I honestly thought they were created just to compete with Pokémon
TIL that Tamagotchi was intended to only be for girls.
Yeah that was apparently the original intentions of BANDAI.
Looking back now, the ads I remember watching on Disney Channel for Tamagotchi really did only have girls in them. I never realized that til now.
I think the thought process was probably like “girls like cutesy wootsy little characters! Boys like monsters that’ll fight each other!”
Caring for a creature to keep it alive? That’s girl stuff 💅
If they didn’t want boys playing with them, they shouldn’t have made them poop.
Hey I still have mine sitting next to me rn
That feels fairly obvious. That said, I definitely had both at some point back then.
Okay tbh, I didn’t even know Digimon was a digital creature thing originally.
I mostly know them for their card game, cartoon series, action figures, and their catchy jingle “Digimon are the champions!”
Hence why I thought it was just Pokémon competition. Because Pokémon also had all this stuff.
It was definitely before Pokémon. The anime and other media certainly outlived that device.
Just googled it, Pokémon beats Digital Monsters by 1 year.
Pokémon first debuted on February 27th, 1996. The original Digital Monster pet toys came out on June 26th, 1997
Really? I feel like I remember having Digimon long before Pokémon. Did Digimon make it to the US first?
Edit: Digimon released the digital pet in the US on December 5, 1997. Pokémon Red and Blue came to the US on September 28, 1998. It’s still kind of wild to me. I thought they were further apart than that. I think because Digimon was elementary for me and Pokémon was middle school.
But I had a Tamagotchi???
….
Oh
Ooooooohhhhhhhhh
That little egg was apparently trying to tell a lot of people that they were eggs.
They still make these and other similar devices. I got swept up in the nostalgia, got a new one, convinced a friend to also get one, and the damn thing was so annoying we were over it in a week.
I seriously almost bought one of the Hello Kitty Tamagothis last year at my local Target as a 21 year old.
I was very tempted
Right, they’re still tantalizing even knowing they’re annoying. Bandai also has something now days called a Vital Bracelet, kind of like a smartwatch meets Digipet. You train your monster by exercising. I got one because they were steeply discounted. Then I found out it was deprecated and replaced by a better model. It also only supported military time. And shortly after they ended up sunsetting the entire franchise, and taking down the associated apps. Like, c’mon Bandai, put a little effort in plz. 🫠
i got one for me and my kid and while it can be annoying, its so fun to share a bit of my childhood with them :)
Tbh I didn’t even know what Digimon was back them. Tamagotchi was the known brand.
I was the target demographic when they came out in the mid 90s. I wanted one, but we were poor and nobody else had the anyway.
I had one of those with the keyhole that you could connect to other devices for battle but I was the only one that had one so I never even tried that function.
