Originally published at: The 1978 Mego 2-XL Talking Robot was a brilliant illusion of interactive computing, based on 8-Track tapes | Boing Boing
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Absolutely my favorite educational toy while growing up. I remember trying to map out a kind of “choose your own adventure” story but was too young to get far and had no idea how to make an 8-track tape recording.
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2-XL was a favourite toy with my family, too. We kids loved doing impressions of his robot voice.
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Here’s the obligatory Techmoan link to something similar in the MiltonBradley Omni
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I had one of these as a kid, and a few months back saw one for sale in a vintage shop. I talk about my disappointment with the 2-XL here: walkswithdave — We walked into a store today and this immediately...
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Hmm… I saw something like this as a kid in Hamleys, London, and the date’s about right. Could be…
And… there was a sequel?! Showing how much the tech had moved on in fourteen years… (not at all)
Same guy behind both versions.
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I did a CD-ROM version of 2XL for toy fair in 1995. It was well received by the full title was never made for some reason.
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I loved my 2XL as a kid, and my parents loved the fact that it ran on AC, and didn’t need batteries.
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I loved mine. My biggest problem was a lack of new content, I don’t know if we couldn’t afford new tapes or they weren’t easy to find?
And I don’t believe it held up as educational for me, nor was the family impressed that it was giving me any real advantage… It wasn’t the.future after all!
Hands down the best educational toy I had was lego.
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I was only familiar with the 90s one. I can still remember the commercial where he chirpily says “A peanut is neither a pea nor a nut. It is a legume.”
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