Review: Electronic Test Tube Aliens

April 19, 2011 Chopsy Baby

There are many types of add-water-to-grow creatures available in toy and gadget shops, but the Electronic Test Tube Aliens must be one of the best. This is reflected in the price, with each alien retailing at £12.99. But rather than grow it and throw it, the Test Tube Alien challenge is to keep them alive. This is done by monitoring their needs via a flashing heartbeat and adding more or less water or daylight as is needed.

Once the alien has hatched and grown, you can choose to use an interactive website to monitor their development and find out how well you have been treating it.

Reviewed by…

Chopsy Baby’s Jen Smith and four-year-old Sidney

Jen says: “Though aimed at children aged six years and upwards, I thought my four-year-old son would love this. He is very much into Doctor Who and aliens.

“We hatched the alien together, which was great fun. Adding a specially prepared mix of water and powder into the test tube, the cocoon comes off of the alien and it comes to life. Sid was a little wary of the fizzing, but this all added to the magic. He thought the alien was fantastic and really took to keeping it happy and alive.

“Our alien grew to full size in around ten days. The growing is actually pretty impressive. The alien quickly became a member of the family, proudly paraded to everyone who came to visit. This is a fantastic toy if your child is pet pestering. If they can deal with the responsibility of keeping a toy alien alive, they may be ready to upgrade to a hamster.

“We did struggle with the interactive website aspect of the toy. We just couldn’t register the alien using the online form which allows us to access the features. But this didn’t matter to us.

“Hatching the alien and growing the alien was really easy and surprisingly fun. More than a month in we have had a disaster. Our Test Tube Alien has been knocked over and dropped quite a few times and one time proved too much. The head has come away from the body a bit, but he is still happily flashing away. The toy has taken a serious amount of punishment but is still alive.”

The better you treat your Test Tube Alien, the longer it will live. Aliens that are treated well can live for around 12 – 18 months, and other owners on the internet are boasting aliens that have been alive for more than two years.

The lid of the test tube is glued on and not meant to be removed, but for those little adventurers, all contents are child safe.

Best of all…
Getting the alien to hatch was great fun

Could improve…
We did struggle to get the online form to work on the website.

Basically…
This is really fun toy, ideal to produce on a rainy day.

Ages: 6+

£12.99