The studio is always working on three new apps (actually four right now) and it doesn’t use any in-game advertising or in-app purchases. That quality control is especially important for Toca Boca, which only has genuinely free and paid-for apps in its large and constantly growing catalog. That was the reason why Helicopter Taxi had to go. It was a bit nostalgic, but I think it was the right thing to do.” “We just need to make sure that the quality is consistent across all our products - not just the products that are coming out but the old ones as well. “Everything is the latest to a kid or a parent in the App Store,” said Jeffery. Helicopter Taxi was still performing OK, and some kids really liked it, but it was starting to show its age. Recently, Toca Boca pulled its first ever app from sale. The same goes for girls who want to play with cars (or robots). “If a boy wants to play with Toca Hair Salon because he thinks it’s good fun, I don’t want to make a product that deters him from that,” he adds. “I’m effectively doubling my market, in theory at least, if i can sell an app to both boys and girls,” says Jeffery. But it’s a decision that also makes commercial sense.
Wrapping apps in a gender-neutral context and letting kids decide what they want to play - based on the merits of the apps themselves - is what Toca Boca is trying to do. “After we did that, it actually performed much better,” says Jeffery. The robots, it turned out, were just too stereotypically boyish, made from things you’d typically find in a tool shed - now, kids can make them out of more general household items like sweets, beads, coffee cups, and pencils. It’s constantly making decisions to maintain this neutrality, using a checklist to formalize the process, and it even had a third-party audit of existing apps that resulted in a redesign for Toca Robot Lab. Toca Boca takes a deliberately gender-neutral approach in all of its apps. It’s a very humbling process.” Gender neutrality “If they don’t like it, they’ll just leave and play with something else.
“Kids can be pretty harsh critics,” said Jeffery. And kids continue to play a part as the apps take shape, acting as playtesters and critics.
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