14 DAY TRIAL // Mobile phone manufacturers nowadays are releasing phones for every type of user, from music enthusiasts (that have been getting a lot of new phones lately), users with active lifestyles, female users or kids.
In Japan, mobile phones for kids aren't very different from mid to hi-end phones in other parts of the world, which makes you wonder why they are considered child phones.
They are equipped with GPS, 3G capabilities and cameras and are mostly useful for parents to track down their children, but maybe not as much for children themselves.
And it's about time someone thought about making an actual mobile phone for kids that is both easy to use and fun. Unfortunately, the phone, dubbed Papipo!, is only available in Japan, so only kids there will be able to enjoy it. At first sight, it looks like a toy more than an actual phone, which is what the designers probably intended in the first place.
Japanese phone company Willcom and toy vendor Bandai were responsible for producing the mobile phone. It comes in seven different designs, 5 for girls and 2 for boys, with themes including Hello Kitty, Tamagochi, Dragons and others, as well as extra colors allowing the change of look when the child is bored with it.
The Papipo! has a built-in camera and is packed with very interesting mobile games, including a game called 'Color Picture' , which is a kind of paint by number game, except that to fill each block, the child has to take a photo of something that has the requested color. Rest assured, it also has the usual set of safety features, including an emergency button that when pressed will automatically alert a certain person. Compared to other mobile phones, the Papipo! is actually quite affordable, coming with a price tag of 4800 Yen, which is about $41.