I like the way it finds its way back to the charging base automatically...though you'd better plan ahead on having it charged up if you want to use it for a serious business video conference. Though I reckon your colleagues'd be too amused by the strangeness of nattering to a robot for the conference to go smoothly...and if they're Red Dwarf fans then the similarity to the scutters will have them giggling far too much.

The Rovio's out this Friday for $300. [RobotsRule]

As you can see, like a few other WowWee vids the production value is prit-tay high. Yes, Femisapien can wield a whip to discipline Robosapien. Yes, she can shake her ass. Something tells me this is only the beginning of BDSM-tinged Femisapien vids. Guess that's what you get when you bring to market a programmable fembot with a molded plastic rear. Femisapien should be shipping soon to the US for $99. [Robots Rule]

Yep, still creepy after all these years. [Boing Boing Gadgets]

I'm a sucker for animatronic noises. They always make me laugh for some reason.

[RoboCommunity]

The Elvinator is only part done, as GW Jax has only given the skin a burned/melted look, and outfitted the Elvinator with an LED eye. But he plans to add in a Jaw piston for custom mouth movements, give the bot custom phrases, and endow it with interactive abilities, such as voice recognition and the ability to "learn." Looks pretty damn cool. [Instructables]

While Femisapien's no Uma Thurman with those blades, the range of motion and the accuracy of the robot's pose-programming does mean this is going to be one cool toy to play with.

Interestingly Geek Alerts is saying that Femisapien will be available in the US soon for $99, which is at odds with the $175 we mentioned earlier. Guess you'll have to wait to find out how much you'll pay to do robotic reconstructions of scenes from Zorro. [Geek Alerts]

If the doggy version is a touch too scary for you there's also an Angel and Devil, and a Fairy Godfather version, and I'm hoping they're somewhat friendlier. The little guys were apparently shown at CES earlier this year, but we've only just caught sight of them now, in this Slashgear review. It does look like their sensitivity is a bit off, since they seem to miss some trigger words, but that's the sort of thing that may be addressed in a software update at a later date.

At least these animated toys have another function besides annoying you as you type: they have a speaker and battery-powered action so you can plug in an MP3 player and use them standalone. They're PC and Mac compatible, and are available for $49.99. [Chatterbots Online via Slashgear]

The collaboration between the big, bad and evil fun-loving kid's entertainment company and Thinkway Toys and others, including WowWee, will further result in a whole host of Disney characters being reincarnated as a scary, robotic army. Next on the list is Tinkerbell, and this time she really flies. The new toys will be showcased at the upcoming Bay Area Maker Faire and, to be honest, we're a little scared they may all corrupt and attempt to take over the world. You have been warned. [Gearlog]

After investigating the story printed in the local Manhasset Press newspaper, WowWee's Customer Service Department determined that it has received 45 different calls over the past 2 months about hawks and other birds of prey swooping down and snatching consumers' FlyTech Dragonfly out of the air.

Interesting—although we probably should have seen this coming after the epic battle between the Dragonfly and Mark Wilson's cat. Look out WowWee. The animal kingdom is waging war against you and your products. [WowWee]

From first viewed to last viewed:

• Mr. Clock Radio by Geewiz Entertainment ($99.99), is primarily an alarm clock radio. However, it does have a line-in jack, making it usable as a personal speaker set. It also has some three-hundred different wake-up message (half are aggressive, half are charming), and a fun/pointless "fortune telling" mode. The price is a little steep for the basic tech it implements, (flashing lights, portable speakers and pre-recorded messages), but we can't help loving the guy for his fantastic witticisms. [Geewiz Entertainment]

• Comprehensive Robot Kit by Bioloid ($869.00), one of the most complete and versatile robotics kits we saw on display at CES '08. The Comprehensive Robot Kit is really a a super-glorified Lego kit. It comes with various robotic bits'n'bobs, including IrDA receivers for dual robot communication, microphones for sound detection, luminosity detectors, piezo-electric speakers, essential battery packs and a full software suite for programmable characteristics in your robot's behavior, all via your PC. At this price, the kit is strictly an educational tool or for serious enthusiasts. [Bioloid Comprehensive Kit]

• Wrex the Dawg by WowWee ($TBA), has three emotional modes (happy, sad and angry), 14-motors for movement and a remote control for general locomotion. Expected to ship this Spring; if Wrex's quirky styling does not have reaching for your wallet, perhaps his mechanized wagging tail will? [WowWee]

• Tribot by WowWee ($99.99), is the robot that will replace the much loved Robosapien. The Tribot comes pre-loaded with a series of games that rely on the user to position the bot in various different orientations, it has three wheels that allow it to have a wide range of movements, a motion sensing controller that allows for Wii-esque navigation and it will hit the shops this summer. [WowWee]

• iRobiQ by Yujin Robot has been doing the rounds since CES 2007. It is a home information service that is able to display the news, weather, cooking recipes, photos, videos and sing some karaoke if you get bored. All this information goodness is displayed on a 7-inch LCD screen, but the iRobiQ also accepts voice commands for various jobs, like sending images to a cellphone, ordering a room to be cleaned by pairing with a Roomba type device and even read books that are stored on its central server. The iRobiQ, at present, has no US distributor, so do not expect it to ship anytime soon. [Yujin Robot; Korean link, via Tech Digest]

• E1 by Roboware ($1,500), recognizes set voice commands via a Bluetooth headset, connects to your network to transmit pictures captured via the on board camera, which it can also display on its tiny LCD screen and boasts bi-pedal motion, generated by a ton of different joints. At present, it is not ready for shipping, as the engineers are working out the bugs in the system. The final model will come with a full software suite, as well as an online developers community that will be launched along side the bot. Roboware hopes to ship the E1 by March, and envisions a truly malleable robot that can be completely defined by its users. [Company website is not live at present]

• Zeno by David Hanson (concept stage); we have covered Zeno an awful lot here at Giz, but the creepy bot was displaying his moves at CES '08, still in prototype stages. Zeno did not look so horrific in the real "frubber," but he still made us a little unsettled. Zeno will be able to talk, recognize faces and detect specific sounds, as well as be user upgradeable via an online community, with which Zeno can remain wirelessly connected thanks to the inbuilt support for Wi-Fi connectivity. [Hanson Robotics]

• FemiSapien by WowWee ($TBA), the FemiSapien is coined as Robosapien's girlfriend, and when the two interact, hilarious girlfriend/boyfriend rifts take place. The Femisapien is able to control Robosapien, but not visa versa. The female bot will be able to dance, move, sing and carry out a range of movement like her out-dated boyfriend. We are not sure the robot god approves of them living in sin, but we did not see them romp. However, if Robosapien carries on acting like this (VERY NSFW), we are sure robot god will be most displeased. Expect the FemiSapien to ship this summer. [Robots Rule]

That's the best of the robots we uncovered at CES '08. It looks like it is going to be a great year for fans of this genere of toys, but Sony, if you are reading, we wouldn't mind Aibo joining in the festivities at some point. Until then folks, there should be more than enough here to tide you over.

So can WowWee justify their gadget? (Or, maybe more importantly, do female robots really need any justification at all?)

• After Warner's announcement, HD DVD won't be attending CES this week, a fact that only looks worse after they put their logo on the press bags. Adding insult to HD DVD's injury, New Line Cinema also joined the Blu-ray exclusive crew.

• WowWee showed us three robots aiming to attack AIBOs, Robosapiens and autonomous helicopters everywhere. The only thing missing was a robot to bring us beer. Luckily, Inter Active Toy covered that with the RC Cooler.

• Other good finds included the Celestron SkyScout Scope, Cobra's OLED radar detectors, and an in-dash CD player for audiophiles. On the GPS front, Magellan's 5340 with built-in Google local search and Garmin's 880 with voice recognition stood out the most. Finally, Logitech unveiled a whole bunch of stuff, including a networked music player, a sleek set of speakers, and an IR remote with capacitive touch.

So far, so good, CES. We'll be looking forward to the press conferences today, and the floor opening on Monday. Until then, keep up with all of our CES 2008 coverage to date.

Syncing with your PC via Wi-Fi, WowWee sees users controlling the Rovio through the internet, cellphones, and yes, even game consoles. What's really promising is that instead of just navigating through your hallways via arm-mounted webcam, you can set waypoints (aka bathrooms) within your house and send your evil minion Rovio there with the click of a button.

The Rovio can also roam your house autonomously, recharging itself at a station ala Roomba. And while LEDs will illuminate your dark, cavernous home with ease, WowWee hasn't gone so far as to offer a decent laser cannon to ward off that prick you inevitably catch boinking your wife.

(On an unrelated note, honey, I may be in Vegas, but I see everything. And I mean everything.

That's right, lest ye think we're dissing the King, I want to state, for the record, that we have the utmost respect for the estate of Elvis Aaron (or was that Aron?) Presley, not to mention a positively drooly reaction to anything coming from the WowWee magic shop. Consider this ringing endorsement of one totally crazy product (yours for only $349.99). [WowWee Alive]

Robosapien to Star on the Silver Screen [Robocommunity]
Related: Robosapien [Gizmodo]

For Valentines, you can even load up a ring on it and ram it into your girlfriend's head as a romantic way of proposing. – Jason Chen

Product Page [Radioshack via Robots Rule via Slashgear]

Product Page [Amazon]

Product Page [Via Bargainist]

The RS Media is able to walk around the house, effectively "seeing" with infrared vision and moving about like an old man in a park feeding pigeons thanks to foot and gauntlet sensors. If the robot "hears" a sound, it will investigate and confront the culprit.

The 22-inch-tall RS Media will go on sale in Australia of all places this October for around $610 in real money. – Nicholas Deleon

The next Robosapien - fully programmable RS Media [gizmag via Shiny Shiny]

WowWee Robotics Home Page [WowWee]

Roboreptile has a new remote control and is very fleet. He can rear up on his hind legs and menace all comers and was also freaking out on the table where they were showing him, Mr. Chimpy, and the full Robosapien family. Roboreptile should be available later this summer—think end of summer—for about $119.99. We attempted to get McChimphead and Roboreptile to fight, but Chimpy's a lover, not a fighter. Punk. – John Biggs

Product Page [WowWee]

The RS Media is by far the coolest new Robosapien to come out of CES. It is essentially an evolved version of the Robosapien V2. It is adding in multimedia hardware options and personality editing software. The RS Media has added stereo speakers to the body and hands, a subwoofer, a SD card slot, and a color LCD screen (equivalent in size and quality of the modern cell phone screen). The personality software allows you to download and create various actions, add sounds, add MP3 music, and choreograph dance routines. They are done with individual profiles also, so one SD card could be the "White Guy Jamming to Journey," while another profile could be "Straight Thuggin' with Tupac." Additionally there is a head-mounted camera for picture and video recording. This Robosapien also has all of the other functions of the current V2 model: IR, voice recognition, movement recognition, bipedal walking, etc. This will be going for around $350 and should be available around November. Check out the other two new Robosapiens after the jump.

The Roboreptile explores the more mobile aspect of the Robosapien line. It uses realistic biomorphic motion and advanced natural dynamics for movement. It has the ability to run at high speeds on four legs, but then can switch over to a slower bipedal movement for other situations. Similar to the other Robosapiens, it uses IR and sonic sensors to prevent reckless running. It can be fully programmed to perform a variety of actions and can also be set in different moods, such as aggressive and defensive/guarding. This will be available in June for around $130.

The P.E.A.BOT is an initial prototype Robosapien that won't be available until early 2007. He is powered by the Segway motion technology and also includes an LCD screen in the head to add personality (I've always wanted a Tony Danza Robosapien Segway, to be honest). It has IR, programmable personality, dynamic arm movement, and even gaming on the LCD screen. Best of all, the P.E.A. BOT included a back-mounted holster perfect for holding cans. Welcome to your new position as my permanent beer-bitch, P.E.A. BOT. Price range is going to be upwards of $200.

Well, we're not going to take it any more. This Robo-cruelty has gone too far.df.sdgfvscxv..lfda;
HELP ITS IN HERE HELP US!EJDDK SEND HELP
The Robopet performs a bunch of cool tricks. Thank you.

Robopet [PCMag]