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aphextron

>Was the original Tamagotchi only marketed towards girls?

Pretty much. Girls had Tamagotchi and boys had Digimon.

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I don’t agree with that. At the height of tama mania everyone had one.

Usually, digi was a more complicated knock off that fit a different niche of people who like battling Pokémon.

Edit: I had both, but digi personally wasn’t all that fun and everyone did tama because it was mellow and easy. We played Pokémon if we wanted to battle.

It also came out later? I think I had a tamagotchi in 1994 or 1995 - I think digimon didn’t show up until a year or two later.

I think tama was 96 and digi was like 98 or 99.

>Usually, digi was a more complicated knock off that fit a different niche of people who like battling Pokémon.

"Knock-off" is a strange description for a product made by the same company as the Tamagotchi. Can they make knock-offs of their own product?

Heh, I guess. It seemed inferior hence the knock off bit.

Digimon was pretty much a Tamagotchi marketed heavily towards boys, but the original Tamagotchi was fairly gender neutral - I remember when they were big when I was a kid plenty of my male friends had one.

Not sure why this is downvoted. Wikipedia says that Tamagotchi was initally marketed exclusively to teenage girls, whereas Digimon -- made by the same creators -- was deliberately aimed at the male audience.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tamagotchi

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digimon

That was in Japan though.

By the time Digimon arrived, the Tamagotchi hype had already subsided a bit (at least here in Germany). And while I knew more girls with one than boys, there were several boys who did (including myself).

Both situations can be true at the same time. IIRC, Tamagotchi were a big hit where I live (Poland), I remember wanting to get one, playing with one someone had, and that it was discussed on a news program the other day - and popularity seemed gender-netural too. Everyone was fascinated with the new digital toy (well, kids were; parents not so much). Digimon came much later, past the popularity wave - and the only person I ever knew who had one (and still has it, and it still works) was my sister.

Apparently the Digimon device had a bunch of "social" features - multiple devices could talk to each other (don't remember if it was contact or infrared) - but I think she never met anyone else to test it with.

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