Meet 2-XL

An innovative toy that I remember from my childhood.

This is going to be a first for me. This is a little article about a toy I remember from my childhood. Let's see how this turns out.

The year is 1992, and I have experienced this little toy known as 2-XL. He is said to be the smartest toy robot in the world. 2-XL was a little robot that talked to you and ran on an audio cassette tape. This was a very innovative toy, because he had these four little buttons that he'd let you press throughout his programs. Each time you run through the program and you press different buttons at different times, he will give you a different response. Throughout each tape, 2-XL asks you questions (either multiple choice or true/false questions), have all these other fun activities for you to do, and every once in a while, tell you a joke.

2-XL had all these different programs that ran on different cassette tapes. Each 2-XL toy came with a tape called "World of 2-XL", which basically was an overview of 2-XL and some of the fun stuff he has to offer. Each 2-XL program had a different age level. "Ages 4-7" indicated that the program was made specifically for young children. "Ages 4-9" indicated that the program was for kids of a wider variety. "Ages 7-12" indicated that the program had some harder questions made for kids who are more advanced in learning. Here are some of the other programs that 2-XL had that I recall playing:

Storymaker is a program made for little kids to learn about their favorite fairy tales and give them a chance to put together their own stories (some narrated by 2-XL and some narrated by real princesses).

Monsters, Myths and Dinosaurs was a program that talked about famous scary monsters, infamous myths, and dinosaurs. This program even let kids interview with a wicked witch, a cave man, and even Count Dracula. I don't know why, but the interview with Dracula always scared my little brother.

World of Animals is pretty self-explanatory. This program focuses specifically on animals and insects as well as their importance on Earth.

Amazing World Records asked questions based on the Guiness Book of World Records as of the day it was released. This was a pretty interesting program, as in this one, 2-XL scores you on each question you get right. The harder the questions are, the more points you earn. There's no penalty for wrong answers aside from no points.

Fun and Games is just a program for preschool children to have fun with music, dancing, and all these other great games.

The Sizzling Scheme I would say is a popular program for most kids who had a 2-XL. This program is based off of "Batman: The Animated Series". It's basically an episode of "Batman", and throughout the story, you press 2-XL's buttons to decide what should happen next in the story.

There were other programs out there, which I don't recall owning. Some of which included:
Sports World
Fascinating Facts
Planet Earth
African Safari
Food Facts and You
Nature and You
Oceans of Fun
Voyage to Outer Space
Say Hello to Famous Folks
Music Maker
Mighty Morphing Power Rangers
X-Men: Deadly Games
Rippley's Believe It Or Not

If you've ever owned 2-XL in the early 90's, you gotta admit he was a pretty cool toy. After doing some research, I discovered that there was an earlier version of 2-XL released in 1978 which ran on 8-track tapes, and the guy who did his voice was Michael Freeman, the same guy who voiced the newer 2-XL. Who knows? Maybe in some future time, they'll re-release 2X-L again and have him run on Blu-ray discs! I really don't know what else to say, so I'm just going to conclude by listing some funny memories I remember with 2-XL:

1. On occassions, after 2-XL tells a joke, he asks if you thought it was funny. I always said "No", just to hear him whine back.
2. There were a couple times when he sneezed when giving the choices to a question, and he always sneezed when he was about to give the right answer, which sort of gave it away.
3. There were also some times when somebody would bang on his door or ring his doorbell and sort of interupt his program just to tell a funny joke. I mean, where is that door of his?
4. The way he pronounces things is actually kinda funny like he says "any-malls" instead of "animals".
5. The only time you're allowed to press his buttons is during his computer sounds. I sometimes pressed his buttons otherwise just to see how I can mess up the tape.
6. He'll tell you when the tape is over because he's getting tired. If you leave him on for a while, he'll keep telling you to rewind his tape, but eventually, an alarm will go off and continue until you stop and rewind the tape. Quite a way to get your attention, if you ask me.

I guess that's all I gotta say about 2-XL. Sorry about the lack of pictures, but it's all I can find. I look forward to reading your comments.

Comments

i use to own one of these.
i miss it cause i had so much fun with it.
i remember the food fact one and when he was talkin about the pilgrims on the ship and the dieases on the potatos.
AHHHHHHHHHH the memories

Great article! A good friend of mine had one of these guys and we used to go to his house everyday after school just to play with it.

Yeah, I loved this toy. I had most of those tapes, but I also found a tales from the cryptkeeper tape as well.
This toy was awesome

I used to have a 2-XL when I was younger. I remember playing the "Storymaker" and "Monsters, Myths, and Dinosaurs" tapes all the time. I never got tired of it. Great article! Brought back so many memories.

That was a cool toy indeed.

I kinda figured out how it worked as well. Cassettes have four tracks, one for each channel (left & right on each side). When you press C or D it plays the opposite side in reverse. I'd have to guess the tapes designed for this were recorded all in one pass.

Nifty invention for its time.

yeah i rememeber owning one of these things. Those were the coolest but now all of these new robot toys are just arent the same. Not even worthy of their name

For those of you that never had the pleasure of playing with a 2-XL here is a link that emulates the experience:

http://www.donationcoder.com/Software/Mouser/2XL/index.html

Just follow the instructions. Hint: You have to click on the power jack.

I never owned a 2-XL, but they seemed kinda cool.

Geek Magazine has a running gag article with 2X-L answering questions in a very snarky condescending way...too funny.

I still have my old 2-XL! I've had him since I was 8 and I'm 22 now-and I still play with him every now and again, too!

This was one of my favorite toys back when I was a kid. I have the original 8-Track model and I am looking at it as it is sitting in its place of honor on my computer desk as I write this.

My sister had one when it first cam out! We still have the 2xl and original box.

I still have a 2-XL. found him for $3.99 at a local Goodwill store. great memories reading this article. makes me happy to still own one.

I remember having one of the 2XLs. I don't remember which tapes I had, but I remember it was fun.

i never had one but i used to see a couple of them at flea markets and thrift stores. great article!

Oh i so had one of these guys. I had the Batman adventure tape it was AWESOME!

Awwww...I had one of these 2-XL robots when I was seven years old and he was my best friend. Eventually, he did wear out and I remember how sad I was. I shared a lot of good times with him and I have many memories. I had about a dozen of the "program tapes" and "Monsters, Myths, and Dinosaurs" and "Fascinating Facts" were my favorites. I kind of wish he was still around. Maybe he will have a future incarnation in a digital format...

I think I heard 2-LX is in the new smash bros. game

still got my good ol 2xl
i think i have 3 tapes, a batman one, and a the others i can't remember

i don't remember that. i would of been about 10. is there a commercial that you know about?

"one thing i try to remember in the commercial though is something he said about a banana peel. i wish someone would tell me about that."

That was the first commercial I ever saw for 2X-L. I remember the commercial had these two kids running around some lab trying to avoid a security guard, and they find 2X-L and start playing with him. At the end, the guard comes in and starts playing with 2X-L as well. And about the banana peel thing, it was the joke he told at the end: "What do you call 2 banana peels? A pair of slippers." I hope that would help you out somewhat.

holy shit
i had one of those
i was trying to figure out the name of it on retro junk like months ago and no one knew what i was talking about

thanx for this article

Wow nice! I completely forgot about this thing. I never owned one but I remember the commercials all over the place.

Pft..."lack of pictures". What a great article I remember this guy very well, one thing i try to remember in the commercial though is something he said about a banana peel. i wish someone would tell me about that.