Once more, to get into a building you have to be able to unlock it by having the right Funkey. Each building generally contains something interesting, quite often a game or challenge. Buildings dot the landscape and you can try and get into them. Many of these are broken or in a state of repair and so will only work with some Funkeys - if you haven't got the right one then you can't get to that location, not at least by that route.Įach area has it's own character and seem to be predominantly populated by one type of Funkey. There are many other Funkeys roaming the world, although with the exception of the tax-collectors your interaction with them is limited.įunkey World is split into a number of sub-worlds that are reached by teleport devices (called portals). You can remove that one at any time and simple insert a different one, your image within the game changes immediately. You appear on the screen as the Funkey that you've placed into the slot on the mother Funkey.
Once your account is created you enter Funkey world. This allows each member of the family and friends to have their own area.
When you first start the software you select a user name and password. I notice looking at the Funkeys web-site there is a USB hub patch, which I hadn't found at the time, so you may find that helps. Hopefully this will be resolved with later versions of the software drivers, but it was infuriating. Connecting through a separate USB hub often failed to recognise the hardware, and connecting directly gave the message "Something is wrong with your Funkey - can you investigate". We also have a number of problems with the Funkey not being recognised by the software. On a very recent machine we had no problems. On another older machine running Windows 2000 everything installed fine and worked, but everything was too slow to be enjoyable, and the software periodically crashed. We had to give up on that machine in the end. On one machine running Windows XP SP2, although the installation said that it had found the Funkey the game itself insisted that it wasn't there.
Install the software and at the appropriate moment plug the mother Funkey into the USB and you should be away. This contains the mother Funkey, two Funkeys and a CD containing the virtual world software. To enter the Funkey world you have to buy a starter kit.
Slide one into a slot in the head of the mother Funkey and it's code is sent to the computer. Each baby Funkey has a set of metal contacts on the base. This acts very much like a card reader - where the little Funkeys are the cards. They do this through a 'mother of all Funkeys' (my name for it) which is much bigger and connects to a spare USB port on your computer. To allow the physical Funkeys to unlock areas of the virtual world on your computer, they must first be able to talk to your computer. The characters act as keys (hence Fun keys) that unlock different parts of the Funkey world. Rarity is important because unlike other virtual worlds you can visit, Funkeys have a manifestation in our world in the form of small plastic collectable characters. Each facial design designates certain characteristics or skills.
For a start it isn't based on the Internet, a big plus if you're worried about just who they are talking to on-line! Instead this make believe world is inhabited by automated Funkeys, strange little people that come in a range of colours and facial designs. My daughter is often to be found travelling various make believe worlds on the Internet, her favourite being Habbo World where she wanders round, buying 'furni' and chatting with friends.įunkeys inhabit a slightly different kind of world. Internet based game worlds are fairly popular these days.