This archive article (written 2009–2016) contains advice that may be out of date and is waiting for veterinary review. Please check with your vet before acting on it. About our articles
| History of Virtual pets |
| The concept of raising
artificial creatures in a video game originated with Puppy Love by Tom
Snyder Productions, released for Macintosh in 1986. The concept next
appeared in 1992 in Dragon Quest V by developer Chunsoft. PF Magic released the first widely popular virtual pets in 1995 with Dogz, followed by Catz in the spring of 1996, eventually becoming a franchise known as Petz. Virtual pets were further popularized by Nintendo's Pokémon series, debuting in 1995. virtual pets were a massive fad in Japan, and to a lesser extent in the United States and United Kingdom during the late 1990s. There have been significant improvements of virtual pets since Tamagotchi's success when it was released in 1996, from dot-images (such as Tamagotchi) to rendered and animated 3D games (such as Nintendogs). Today, there are also "virtual pets" which have physical robotic bodies, known as Ludobots or Entertainment robots. The idea of an animal companion composed of technology rather than flesh has also inspired a lot of fiction, such as the anime Digimon (itself a contraction of "Digital Monster"). The popularity of virtual pets in the United States, and the constant need for attention the pets required, led to them being banned from schools across the country, a move that hastened the virtual pet's decline from popularity. Common features of virtual pets: There are many common features between different virtual pets, some of them are used to give a sense of reality to the user (such as pet's responds to "touch"), and some for enhancing playability (such as training). Communicating with virtual pets: With advanced video-gaming technology, most modern virtual pets do not show a message box or icon to display the pet's internal variable, health state or emotion like earlier generations (such as Tamagotchi). Instead, users can only understand the pet by interpreting their actions, body language, facial expressions, etc. This helps keep a pet's behavior seem natural, rather than calculated, and fosters a feeling of a relationship between user and digital pet. |
| Sense of reality: To give a sense of reality to users, most virtual pets have certain level of autonomy and unpredictability. The user can interact with the pet and this process of personalizing can make the pet more distinctive. Personalizing increases the feeling of responsibility for the pet to the user. For example, if a Tamagotchi is unattended for long enough, it will "die". Interactivity: To increase user's personal attachment to the pet, the pet interacts with the user. Interactivity can be classified into two categories: Short-term and long-term. Short-term interactivity includes direct interaction or action to reaction from the pet. Example: "touch" a pet with mouse cursor and the pet will give a direct response to the "touching". Long-term interactivity includes action that affect pet's growth, behavior or life span. Example like training the pet may have good effect on pet's health. Long-term interactivity is quite important for a sense of reality as the user would think that he has some lasting influence on the pet. Two kinds of interactivity are often combined. Such as playing with a pet (short-term interactivity) may make the pet more optimistic (long-term interactivity). Example of common features: Responds to calling Responds to touching Training the pet Supplies or toys for the pet Dressing up the pet Competition or trial amongst pets Meeting other pets Complaining when it needs care |