five inch figures that are basically Dragon Ball Hot Wheels.

And I really fucking want.

And I really specifically want the Bulma's motorcycle, the capsule motorcycle.

And I was trying to engage with some of these systems to get it.

But I was also, I mean, I got pulled into this, of course, because a friend of mine.

Right.

Yes, indeed.

Yes, indeed.

So, a friend of mine really wanted a Lubu, which we've said is this plush toy.

I think that we haven't explained what flying boxes are fully, which is that basically

you will, they will advertise a set of toys that are sold within like the same cardboard package or whatever.

So you buy a box, you don't know what's inside of it, you sort of know the six or seven options that there's going to be, and then there will also be an even limited chance to get a secret item.

And sometimes those secret items you haven't even seen a picture of, they'll include an outline to make it more desirable and sort of, yeah, you go, ooh, what could that silhouette be?

Yeah, yeah, um, right.

And then, so, Laboo Boo, as right now, as far as what like the skews that you'll find, is a set

called Big in Energy, which are kind of fluffier, brighter rainbow-colored sets of these little guys, which are again like little, maybe three to four-inch long plushies of kind of a little fluffy monster guy with a face.

Sometimes they're making funny expressions, but they have like a big monster teeth, smile,

and like big sort of pupil, like single pupil.

Very where the wild things are.

100 wild.

The wild things are meets teletubbies, um, but with more monstrous, you know, faces.

Yeah, they have like little claws.

They're like monster-y, but they're kind of cute, and they're like little silver guys.

Um, so there's the biggin energy, there's the macaroon set, which is a little softer and also softer colors.

Oh, I see.

There's a there's a really funny Coke tie-in, which has three different figures, and two of them are just like normal light white laboobus like holding a bottle of Coke.

The third one is a little one inside of a can, but they didn't sew legs on because I guess they just assumed you would never take it out of the can.

Oh, so there's nothing to do.

It's chilly.

Yeah, you can take them out, and it's just like a nub.

It is so.

Yeah, it's like you were buying half a figure.

It's, it's very, it's very strange.

There's also like other licensed things.

Like, they'll sell you a keychain.

They will sell you a magnet.

They will sell like

bigger figures of these things that don't have these sort of

randomization element to it.

It's just like not just a woo-woo-boo and like a little king outfit.

Accessories, right?

I see.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Also, maybe worth mentioning, they are, of the stuff that PopMart offers, the most expensive, basically.

The Labo-Boo stuff, I,

from what I've seen anyway, like a lot, there's a lot of stuff you can get that, like, at the $60 mark.

Oh, oh, oh,

so those big figures, those big figures that are one of one are $60.

The

smaller bag charm figures, which is what the people really want, are really only like $25 to $28.

And there are other licenses that are all within that price range.

But that's for a blind box, to me, still quite expensive.

Looking at Canadian prices, so

this says $37.99 Canadian for one of these Macaron

vinyl face labooboo blind boxes.

Right.

And I'm used to maybe 25 Canadian.

Like U.S.

prices,

I usually see blind boxes in the range of like $8

to $20, $20-ish.

Right.

Yeah.

So lububoos are a bit above that usually.

Yeah, I mean

within the pop marketplace, they're kind of average.

And I will say, as a Trinkets girl, as a blind box person, like those prices have been going up.

I used to, like, I used to be able to get like.

It's not what it used to be.

Yeah, yeah.

I would get a blind box of like a

fuck.

It was a snake size.

These things would be a little bit more.

Eyelash.

Blind box ball jointed dolls, okay?

You cannot get any more.

The one that I was thinking of is like they'll do like Snoopy's living room or Snoopy's kitchen, and the blind box will be like, it'll be a full set of a Snoopy like cafe or whatever.

And the blind box will be like, either you'll get a set of a counter with a plate of cookies and a

pot of coffee, or you'll get one with a newspaper and a little thing that we have.

So the prices of those have expanded from like $11 to $15 to like even

$16, $17 in my lifetime.

So, you know, I

laboo booze are expensive.

I don't want to say that they aren't.

But like in the grand scope of things, it just feels like

the prices in general are.

The entire hobby is going up in price.

There's a bunch of reasons why that is.

There's not one reason, but

inflation,

tariffs, tariffs, and interest, and

everything.

Blind box stuff has become more of a thing.

Like, I believe, and Ali, correct me if I'm wrong, that part of the thing with laboobus was because Rose had one on her bag or something.

I believe.

I believe so.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah, so it became sort of as part of the greater like bag charm wave that has been happening.

Uh-huh.

Yeah, and this, I mean, this is something that has been a trend over time.

The bag charm is not a new thing.

No.

Like, you know.

But it's been surging.

I guess.

It's been surging in a big way.

Like, it's funny because you can even think of like, I want to say last summer, maybe last fall, the bag charm trend that a lot of like big brands were going into were bag charms of rep

recreations of the bags that they sold.

So that's why you'll see like.

There's bagu bag charms that look like backpacks or they're fanny packs.

Like right even Kate Spade and like Gucci were doing this sort of like little keychainization.

So like the low boo-boo is just like an extension of that.

But like if, if, you know,

I'm saying this dismissively, but, like, in a fucking culture that is run by now blind boxes and draft kings, like, the fact that

Pokemon cards are huge again for fluctuating.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

This sort of chasing a thing is, is

really weird to me.

And I think, like, you know, people are so dismissive and I think, you know, rightfully sort of confused by the way that this is blown up.

But the thing that, like, is shocking to me is that like people don't even realize that this is a blind box they don't believe they don't realize that there's a gambling aspect to this they don't realize that like there are people buying multiples and multiples of these things because they're secret chasing because they want the one that's purple or that's like right

and that's end right that's how i got pulled into this bullshit because my friend really wanted one she's like well i'm gonna buy one for my niece and i'm gonna buy one for myself and i have to keep logging into the app and when they when they come back in stock because you only have like a five seconds to fucking get them.

So she got one.

She was like, I don't know that I want this color.

So I'm going to buy a second one.

And then

I was like,

because I thought she was just like, there's no pity on the Laboo Boo banner.

This probably is not a, you know,

you can't have pity.

Well, I mean, now I will say some blind boxes, I don't know if this is true of Laboo Boo, but if some blind boxes, if you buy the full set,

if you buy like the box with all the boxes,

they will give you get one of every one, including the special one.

Like, that's not uncommon, but you do have to buy all of them.

You do have to buy 10 of them or whatever.

And they do, yeah.

And there are people who certainly buy cases.

PopMart does an interesting thing: is that you're not guaranteed the secret if you buy a set.

Obviously, that's just not how the secret works.

But if you do get the secret and you bought a case, they will mail you the one that's missing.

which I thought was like, oh, okay.

I mean,

they will do that.

So yeah, if you spend $300, then

you're going to find that.

Yeah.

So let me

kind of get get into what pop now actually is.

Because when you go

pop now.

Pop now.

Because

so you can

also context here is that the purchase, yeah, the purchase

opportunity for Lou Boo Boo sort of shifted recently because of bots and resellers and the huge explosion in popularization that you used to be able to just log on to the website and buy one, or you used to be able to go to one of the pop merch stores and buy one.

they don't sell them in stores anymore, or I don't think in the U.S.

region at least.

You can't use the website to do it because they turned that off and have now made it only app-based.

So, you need this fucking demon on your phone to even buy one.

And then, so you can log into the store, you can see a product that you want, you add it to your cart, you close it, you're done.

That's fine.

Except they have this thing called Pop Now,

which is a like a virtual representation of buying a pop, like a blind box in the store.

You are given this like virtual, this representation of a

like the display case that we were referring to before with the

10 different boxes all neatly lined up in it.

And you can click each one and press a button to shake it.

And it'll say,

You've shoken because you shook it, you know that there's not these two in the box.

So if if you're, for instance, secret chasing, or if you're like me and you really want that Bulma motorcycle, or you're just like more casual, like I ran into a thing, the Pop Mart focus besides the Dragon Ball Z thing for me right now, is I kind of find the Puckies really cute.

Pucky is like a

little face with like a little duck bill that kind of gives me, it's like a cross between an Animal Crossing character and a precious moments for me.

Yeah, I see that vibe.

Yeah, and the forest party set specifically, I think the like use of varied fabrics, I think the colors, I think the like actual design of the the plushies is really interesting to me.

There's like a bird one that's like this pink and yellow bird that has he also did some like

no go ahead.

Oh it has this like huge wingspan that like looks really cool in plushie form if you're a person who thinks plushies look cool.

But go on.

Pucky also did these little like poly pocket style compact ones a couple of years ago.

Those are before we covered it really well.

I listen.

I might be able to hook you up.

I don't know.

We'll have to have a talk later.

I appreciate that.

But yeah.

So,

yes, through this hint system, you can kind of

figure you can avoid ones that you don't want.

You can avoid repeats.

I've seen people like, and I

almost got caught in this, but I've seen people in the like Pucky Discord being like, well I shook everything in the box and then I saw two that

the the two that were the only ones that didn't say they didn't have the thing that I wanted I just bought them because I knew one of them would have them and that's somebody

transformed just that easily into somebody who's buying two things instead of one you know what I mean yeah whereas you know without this app thing you just go to a store you kind of wiggle it you you know you have fun with your friends and you you buy your thing and you leave and you're either disappointed by it or or

here.

If you don't get it,

and the physicality of the thing is in your hand, like as somebody who is

trinkets focused, like the ability to pick something up and be like, you know what, the only way to appreciate this is not via owning it.

Or, like, I can understand the scale of this, and I can understand that I don't need two or three of these in my home is like an experience that you get at the store and not through the app.

And, you know, because it is an app and because it feels feels like a game, it like, you know, the sort of like

pressure system that I feel in my head when I, first of all, would I have to log into the

app every day to do a daily check-in to look at three products and to

text somebody about something.

You don't always have to text somebody.

You can just lock out of it.

But when you're talking about it.

Yeah, yeah.

So through that, I get daily points and I can spend those points for an additional hint to figure out what's not in the box that I want.

So

I can put myself in this position that that pookie person was in where I was like, well, I'm just going to buy these two because I want the thing and I want the thing.

And the wanting of the thing is already frustrated by the fact that it's a gamble that you're gambling, even picking up the box.

Right.

Yeah.

But the fact that the like app is like,

you know, the, the, the, like, when you look at like Laboo Boo fandom

spaces, what you will see on a night of release is a flood of these pictures of like, these are the two that I knew that I got because it's revealed to me in the app.

Like, I don't even have to wait for it to come to my home before I have the like adrenaline rush of being able to post to socials that I have it.

And like, that feels really weird.

And, you know, even like, I, the, the thing that I was thinking of when I was thinking about talking about it for the show show is that, like,

if I was somebody who worked for Meta's

fucking billion-dollar experience of somebody, like, we're really going to create going to the grocery store, what it feels like to put milk in your cart, seeing people do this shit where, like, you can see the thing and you can see how pristine it is, and you can see how you want it.

You can see these boxes, and every box is like a potential of this thing that you want.

And that's what they've been missing is just experience of squeezing the fruit.

Yeah.

Squeezing the fruit in the fruit aisle.

Find the good fruit.

Yeah.

And it's just, like, it just, and like, I, you know, we are a video games podcast.

We are going to have

different ways of talking about the way that we interact with this stuff.

But like,

I am a person who, like, I can speak to one experience of like having a weird dinner with my parents, having a really stressful ride home, coming home, sitting on the couch, and just throwing $40 at Infinity Nikki because the way that I'm going to be happy tonight is to get the haircut that I really want.

Yeah,

you know, this site, I was playing a mecha gotcha that came out recently.

Just be like, oh, yeah, this is like, it's sort of like front mission.

I mean, it's, it's quite literally stuff that was built to be a front mission game that didn't release and instead turned into a gotcha.

I'm not going to name it.

I'm not going to like promote it here, beyond, which I'm already kind of doing, but like instantly was like, well, what, how much can I put in to feel good tonight on a night that I'm feeling bad?

You know, which is bad, terrible, not good.

Right.

And like in, you know, in the, in the, the treaties, you know, desire and, you know, the way that you, you know, I sort of, when I interact with these free-to-play systems, I kind of tell myself, like, if I'm spending about the cost of what I would have spent on a video game anyway, then that's fine.

And that's why the Tamagotchi were appealing because one is $40, one is $60.

That's like the price of a video game.

I'm getting a video game out of it.

If I want to spend $5 for the expansion, I can do that later on.

But in this, this other system

where

the results are just, you know,

always moving and dependent on the physicality of the thing being in stock, but it's not even in stock because the way you're interacting with it is this whole digital thing.

And then, like, the weird thing about the Laboo Boo pre-orders that they're doing right now is that those things aren't shipping until like September.

So, in theory, it's good that they're trying to respond to demands by even having these pre-orders, but by having the system that like

is a little bit

more

that's also become more common with blind boxes in general is the

pre-order thing that's like a few months out.

Yeah.

I feel like Trigger's just like, here's what we have right now.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

But it's one thing if you're like, figuring it's been like that for a long time.

Yes.

Yeah.

Yeah.

The thing that's different is, let's say you were pre-ordering an October laboo boo right now, right?

You would then wait until October to see if you got the one you wanted.

But every day you can log in and be like, Am I going to shake it and get the one I want?

Ooh, it's down to these two.

I should buy one and see if it's the one.

Does it tell you at that point if you got the one you want?

Yeah.

So once you check out, it sort of gives you this.

Oh my God.

Okay.

It's actually even weirder.

It sort of gives you this option to whether or not you want to find out, but that is tied to a clock that's going to tell you anyway.

So in a couple hours, if you check the app again, you're going to see what it is.

You do have the opportunity to

the opportunity

i love to be a consumer so many skills

so many products you have the opportunity to

you can either just hit the button find out what you got it is what it is but you can invite somebody via a link to this sort of like private chat room where there's a ui where everybody can kind of guess which one that you got and if you got

yep if you got it correct, you also get like a limited run of these points that you eventually turn into more hints down the line.

So it's a very can I tell you about the most evil version of this that I found?

There's a site that I won't name

that resells Magic of Gathering cards, Pokemon cards, CSGO skins, One Piece, I've linked it here, Lorcana, like all of the various big collectible things, sports cards, etc.

They are a secondhand dealer, so they are not selling you Pokemon card packs.

They are opening their own packs and then repackaging them into

different preset packs that have a bunch of different stuff.

You can go onto the site.

And so, so one, that's already fucked, right?

Because they've already jimmied the numbers.

Yeah, 100%.

Yeah.

And also, who can trust them to begin with, right?

Also, there's reporting or not reporting, but there's conversation around them on places like Reddit that are like, yeah, I bought this thing and it didn't show up for five months.

I don't even believe they actually had it.

I think they had to wait to, you know what I mean?

Like, those sorts of accusations are out there.

But one.

Kind of a ponzi, Pokemon Ponzi situation.

Exactly.

You can log in.

You can see what they're claiming is the drop table.

They don't have real money prices on anything.

They have their in-system gem pricing, which we know is like an obscurinist tactic to make you not understand how much money anything is.

I'll just like link one of these so that you can just like click in and see a thing.

You can see what recent, what what polls other people got the best drops list and then the truly fucked one is there is a demo open button you can hit the button to open a pack for fake and see what you could have gotten so you could do that get the the pleasure of like oh look i would have gotten this card i would really i would have gotten this sick umbrella if only i'd registered and actually done it and like and then there's the button to register you wouldn't have it's fake of course i wouldn't have right you know i i am not making any particular accusations.

I'm not naming this company because I haven't done any sort of like actual journalistic reporting or research on it.

But all of these systems are like so nefarious and so aggressive.

And the thing that's the exact slot machine stream shit.

It's the slot machine.

It's all part of that stuff.

It's all part of that 100%.

Which I think.

I've made this statement before on other podcasts, maybe even on this one, but like

my gut, my armchair kind of, you know, a

sociological read on this, this stuff, all of it, the blind boxes, the, you know, the collectible blind boxes from people who want to collect things with that have value, not the blind box buying for the sake of, I think that these things are cute and I'll take one of whatever one I get.

Like, I think that there might be a difference between those two things, but I think that the boom of collectibles, the boom in sports betting, the boom in like,

you know, this style of secondary market stuff

reflects like a deep distrust in the economic system, which is understandable, that there is any way of getting ahead through simply

maintaining a job and getting your income right and like just like saving money.

There's just no way.

It doesn't feel possible.

So I may as well toss a hundred bucks on the game this weekend.

I may as well like try to get into Pokemon trading card games because

day trading is another big part of this, right?

Like the kind of like

crypto,

you know, using Robinhood to do day trading, the GameStop stuff.

I think all of that comes from this this sense that this system is fucking broken.

It's rigged against us.

But what if I'm smart enough?

A million people are whispering in your ear.

All these companies are whispering in your ear saying, but if you play it right, it's not just luck.

It's not just that you might get lucky, you know, especially the sports gambling apps, right?

Like you could get the parlay.

You could figure out the very clever arrangement of bets to make to where you could get an extra 1500 bucks in your pocket this week.

You could get an extra $10,000.

And all it takes is the right bets.

All it takes is jiggling the pack in your hands to say, ooh, I think it feels a little heavier than the other pack, right?

It's, it is, it is vulturous.

Like, I really think that it is acting on a real anxiety and taking advantage of it in a nightmarish way.

And that's on top of just traditional gambling addiction, you know, parasitism and stuff, right?

Like, it's just brutal.

And I don't say that to like, again, I put some money into a gotcha game this week, you know?

Like, right, yeah.

I'm in the world too.

um but it is but it is and the thing that about the the kind of card game site that i was just talking about that's so scary to me um and and to some degrees the pop now thing you were just describing is like to this point this sort of the the card game site i was talking about many of these techniques don't exist on the first party variations of this stuff right you nintendo is not doing this sort of shit yeah that's exactly right you know um you know and listen the pokemon tcg pocket game has some dark pattern type stuff in in it.

I'm not saying it doesn't, right?

But in terms of like, well, we repackaged our own things and we've given you the fake draw button and we've set up social pressures to blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

A lot of those things are not in first-party things yet.

Pop now is first-party, and it's not this bad.

I'm not saying it's as bad as the site that I was just describing.

But like, let's pay attention and see if more of the stuff floats into first-party.

you know, kind of things.

And then stream of a world where we could potentially regulate some safety mechanisms around it because

I don't know, man.

It's scary to think where it could go.

I, yeah.

And I, you know, I think that's part of what was scary about it for me with the labuboo aspect is because this is such a cultural thing and the core way that people are forced to interact with it.

People are not, I don't think that it's even on the your sort of radar unless you're in that system or you know someone who's going through it.

And like, you know, I think that laboo boo itself is an interesting place i have i have a friend who has two young daughters one is like still elementary school age and another is toddler so i was like how much of your life is like ruled by laboobu at the moment

and because they're young enough he went to a grocery store he got some lefu food they play games with it they dress them up and you know it is what it is and like they're you know if you're young enough or if you're not clued in on this stuff enough or you're just like i'm gonna to buy the thing at the store that I see, that's that is what it is.

But if you're high school age, where this is like a status symbol for you, if you know, you're an adult who is a collector in this way, and you're sort of engaging with these systems because, you know, because the consumer of it is, because I like Black Fink and I want the thing, and I saw my friend, like, what if Gucci had made beanie babies?

It's 100% that, yeah, like it's, it is that, and, like, you know, I,

it's, you know,

I want to, you know, I, I appreciate the community aspect of it.

As far as what I've seen, people have been really supportive.

You know, there's obviously a lot of overconsumption of these things, but it leads to people who get extras and sort of share them with their friends or, you know, are willing to sort of trade them in the way that like

probably the development of some of these blind box things were supposed to.

be, you know, were for years and years.

Not only blind boxes are new, necessarily.

No, no, no.

And they've existed forever.

Like, if you're like, oh, this sounds similar to gachas, like, the word gacha is based on gachapon, which is what this stuff is.

Like, they're all in the family with each other.

Like, blind boxes are just big gachapon, basically.

Yeah, 100%.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

But to your point, Ali, like, we know a lot of this stuff and have, like, you know, anyone who listened to this podcast has heard someone complain about a gacha system or complain about FIFA Ultimate Club or talk about the dangers of how even something like the old Xbox marketplace changing from dollars to Microsoft credit points, Spacebucks, was was like a way of misleading you on how much money you spent.

But like, if you're a 15-year-old who wants to buy a labo-boo, you have not prepared yourself to

anticipate the ways in which you might be being manipulated by the marketplace, you know?

And not that those, not that 15-year-olds are stupid.

You know, I think that like there are absolutely a lot of those folks.

But as something like this mainstreams, you get people who are not, who have not already gone through the arc of being like, oh, wow, it's free to shake the box and see if I'm getting the one I want to understanding the ways in which that might be preying on certain predilections they have.

Right.

Yeah, yeah.

And the way that the digitation of that makes it like, oh, I bought one.

It wasn't the thing that I want.

And

it's just an app.

Like, I'll just hit the button again.

You know what I mean?

It encourages such just hit the button again sort of behavior because

the product is so divorced from it.

So yeah, and then like, you know, you can be dismissive of trends as much as you want.

I, you know, I'm, I'm, I fall graciously somewhere in that.

But, like, you know,

you didn't have to interact with these systems for the beanie babies or the tickle me elbow as crazy as those releases.

And some of the family.

Mary never looked up at you and said, if you text your friend about me right now, I'll give you 10% off.

Yeah.

And, you know, I, it's just, it's just really weird.

It is just really weird.

It is just, yeah.

Once you like, I do think that there's a degree of like laying it out on the table and being like, all right, come on, come on.

You know, you can see what this is.

Like, it's not hidden.

You know, they're not doing a good job of making it not seem

exploitative, you know, in some ways.

So, yeah, 100%.

And, you know, there's the, there's the, the thing that you can say, like, you know, you could be the person who's like, well, at least you're getting a hint.

If you go to the store, you'll never know.

And like, you know, but like, come on, man.

Like, just

consider it for a second about how, like, like this is worse this is worse actually

um

yeah i as i'm a blind box enjoyer like i i don't like

go all out necessarily but i'll pop into my favorite blind box online retailer every so often and i'll see what they've got coming out um and i'll i'll pick a few things up and like for me

I don't think I would want to know before it's arrived what's in it because like for me that's like the feeling of it's like it's like getting a present like an actual it's it's the closest thing you to you can do to buying a real present for yourself in the sense that a present is both a thing that you might want and a thing that you don't know what it is um

and so you get that feeling of like

oh it's a fun little surprise like i don't want to know what it is beforehand i don't want to know what it is months beforehand even if it's the thing i want because i'm not going to when i get it be excited in the same way.

And what I'm specifically chasing is the excitement of, wow, this is so cute.

I'm going to set it up on the shelf.

Yeah.

Absolutely.

If you dilute that and then make it into a thing where I, you know, the loop of it, the loop of getting this smaller taste of it versus getting the real thing, that's, I don't want that.

That's, I know that's garbage.

Yeah.

Well, and again, like, that's why that site, the card game site I was just talking about feels so fucked.

It's like, you know, I used to work at a card game comic book and like board game and RPG shop forever ago, now 15 years ago.

And,

you know, someone would come in with 15 bucks cash, you know, a 16 year old would come in with 15 bucks cash and be like, I want three or four magic packs, you know, and a and a Diet Coke, right?

Um, and then they'd open those packs.

They wouldn't get shit.

Maybe they'd be like, can I trade these cards in for something you already have in the in the shelf, right?

But what we couldn't do is say, well, actually, we've uh, we've prepared our own special packs.

And you can like flip through it all you want and pull one out and see if you like it.

And also, we don't use dollars here.

We use card points.

And you actually have a thousand card points right now.

And

we were not even going to open the pack.

We're just going to show you the JPEG that is what you got.

And

if you don't like it, just pull another one.

You have to just press this button to get another one.

You don't have to give me money in your hand.

It's hooked up to a credit system so that you know, you could just, you could go a little in debt.

You know, you'll pay us back later and it will accrue interest.

And all of a sudden all of these systems.

$10 buys you 1,230 card points.

That's right.

Yeah.

Not 1,000 card points.

Yeah, exactly.

It's not one-to-one.

Exactly.

And so like all of those systems shift in a relationship that is already about giving me $5 so you can maybe get something that you want.

But often, especially people who are already deep into those sort of systems, like, you know, I will say another thing about something like a blind box is like, oh, there's seven possible things in here.

Let's contrast that with like a new Pokemon release that has 150 cards and 50 variations on like the kind of energy or whatever.

Yeah, some of it's just energy.

You know, those tend to be, those, those things tend to be kind of standardized at this point, but like you're going to get a lot of shit that you don't care about if what you're trying to do is collect something for its monetary value versus like playing the game.

And even if you're trying to play the game often, you're just not getting what you need, you know, to play with.

I don't know.

It's, it is, it is.

I spent a lot of time in those spaces, both as a player and as a consumer.

And so I have a strong love of my time spent in some of those card games and some of those sort of systems.

I understand the appeal.

And also, I will always frame all my conversations around the stuff with like, I grew up in Atlantic City where people were not figuratively using gambling systems to ruin their lives, but were literally at the casino, you know, coming into the store I worked at, saying, I have to buy a new shirt because I sweat through my shirt last night when I lost $1,000 and I have to go back and win it back.

Do you have a shirt for under $15?

You know, like different situation.

And I think that that puts a lot of this stuff in certain perspectives for me where it's easier for me to accept my own more healthy relationships with those, even if I don't want to like shout out the new gotcha I'm playing if I'm playing if I happen to be playing one at a given at any given point.

Um, but at the same time, that experience has made me very familiar with how easy it is to get caught in those loops, you know, how desperate you can get to get the thing you really want, how important it can feel, you know.

Um, I working in that card game shop, there were so many times when someone would just like come in with their extra 20 bucks that week, drop it on some magic cards, not get shit, and you could tell it like ruined their night, you know?

Um, and so it's it's wild to see that that whole

like attitude towards your hobby spread so widely, so quick over the last five years.

Yeah.

And I feel like, you know, the reason why the laboo boo thing sort of like just lit a fire in my brain, even just going through the experience and feeling like, oh, I, this doesn't feel good to me.

Like, I realize like I want to hit the button again that says bye now until I get this motorcycle.

Like, but like, I, I have been so, so I had

over the summer I was watching like card opening videos for the first time because of some of the

Final Fantasy magic sets.

Yeah.

And the like the the realizing that like, you know, as these

As these things are around these sorts of hobbies and as you're getting into content creation and as you're getting into

your only ability to

participate in this hobby or to be a content creator in the scene is to literally spend money to be able to

go into it.

So, like, you know, the idea that you're watching, you know, somebody is watching a 200,000 view card opening pack, and this guy spent $2,000 and he's going through all of them.

And you want to be a card opening YouTuber.

How much do you feel like you have to spend to, you know, to be a novice, to get somewhere in this thing that you want to be a part of?

And like the you know the the the fact that like

the investments come from emotional places like that and you know you know the laboo boo comes from an emotional place too it's like the societal pressure it's this thing that people are want to get for their kids it's they want to get multiple ones for their kids like part of why i wanted to talk about with this with the tamagachi uni and the customization options is like what you're seeing people do is like really care for these things in a way that like i'm gonna match up with my outfit today I'm going to buy a little outfit for it.

Uh, you know, it's going to be,

it has to be choosing me.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

And, you know, like, the, this, the, the, like, the, you know, the, the only way to show appreciation for these things or to find a community in this way or to

introduce yourself into a hobby is, is to go there and spend money and then just keep

spending money to keep doing it.

And it's just like, you know,

I just got really into Tamagotchis when I admitted that I didn't, you know, as a kid, I was like, that's kind of fine.

And from there, I was like, those designs are really cute.

And, you know, I did my research.

I decided which devices I wanted.

I kind of ended up deciding that I wanted to compare two of them.

And I spent the money that they charged me, you know, and you know, in and out.

You didn't have to buy.

I mean, we didn't even get into like.

I go into a store and buy a uni because I have one of the only bandai stores in the country

X amount of minutes from me.

If I did this and I was somewhere else and I had to pay $140 online, we wouldn't have an episode.

You know what I mean?

Like, you know, so it's, it's just, it's just, it's tough.

It's just, it's tough to be in the world, man.

Well, and that's the thing is, like, it's not like it's hard to imagine alternatives to some of what this is, right?

Because like, um, you're talking about accessorizing with a labo-boo, right?

Accessorizing doesn't require blind boxes.

People have been accessorizing and will continue to accessorize forever.

Um, And so you have to then look at the kind of

commerce model around it and say,

is this the best way to enable people to do the thing that they really want to do?

And part of what they want to do is open a blind box, right?

But the second that it is, you know, you think of the other half of that, which is just, I want to get something to customize my look.

That does not require all of the other stuff, which is why, like, you know, in card games, it's been 15 years of people people realizing, well, we could just sell the set as the set.

The new set can drop and we can sell a lot of the fantasy flight games did this for a long time.

Like, here is every card in the set.

And maybe you want doubles.

And so you're going to buy the set twice or whatever.

But like, you're not just going to keep buying new packs indefinitely.

We're not going to like rake you over the coals in that particular way.

And, and I think for me, like, that's a good example of coming at these things from the perspective that is like, no one's going to stop gambling.

No one is going to stop buying things without knowing what they're buying necessarily.

The kind of blind box or gotcha style thing.

Those aren't going anywhere.

And, you know, outside of like huge regulatory change that seems out of reach, you know, even places like the EU and China, which have had new regulations get put in place around this style of thing, have been regulations about being clear about percentage chances,

showing exactly what you can get, limiting who has access to it or how many times per day you can do it.

But they're not full bans as far as I know around these things.

And so there's also sometimes a thing where they'll be like, on average, it would cost this amount to get this.

That's it.

They'll be able to give you two prices.

If you're super lucky, if you're super unlucky.

Right, totally.

And, you know, I would like even maybe stronger than that, even.

Yes.

But where it comes from is like, okay.

We know people are going to keep doing this.

How do we make sure that it inside of that scenario where people are going to keep doing this?

How do we make it as clean and clear and

make it be the best possible experience for people who want to continue doing this as possible without it being, you know,

something that they could like ruin their lives over?

And I think that that's a perfectly fair way to come about talking about this stuff.

You know, I don't think it's dismissive of the desire to want to.

open a gotcha pack and see the fun you know see the the sick animation when you go to five star or you know open up the blind box and be like oh holy shit i got the one where kirby is a chef you know like i want that I want to continue getting the chef Kirby, you know?

I mean, that's, you know, that's, I think, a good, a good example is that, like,

you know, you're talking about the, the Kirby room remains collection.

And, like, the way that we experienced that was like, you and me, and Jack and KB each got one.

And we opened them up and they connect.

So we connected the little rooms.

And, like, we did.

In that scenario, if I had been really unhappy with the bathroom one, which I certainly was not,

it's within arm's reach of me right now.

If I'd been really unhappy with the bathroom one and really jealous of the like birthday party room one, which I kind of don't understand,

then I could have been like, hey, do you, do you want to swap?

I kind of, I really like yours, but I don't, you know, like there's, there's room where like when you are having, when you're sharing, you can, you can have

those

activities and have them socially in a way that isn't like extremely gross,

you know, where it's like it's a shared activity, everyone's got one, you swap things around, like, you know,

it's an experience of like, and then that becomes not just one in a pile, but that becomes like, oh, yeah, that's the that's the Kirby that I got

like next Christmas or whatever, yeah, with my friends.

Like

it sort of adds a little bit of something into what is otherwise kind of by design a lineup of interchangeable plastic things.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Simple as that.

Yeah.

Any other final thoughts on this stuff?

Do you want to say this very petty thing you've written?

No, no.

I would rather really quickly talk about the virtual pet that I got.

Oh, please.

Oh my god, I completely forgot.

I'm so sorry.

I completely forgot.

What's it called?

It's called

Puni Rune Runes?

Puni Runes?

Puni Runes.

I don't know.

It's.

So I was looking at.

Allie had mentioned the Temagachi stuff, and I was looking at them, and the Paradise was the release for it was really fucked up here.

It was just not available easily.

And even more so, the uni.

And I was like, well, it's really nice in these things when we're able to have something where at least a couple people people have played it or something similar, and they can have the, you know.

So, I found something else, and it was something that on the Temagotchi Reddit, people seemed to really like.

So, I was like, okay, if the Tamagotchi fans like a non-temagotchi thing, then

maybe it's good.

And the thing is called Puni Rune Runes, Puni Runes.

I don't know.

There's an anime or something attached to it.

I don't know.

And it's like a big, it's much bigger than a Temagachi.

Not much bigger, but it's big.

It's a big round thing, and there's a hole in the side.

And the whole thing about it is you put your finger in the hole, and inside the hole, there's like a little, it's a joystick, but it's covered with like a kind of slightly sticky silicone kind of nub.

This is like a, it's like, it's kind of a button, but it feels like a little, oops, I woke it up, a little like slime ball.

Oh, it feels like slime.

It's not like furry or even like the sort of labor texture of like a dog's nose.

No.

Okay.

Well, it just sounds like, you know, it would feel like a pet.

Yeah.

Like a little wet.

You know, like a dog's nose.

The thing about it is that it's a slime.

It's, it's,

it's all like, it starts out as a little slime ball.

You feed it food.

You buy food and then you turn the food into slime.

You like slimeify the food and then feed it the food.

If it's

when its room gets dirty, you use it it to clean up, like, like it, like, when you're cleaning your keyboard with, like, keyboard cleaning slime or whatever, and then you give it a bath to clean it.

I see.

Um, there's the whole, like, how you're leveling it up and stuff is these little slime balls.

Um, when it is are you feeding it by reaching in and touching it?

Yes.

You, well, you, when you feed it, you reach in and you push the food down onto it.

Like, it puts the food above, and you reach your finger in.

And like, when you, I should say, when you put your finger in the hole, there's a sensor in the hole that knows you've put your finger in.

And when you start playing, it lets you pick the skin color of your finger because you see your finger.

That's fine.

Not your finger.

You see a finger in the hole before you even touch the button.

Yeah, you see the finger go in, and then the little guy looks up, like, huh?

So when you're feeding it, you push the food down and then he eats it.

When you're cleaning the room, you like are like rubbing the little button around

and

like cleaning up.

That way,

You can you can like pet it or you can like push it down hard for like the various mini games that involve like pounding mochi or like

jumping around.

There's like a rhythm game one

and also when it's sick when it's sick or like when you don't feed it or whatever it like melts the way that slime melts when you just leave it unattended for too long and you have to like massage it back to life.

Yes.

Yes.

Now I understand.

Yeah.

And you sort of get get to pick the direction in which it evolves.

So it's not too happenstance.

So I started with a little yellow blob, and I evolved it into this like

slime elephant kind of guy.

And then I put a little hat on him.

These are really cute.

And then afterwards, once they're adults and stuff, you can release them and you start anew with a new little slime guy.

There's, as far as I can tell, no connectivity to anything at all.

Just a cute little guy you can pet.

Yeah.

Pre- or post-Youtube slime.

Oh, good.

This is post-Youtube Slime.

This is like a recent toy.

Okay.

And like the YouTube slime is old enough now that you get adults who are like, slime nostalgia.

I'm getting slime again.

Right.

So

YouTube Slime or someone who grew up on YouTube Slime could buy one of these with their own money.

Right.

Yeah.

I mean, like, the slime monster is obviously not a new new thing.

They've been doing that since the 60s and 70s.

But the idea of like this is your slime that you take care of and you kind of touch and wiggle it is like that's YouTube slime.

I know what that is.

It's cute.

The thing that made me think like, oh, this is definitely not just like...

This is not just like dragon dragon quest slime type shit.

This is YouTube slime was the thing of like, okay, I left it overnight and forgot to feed it.

And I opened it up this morning.

It's just a pool of goo.

And I have to like reactivate it-like, literally, I have to reactivate to get it back to being a guy again.

Yeah, okay, that said they should get the Dragon Quest slimes as a crossover.

They should do that.

They're gonna do a Sanrio one, apparently, um, that Allie linked me to, but yeah, the like nubbing inside.

I keep like having this thought of, like, should I get a flashlight and look in there?

Um,

because the hole is it's you know, it's it's deep, and like when you're when you're playing with it, if you keep your finger inside, it gets a little bit like humid because it's like plastic.

Um, and it's like kind of gross and weird.

Um,

but the the the uh the button cover material is like, I'm trying to think of like what an analog for this is because it's not like a rubberized thing because that's not sticky.

It's kind of, I don't know, it's

is it like those those like slap hands that would like stick it out sort of

sticky and it's a little more firm, but it's a similar kind of thing.

Like there is a slight amount of stick to it

in a way that's like,

yeah,

I had looked at someone talking about these and they said that like

it is a dust magnet.

So if you go to their Etsy store, they sell...

hole covers for it, which is really like, okay.

I'm a sucker for a device that's bizarre as hell.

Like the thing that was most appealing to me about the paradise was that wheel on the side.

It's interesting to see things like that, kind of like the play date crank and things like that, kind of weird little tactile elements being added into toys where for the longest time the advancement was, oh, there's a touchscreen, which is the complete absence of tactile elements.

I know.

Yeah.

So the play date thing is really something that appealed to the paradise with me.

And I was sort of wondering, like, you know, if I'm Bandai, that would sort of be on my radar though but i you know i don't know um

the the like the only thing that i've seen uh with tamagotchi that gets anywhere even close to that is that the

tomagotchi pics which is real novelty was that it had a picture inside it obviously um but instead of having physical buttons it had like touch buttons and i've seen people say like oh i really like the pics because i felt like i had such a better bond with my pet because it had this sort of like swipe function because the buttons were touch where you would like swipe through mini games and like also pet your pet um which you've never been able to do in atomagachi so people are like oh i feel like i'm so much closer to it even though like the the conceit around that game is that like your pet is

has a randomized number of

games that it can play per day and you can make it play two and depending on that is the job that it gets at the end of your cycle and like it ends up moving out of that's random

it's really weird um

is there any like is there any parenting or like gene stuff with that one or is it just like what's the the the like selection process for choosing an elephant guy versus

um it was a little confusing uh when it's ready to evolve it sort of presents you with like a

bunch of options, like, okay, okay, yellow, blue, red.

Or, like, you know, it's sort of a tree-type thing.

So, I picked, I think, yellow, and then I picked blue, and then it became like the elephant.

So, it's you are specifically choosing

your path there.

You're not like

going, I thought for a bit that it was going to be like, oh, well, okay, when I'm slimifying this food, to slimify it correctly, I have to use two yellow slimes so I'm going to put two yellow slimes into this food and then cook it and then if I feed it a lot of yellow slime food maybe it'll become a like yellow and it's like no just choose

you want to see different stuff just choose just see what you want to what you want to do um

which I

oddly I think like in terms of picking one of these for someone who just wants to have a thing to like poke at literally or figuratively from time to time um

it's it's very appealing because it's just like, yeah, I don't want to have to worry about like

what I'm doing in a way that, like, oh, well, now it's going to be like a doctor or whatever.

I just want to pet my little guy on the head.

Yeah.

And then, like, you know, do a very simple platforming game and then like feed him a jellyfied pretzel.

And then we both call it a night, you know?

No one cheers

to that.

I don't cheers to that.

Yeah.

God.

Well, thank you for the slime update.

Thank you for Allie, the

Tamagotchi update, and etc.

I think we've done one of these without a break.

I think we just, we didn't really hit a break point.

And so we just did it.

We're

going to talk about this stuff for so bad that I've been talking to myself in my apartment for three days.

I just want to put that out there.

Wow.

Preparing for the show.

Yeah, you were ready to go.

You had had it down 100%.

So I think that's probably the end of the episode.

Janine, you and I can talk about on another episode.

We have to find this time.

Fuck.

Last second.

I'll bleep it.

I'll bleep it.

I'll bleep it.

I'll bleep it.

I'm doing the action.

Okay.

So I'll bleep it.

I was like ready to tie it in to,

but

we can't.

But like, there was such a, there was such a real, like, oh, a little,

I'm not going to say it because then you'd have to bleep out.

Or you'd have to bleep it out.

I have to bleep out the, yeah.

Uh-huh.

So, so, and I'm also glad that I did a

intro that was about our little collectible guys and not about this other thing that we will talk about in the future.

So, anyway, which also has collectible guys,

well, it does.

If you think about it, if you think about it,

I'm looking forward to listening to it.

All right.

I think that is it.

As always, you can support us by going to friendsatthetable.cash.

Actually, really quick, really, really, really quick.

I know, Ali, you have a heart out.

I know, I know,

but I do want to say that I am going to probably put

link

or an image in the

post

about how and why you should call the Visa and MasterCard Stripe and PayPal and voice

some complaints about their recent decisions to put pressure on

services, platforms like Steam and Itch that led to the removal of some not safe for work games along with some stuff that got caught up in the crossfire because of tagging.

Those requirements are draconian.

And, you know, I've spent some time on this podcast being like, we are in the age of the gooner and it's frustrating.

Give me good horny games instead of bad ones.

I've never said, don't put the bad horny games on any of these platforms.

And those are, of course, those aren't even the games that are getting pulled.

Stellar Blade continues to be sold.

Games where you can, where that have no interest in sexuality,

but simply want to, you know uh produce uh bodies to look at uh those continue to be sold uh as long as what they're not doing is for instance having any sex in them um uh irritating australian transphobes that's right yes exactly the australian transphobes

don't care about stellar blade uh they do care about limiting the broad range of human sexuality into something uh that is uh limiting boring and fascistic you know um not fetishistic which I'm good with, actually.

So, so yeah, I'll have some resources there.

I wanted to make sure we gave time to this thing that folks are excited to talk about and not just like dive in headfirst on the same episode to

where we had a very limited, like I said, Al, you have a heart out right now.

So, but I do want to provide those resources and lend our voices to that.

I think we all know people who are in that space, who make porn games, who make erotic games, who make queer games, who have been hit by this or who fear fear that their future work will be hit by this.

I think that work is imperative and I think that that work should be supported

even if it icks you out and even if you are someone who's not interested in it, I think that it doesn't have to be for you to be important.

And it certainly doesn't need to be for you to for you to believe like, oh, MasterCard should decide what gets sold.

Fundamentally, I think there are lots of great conversations to have about what sorts of sexual content should be on platforms.

I'm fine with having certain conversations around that.

I'm definitely fine with having conversations around what tools are available to see what you want to see and what you don't want to see.

What I'm not cool with is letting a company that is very clearly pushed around by a religious extremist minority from Australia, you know, to limit

the available expressivity to queer folks around me who I love and care for, who want to make cool shit.

Even if that means that some people want to make some shit that I don't think is that cool and sell it on the same platforms, you know?

So

simple, easy.

I'll put the image and the link in the description.

Yeah.

And I mean, we should try to have a follow-up, like broader conversation about this in a future episode.

But like this is sort of a time-sensitive thing.

So if you see

these resources, like you can take the time out of your day to call about this.

It makes a difference.

I mean, the reason I have a heart out is to phone bank for the hopeful future mayor of New New York City.

So like

fucking putting your time in, putting your voice in, putting your dollar in, you know.

Yeah.

This is a very simple way to do that.

If you feel capable of being, of having the time and the circumstance to sit down and have sort of a polite but firm conversation with a stranger who is not interested in yelling at you or is not going to argue with you and just going to say, thanks for sharing your opinion.

And it's going to go up the

chain.

I'm going to try the chain here.

You know, what was the thing where like it was only like

i think the the the the group that specifically like was behind the recent changes were like this only took like 300 calls yeah like a very monuscule like

insane number yeah i try not to say insane anymore but like it literally is

like that just is

absurd just like totally yeah yeah

deeply frustrating so yeah please uh i definitely think it's worth us raising our voices on this uh it's definitely worth worth pushing back on it.

You don't need me to go through all the arguments.

The arguments are out there, and you should trust the people who are in these spaces in the same way that we should have listened to sex workers who are already anticipating and dealing with these problems for years.

None of this stuff should be a surprise to us.

If it is, it kind of should be a suggestion to make sure you listen to some other voices than maybe the ones you already are, because this is stuff that has been on the table and kind of in the wings for a long time.

So

yeah, it's worth our time to push back against it.

All right.

Friendstable.cash is the address to support us.

Go to that URL to support us.

Friends hyphen table on

Blue Sky, or we just Friends Table.

Friends-table.

I got it right.

It's hyphen table.

It's hyphen table.blue sky.

That's B-S-K-Y dot social.

So follow us there.

We post about things like our new Outward episode that went up last week.

We're continuing to do that.

We have Flag Merch in the shop, which at this point you even know who the mysterious flag in the cloak is if you're listening to Perpetua.

Let me friends of people.shop.

The soft pitch on flag stuff, even if you don't listen to Perpetua, is we are evoking an era of video games where the thing they love to do more than anything was evoke previous eras of video games.

That's true.

And I think even if you are not in on on perpetua there is something to appreciate in some of those designs just check them out i also would say to connect it to our own topic they're kind of virtual pet coded they're definitely dragon cross dragon quest slime coded so our cute little trees i had a i had a bad idea one night where i was like how hard would it be to make a virtual flag pet thing

I've seen people

a little too hard.

I don't know.

Yeah, I've seen people like really start to be like, I want to make my own virtual pet.

And like, you know, the, I think the coding aspect of it is probably easier.

That's the device half of it.

That I think is probably going to be your difficulty there.

Yeah.

Shout out to last.

Seems hard.

Never seen ever.

Graphing calculators.

Did they go away?

Thanks.

Like T1, whatever the fuck.

Anyway, yeah.

Right.

We're done.

That's it.

That's done.

Go listen to Media Club Plus.

That's wrapped up.

Hunter Hunter is wrapped up.

Media Club Plus continues.

In fact, Allie, you are on the first new episode of Media Club Plus coming up soon.

Yes, and

I am a recurring cast for

the season mini that we're doing in between.

If you don't know, go find out.

Yes.

It's exciting.

I just said it.

So, you know, go listen to it.

All right.

I think that's it.

Please leave us some reviews.

We're out of time today, so I'm going to let Allie go, but I'll read some reviews next time.

I promise.

Until then, to be continued.