Frying things just makes them brownish, for example, so frying an egg doesn’t actually result in anything that resembles a fried egg. In Toca Kitchen the choices are too limited, and they’ve skimped on the graphics: the results look dull. I’ve found these somewhat disappointing – they sound like more fun than they actually are. Cut, blow dry, comb, wash, colour hair chop, fry, boil, mince food. Toca Hair Salon and Toca Kitchen are two of a kind – you get some materials and can perform some actions on them. Updates to the app have brought new varieties of each body part, as well as new mazes, so Ingrid keeps returning to this app. When the robot is done you can fly it through a simple maze to pick up gold stars. The graphics are well made and fun to look at: the robots can have arms with propeller attachments and a body like a fridge.

But the app is 5 seconds away whereas setting up a tea party with real toy plates and cups takes time, so Ingrid is infinitely more likely to use the app than the real thing.Ī bit similar is Toca Robot, where you build a robot by picking body parts for it. Of course you could play those things without an app, with actual physical items – and we have. The customer picks items to buy, counts up the coins, puts the stuff in their bag.

The shopkeeper chooses which items to sell, sets their prices, rings up the items on the till. One person takes the role of shopkeeper, the other is the customer. Then there’s Toca Store, which is sort of similar but more clearly meant to be played together. I believe that kids are supposed to invite their stuffed animals to the tea party but Ingrid usually plays with me instead. These have great multi-touch support and work very well for several players. There’s Birthday Party and Tea Party, where you start by setting a table, choosing plates and cakes, and then proceed to eat the cakes and drink the tea and lemonade.

Toca robot