For my final project, I want to create a physically interactive AI Tamagotchi. A mini robot creature that the user can pat, touch, hold, and communicate with, but which responds in unexpectedly pessimistic ways. The project combines physical interaction through Arduino sensors with a character AI conversational system and visual interface built in p5.
I recently got obsessed with Tamagotchi, which is a small handheld digital pets that require constant attention: need users feed them, clean up after them, and respond to their needs. Tamagotchis reward human care with affection or happiness, but with the growing cultural anxieties around automation and AI as well as environmental destruction caused by human behavior, I want to imagines this project in a future in which artificial no longer need, or even want, human caretaking.
The final project would be a mini physical pet built with neopixels and sensors(e.g., force sensor, knob) to react (e.g., twitch, turn away, glow, flash) when touched. Users interact with it through force sensors, knobs, and touch inputs connected to an Arduino. The p5 interface displays a larger animated avatar of the creature and handles generative dialogue and visual responses.
However, unlike typical virtual pets, this creature is intentionally negative and pessimistic toward the user.
- When patted, it snaps: “Go away, you silly little human.”
- When fed (via knob input), it complains: “Ugh, you call this food?”
- When left alone too long, it becomes sarcastic: “Finally. Peace without humans.”
Using an AI API, the creature can answer user questions and hold brief conversations, but it always maintains a consistent disrespectful personality, reflecting a world where robots might question human motives, or judge the damage humans have done to the environment.