Review: Thomas Wooden Talking Railway [Farewell at the Docks]
Written on Nov 14, 2009 by Brian and filed under Learning Curve, Reviews
Right, so technology and classic wooden Thomas trains don’t go together right? If you’re a regular reader, you’ll know that’s not true, as we brought you the news of RFID integration coming to Thomas at this year’s Toy Fair. We have our first hands on one of the new Talking Railway sets from Learning Curve featuring Cranky, Thomas and Spencer. If you have a child who loves Thomas, then this new lineup will have them “Peep Peep-ing” with excitement.
What Does RFID Do?
The short story is RFID chips are planted in Talking Railway enabled trains. Currently this includes Thomas, James, Percie, Spencer, Rosie, Toby, Edward and several other favorites. You’ll know it’s a Talking Railway engine by looking at the magnetic connectors. They’re gold instead of the standard silver. There’s also a making underneath the train that indicates it’s RFID enabled. When a Talking Railway engine passes over an RFID reader, which is embedded in special stations and locations, kids hear an engine-appropriate message.
In the case of the Farewell at the Docks set we tested, that means Sir Topham Hatt has different greetings for Thomas than Spencer, both engines are included with the set. And if you were to add a Talking Railway James for instance, he’d get his own set of messages when pushed over the sensor. Of course regular engines and so on work with this set, they’ll get sounds and messages, they’re just not engine specific.
The only downside to this particular use of RFID, is that they haven’t given us any way to update the recordings stored in the stations. So that means if in a few years they release more Talking Railway engines, stations bought today won’t support the new trains. Learning Curve has indicated they have no plans to release new talking engines in 2010, but after that, it’s hard to tell, and you may find the current systems outdated.
Do Kids Really Care?
They do. Our mostly boy test group had dozens of combined Thomas playing years under their belts. To date there have been trains that can talk when a button is pressed on their cabs, or certain features that activate and make noise when a train is driven over a waterfall for instance. But nothing quite like this, a system that just works on its own and is customized to the engine driving over the sensor.
It was pretty funny actually, watching the kids being surprised each time as they’d try to trick the system into mixing up the trains. Of course they couldn’t do it. Unless you cut out the RFID chips and switch them, it will never make a mistake. But kids trying to trick Sir Topham Hatt really underscores the “magic” of the technology. They also enjoyed getting instructions for the engines, contributing to imaginative play. Here’s a little video of what you can expect.
Aside from the talking Sir Topham Hatt, this package also includes Cranky, specially decorated Thomas and Spencer, decorated tunnel, bridge and track; totaling 24 pieces in all. This package retails for $99.99 and is exclusive to Toys R Us. In general, there’s a small premium for the Talking Railway engines, about $4 from what we can find, though Toys R Us currently sells a regular Cranky and the Talking Railway Cranky for the same price, $39.99. We’re not going to get too bogged down in price, the wooden railway pieces are expensive, but the Talking Railway engines and stations don’t appear to command a huge premium, which is nice.
Bottom Line
Kids that are into trains and Thomas specifically, really enjoyed the extra interactivity the Talking Railway offered. If you’ve already decided to buy Thomas sets and trains, the little extra for the Talking Railway pieces is worthwhile, especially when you factor in the many hours, if not generations, of play.
Rating – 4.5 out of 5 Stars – Editor’s Choice
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