We’ve been using BubblePal for a few days, and while my 3-year-old loves it, there are definitely things that could be improved.
The TTS voices are quite good, clear, and pleasant; though not the best I’ve heard so far they are good enough for the category. Speech understanding is generally okay, but it struggles with short sentences, and unfortunately often when my kid speaks; it misinterprets him about 50% of the time. Response speed is still not completely satisfactory; sometimes we would repeat questions multiple times thinking it did not hear us, and weirdly, some answers just don’t play even though they show up in the app.
The LLM responses ok but sometimes off topic and mostly railroded. For example, when we played with the Bunny character, my kid asked, “How are you?”, and it started talking about an exploration or a strange symbol or noise instead of responding naturally. Same question to “Einstein” will prompt a quite long discussion about energy. In general, by default conversations feel a little rigid and railroaded rather than dynamic and natural. This is no doubtly a setup which is also connected to the hardware and the choiche to have a push-to-talk mechanism (more to it later) which demands for “longer” responses.
One strong point is age appropriateness. It never says anything strange or dangerous (even when asked to) and replied to “harder-parent” questions, appropriately. In any case, all conversations are saved for parents to review.
NOTES on the screenshots:
- Clearly we never spoke chinese nor we actually proposed to fly to the moon.
- Please note the *ride* (i.e. “laugh”) tag which is actually read out loud
- Solid answer there on the “what are the ‘willy’ and ‘flower’ for?” question 😀
- In the last image “Ciao Elisabetta” was actually “Ciao come stai?” (i.e. Hi, how are you?).. The question was correct. It seems sometimes what is reported on the app does not fully correspond to what it actually understands.
The hardware is great—solid, well-designed, with nice colors and a comfortable feel. Battery life seems fine so far.
Setup was easy, but it requires an internet connection at all times, which is a slight downside. I wish it allowed custom character names since we wanted to integrate it with an existing stuffed animal. The push-to-talk button is frustrating—it works like a walkie-talkie, which makes conversations feel unnatural and is difficult for my kid to use. Another annoyance: sometimes it responds in the wrong language. It would be great to have a way to set preferred languages.
Overall, BubblePal is a fun and promising toy, but its interaction limitations, slow response times, and lack of flexibility hold it back in the uncanny valley.
Right now, it’s more of a fun AI gadget than a truly conversational companion, but my kid enjoys it, so that’s definitely a win!
—
📊 Report Card
🗣️ TTS (Voice Quality) ⭐⭐⭐⭐☆ (⅘)
🧠 Speech Understanding ⭐⭐⭐⭐☆ (⅘)
⏳ Response Speed ⭐⭐⭐☆☆ (⅗)
🤖 LLM Quality ⭐⭐⭐☆☆ (⅗)
🔄 Adaptability ⭐⭐☆☆☆ (⅖)
👶 Age Appropriateness ⭐⭐⭐⭐☆ (⅘)
🎨 Hardware & Design ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ (5/5)
⚙️ Setup & Connectivity ⭐⭐⭐⭐☆ (⅘)
🛠️ Customization & Interaction ⭐⭐☆☆☆ (⅖)
🏆 Final Score: ⭐⭐⭐🌓☆ (3.5/5) – A great idea, but needs improvement!
