Jibo

We signed the kids up for an MIT Robotics Lap experiment that turns out to be playing a video game where an animated “Jibo” robot tells you instructions.

Ezra speed-taps past all the instructions and informs the grad student about all the bugs he finds (including that speed-tapping through the instructions causes them to garble). He spends the first level figuring out that the trampoline is an effective item and then uses only the trampoline to quickly solve all the other levels.

Phineas reads all the instructions aloud, interjecting commentary: “‘Hi, I’m Jibo! When you’re playing the game, I might have something to say, so please listen carefully–’ I always listen carefully!” He tries all the items the game suggests, but ultimately finds that trampolines are the best item for each level.

At the end of the game, the grad student asks questions. Ezra is happy to grant that Jibo had “a bunch of good ideas” (though he doesn’t name any). He is pleased to learn that the grad student is also the author of the game and asks her about some technical details. He also talks about how he thinks it’s fun when games have a few visible glitches because they can be funny.

Phineas doesn’t think that Jibo had any ideas because Jibo is not alive. He also points out that he is the one who solved the whole game and Jibo did not really help. (“I’m quite smart!”) He does not have any questions for the researcher.

Both kids suggest that the main game improvement would be for Jibo to do all its talking up front and not interrupt mid-game.