Toy Wizards would like to thank Wicked Cool Toys for providing a sample of My Partner Pikachu for us to review. You can snag your own from Amazon today for only $17.98!
My Partner Pikachu from Wicked Cool Toys claims to do a lot of things. Just check out the product description:
“Play with Pikachu like never before! My Partner Pikachu’s’s 3 touch sensors let you and Pikachu communicate in a new and fun way. Enter over 100 different combinations to watch My My Partner Pikachu come alive as his arms and ears move, his cheeks and tail light up, and he plays 20 iconic Pikachu sound effects and expressions! My Partner Pikachu’s 2 modes of play lets you bring the thrill of becoming a Pokemon trainer into the real world! Gotta Catch ‘Em All! Suitable for ages 4 years and up. Batteries included. “
Tall order, right? So let’s dive into this toy and see what it does. Strictly speaking from the toy design itself, it’s seriously perfect looking. I love the size and scale of it. It’s about 3 inches or so and it is super clean. It looks like Pikachu circa 2000. Not the short and fat 1998 look, but the super-iconic one that came right after it.
There’s a really humorous discrepancy happening with this toy, and all of this I’m seriously saying in good fun. This is very much a kids’ toy, I’d say for children in the 4-7 year range. There are supposedly a few modes of ‘play’, training and discovery. By touching a combination of various Pika-parts of his body, it’s supposed to activate different modes or expressions. I’m pretty sure this is all just marketing.
Pikachu really doesn’t do anything but squeal and make sounds when you touch him. And that’s it! It’s fun and exciting and adorable, but it’s definitely not the grandiose experience that the packaging and advertisement want me to think it is.
Like I said in the video review, either I’m really stupid, or this toy is trying to pull one on me. It’s a strange, lucid gray area that I’m not sure I want to be a part of. Like I’m missing a detail, or this toy is smart enough to take over the world and I’m not privy to the key to activate said domination.
For a toy that is small, cute, excellently priced and makes little arm/ear flappy movements and has a super clean sound chip? I would seriously give My Partner Pikachu 4.5 out of 5 Wizard Stars. It’s great and looks amazing sitting next to me at my desk. But for an “Interactive friendship piece that you can train and teach and discover”? Get the hell out of here, it doesn’t do that. In that regard, we’re looking at like 2.5 stars. But all in all, it’s great. Let’s settle on 3.5 because I think his little Pika-chirps will make a lot of kids happy!
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