Character Options might have stolen the London Toy Fair, at least where adults are concerned. It demonstrated a wearable wristband that prompts special effect noise and/or music as you move.
The bands, which cost £49.99 for a pair and will be available from June, look much like fitness trackers or the LED devices often found at Coldplay gigs. However, they dispense of many of the normal tracking sensors and focus purely on motion.
That’s because they link, via Bluetooth, to a smartphone or tablet with one of two apps installed. The first is an audio board with up to 40,000 sound clips that play with certain movements and motions.
The second app is an interactive graphics generator that can feed different visual effects to a big screen via an output on your mobile device or, presumably, through wireless screen mirroring.
Both apps are included as free downloads, making the overall price of BeatMoovz very reasonable.
Multiple BeatMoovz bands can be linked with the apps too, so extra users can join in. Or you can wear two on your wrists, two on your ankles to make your limbs musical instruments.
In our demo, the inventor of BeatMoovz showed us how to create dance music by simply waving and flicking his wrists. But more exciting for us, as old-school kung fu movie fans, is that you can switch to a soundboard of cheesy karate effects, or robotic noises. It’s basically like having Police Academy’s Michael Winslow follow you around making innapropriate, funny noises.
We were told that anywhere up to a thousand people can be wearing BeatMoovz and interacting at once, although we’re pretty sure our Bluetooth devices can’t handle that many connections. But the point was that this could go down as well in a nightclub as an after school club for the kids.
It’s definitely good to see a tech toy that isn’t just for the sprogs.
Sourse: pocket-lint.com
