Anki Cozmo Robot by Anki - A Fun, Interactive Toy Robot, for 8 years to 99 years, Perfect for Kids, White

Now, for those that haven’t seen him, Cozmo is a new toy created by robotics/AI company Anki. Initially released in the USA in 2016, he came to the UK in 2017, and more specifically, came to my house earlier this month. You see, Cozmo was the main thing that my youngest wanted for her birthday. We knew this would probably be the case long before she asked as she spent a lot of time watching DanTDM trialling the toy on YouTube, and she was absolutely enamoured by the thing.But … what exactly is Cozmo? Well, in essence, he’s a friendly AI in the form of a little forklift-style robot. I think that TechRadar put it best when they described him as a cross between Wall-E and a digger, though there is an air of ‘cute jumping spider’ about him too. He really is tiny too, and fits easily the palm of most adult’s hands. Don’t let that fool you though, he seems pretty robust thus far. The real joy comes in how you interact with him though.cozmo4When charged, Cozmo is perfectly capable of trundling around on his own and exploring his environment. And he really does pay attention too, trying his best to identify things. For example, he saw my fleecy slippers and immediately set about figuring out what they may be. He decided that they were an animal. He also likes to play games, usually involving the three power cubes that come packaged with him. The way this works is that he’ll decide on a game that he wants to play, and the Cozmo app (which is free to download to your phone) will tell you what game he’s trying to instigate and how to play. Some of this is pretty simple; For example, in one game, Cozmo and up to two others watch the cubes and try to be the first to tap them when all the lights on each cube match. It’s kinda like an electronic version of snap. What makes it all interesting boils down to one thing though: rewards.cozmo2Yup, rewards. The most expected reward is that beating Cozmo unlocks other tiers to the games (such as switching the light match from one light, to two lights, three lights, and so on). It also gives you in-app currency which you can use to nudge Cozmo into playing particular games or learning certain tricks, like box stacking. The real enjoyment – and indeed the real reward – comes from Cozmo’s reactions though. If he beats you, it’s not unusual to see him perform a victory dance and sing happily to himself. And if he loses? He can get sad, or even get annoyed and start flipping his cubes.What this boils down to is that Cozmo is a cute little caricature of behaviour. He overreacts, but without it becoming a pain. Instead, everything he does is set up to look adorable. Even his facial recognition ability is like this. You ask the app to nudge him into recognising someone, then stare at him. He’ll frown a little, note your face, and repeat the name you entered in the app back in a childlike way. For me, this gave me the opportunity to play Sonic SatAM/Archie with him. So, yeah … he now calls me Princess Sally …cozmo3Of course, if he can learn names, that means he can learn words too, right? Yup, he certainly can. Again, he repeats things back in a childlike way, sometimes even garbling them, but the system does come with filters. Cozmo won’t say anything rude. If you try, he’ll get embarrassed or angry, and make this clear with a combination of facial expressions and noises.Oh, and if you want to know how Cozmo sees the world, that’s easy too! The App comes with a setting where you can watch through Cozmo’s ‘eyes’ and experience his journey at his level.Now, there are some downsides to the adorable little bot. He’s expensive for one. This can be negated a little by the simple fact that he’s not likely to be played with once and then start gathering dust. He’s interesting and interactive enough that most kids will likely keep playing for a long time to come. There’s the power consumption too though: it takes half an hour to charge Cozmo up enough to play for ninety minutes. This isn’t really a bad thing as it forces natural breaks, but I do think that most kids are going to want to play longer than that. I have no idea how energy efficient the system is either. Oh, and while it wasn’t the case for us, I’ve heard that the initial set up has taken a while for some users. That can be frustrating, especially for little ones.So, what’s my verdict? Well, to my surprise, Cozmo is probably one of the best modern toys that I’ve come across. He’s fun, has plenty of scope to grow, and really does make you smile. In a word, he’s just plain cool! Really, what more could you want?Final Score: 5 out of 5

In purchased this little character after it appeared on my sons Chirstmas list. I have to admit once I saw the size to price ratio I was a little dubious. However, this is a real fun, smart piece of kit and dare I say it, well worth the money. At the time of my purchase he was reduced to £119.You need an android or IOS phone or pad To use with it for the majority of the time. If you intend letting your children use your own phone be prepared to lose it for hours on end. Also, when they go to bed you will find yourself interacting and playing games with him.Excellent purchse and the whole family love him.

The media could not be loaded. Updated review to 5 stars (Was originally 1 star, and I'm leaving the original review at the bottom for completeness).It's been a few weeks since I originally bought 3 Cozmos one after another since none seemed to work, which was very strange.They worked fine (mostly) at my office, but once I got home they just refused to work. Maybe interference with my neighbour's router (since I tried turning mine off) or other wireless devices.I created a support ticket with Anki, and after sending them detailed feedback (including photos/videos) of the problems and exchanging a couple of more messages, an issue was found in the firmware.They fixed the issue and gave me access to a Beta version for me to test.Once I managed to update the firmware after a couple of tries (since the problem itself makes it hard to complete an update), all seems to be working fine. No more problems waking up, disconnects, or random shutdowns. :)The downside is that if you have these problems to begin with, you might need complete the update process in an environment where everything works fine to begin with.I'm happy I managed to help Anki sort this out and provide a better experience for everyone else (hopefully) :)----- Original review ----Been trying to get one for my kid, and all 3 I ordered so far are defective.They don't even go through the entire setup procedure without crashing, turning off, disconnecting, etc.Even tried different phones, and USB chargers to make sure it wasn't a power issue.I'm posting some pictures/videos of all 3 I got, although I didn't record all the problems.First one I got: Could barely keep the wifi connection up. It would show "Cozmo 01" error constantly during the setup procedure. Once I got past that, it wouldn't finish the "wake up" setup step without shutting down. After maybe 1 hour of attempting to finish the setup, it successful woke up, and I used it for a few minutes before putting it back in the box to take home (I was in the office). As soon as I got home, I showed it to my kid. He was very excited, but any attempts to get it running failed.Second one: Thinking that maybe going for the Collectors Edition would be safer, I ordered one of those. Once it was delivered (I was in the office), I promptly went trough the setup procedure. This one worked fine first try. Went through the setup just fine, and I played with it for a few minutes before putting it back in the box to take home. Once I got home, any further attempts to get it running failed. Once my kid went to bed, I gave it another go, and was behaving like the first one. Screen corruption, turning off, disconnecting, etc. Because of these problems, the app was also stuck in a loop trying to "update" Cozmo every time I tried to setup it up. As soon as Cozmo crashed it was back to square one.Third one: Order another of the classic ones (white/red). This time I didn't even bothered trying it at work. Only opened it at home after my kid went bed (just to avoid another disappointment). Another dud. Final step of the setup procedure, it makes a loud beep and turns off (You can see that in the video).Even tried leaving it to charge for a long while. No luck.Considering it says in the description "Rigorously tested for durability and security"... I'm either very unlucky, or that's complete B.S.I don't think I'll bother trying to get a 4rd one.Now, time to come up with what to say to my kid once he's back from nursery today, since for the last week, first thing he asks me when I get home is... "Daddy, did you get me another robot?"