Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

This brings back SO many memories! It is exactly like the Speak & Spell I remember using for hours. Ah, nostalgia! My kids went right to it, and much like me as a kid, like the "Mystery Word" (aka Hangman) game the best. So in that way, it's a hit. I'm sure there's a $0.99 app that would do the same thing - however this will be a cool thing to keep in the car or to pull out when I don't want them lost in the screen time vortex. That being said, I think this needs some updates for today's generation. 1. The keyboard should be QWERTY. In the 70s and 80s, kids wrote the alphabet. Today they are typing in kindergarten, and having the keys in ABC layout is REALLY messing with my kids. Though it's not true to the original, this would be a much better toy if the keys were organized like they are on a typing keyboard. 2. The voice. Argh. I remember being so frustrated with this voice as a kid. You spell what you think it said, and it's wrong. So you repeat-repeat-repeat and try the other thing it might be saying. Nope. Finally it tells you the word and you're like "REALLY?". So the nostalgia is cool for me, but the kids just think it's annoying. I think there should be a toggle switch for the original synthesized voice and then a more "Siri"esque voice that the kids can actually understand. 3. Kids can pick a level: A, B, C, or D. But there isn't really a way to "level-up". It would be awesome if there were a new game mode where kids could earn points, and move up through the levels more like the games they are accustomed to, and to do some head-to-head play games against each other. 4. I think there should be more words. The original Speak & Spell was limited by the technology of the time. There's no reason this one can't have spelling lists from K-12 loaded into it. Heck, it should talk to my laptop and let me enter the week's spelling words to add to the preloaded list. It seems unnecessarily limited. So, bottom line, this is exactly like it was when I was a kid, which is super cool for me. I'd like to see some updates to make it more functional and entertaining for kids today. Edited after more time playing with it: bumped up my rating because my kids are quickly making progress in being able to spell challenging words, and they haven't lost interest. Educational with staying power!