Does controlling a six-legged robot and firing nerf-like darts at other opponents with your Android phone sound cool to you? It did to me so that is why I thought I would review the Combat Creatures Stealth Stryder App-Attacknid. Now you will find a variety of Attacknids from Combat Creatures (from $60 to $130), but the Stealth Stryder App-Attacknid is the only one that allows you to control it with your Android or iOS phone via and app and Bluetooth connectivity. It happens to be a Brookstone exclusive. Are these Attacknids as fun as they sound? Well hit the break to get started.
Design
All the Attacknids have six legs and various colors. This version has an all black finish and is 10-inches tall. You will also find a number of decals in the box to customize your Attacknid the way you want. Each of the six legs have a separate piece they call Exploda-Armor. They easily fall off when pitted in a battle with other Attacknids. Unfortunately they aren't so easy to put back into place.
At the top, you will find the Battle Brain that rotates 360 degrees. This is obviously the “brains” of the Attacknid, and if it gets hit three times (from another Attacknid), your opponent wins and power will shutdown.
Now you can't have a battle without weapons so you will find a Dart Blaster that holds up to 12 Powa-Darts, which are nerf-like. The reel of darts must be placed in the holder perfectly or you will have misfires, but once you get it right, you can elevate your blaster and fire up to 35 feet. Other Attacknids offer the same Powa-Darts, but other variants offer shooting discs.
You will also find a search light on the Battle Brain for aiming at your targets. Unfortunately it's a simple light, not laser-like, and it can't be seen all that well in bright conditions.
Power comes from 4 AA batteries, and for whatever reason, they don't recommend that you use rechargeables.
The Attacknid moves pretty easily and can not only move on carpet or hard floors, it can even move on gravel or through snow. Other than the minor issues I mentioned, it's fairly solid.
Pairing your phone and software
One of the biggest problems with products like these is that developers tend to focus too much energy on the iOS side of things and either ignore Android completely or release a half-baked product for Android. Brookstone is so in bed with iOS that I was pleasantly surprised that Android was even supported. Unfortunately, only the Galaxy S 3, Galaxy S 4, and Galaxy Note II are supported. Now if you're going to only support a few Android devices, I guess that isn't a bad selection since it represents a large market share, but there is absolutely no reason why more devices aren't supported.
The app is getting hammered in the Play Store from confused souls that cannot figure out why they can pair their phone and the Attacknid, but the app doesn't recognize it. The problem lies in that whomever developed the app doesn't understand Android. When you open the app, you need to hit the menu key in order to proceed to pair (or connect) your phone and the Attacknid. Unfortunately they didn't offer a three dot menu key so if your phone doesn't have a hard menu button like Samsung phones, it's impossible to connect to the Attacknid. If they were to just add a standard three dot menu, it would work with just about any Android phone as long as it has Android 4.0 or higher. Unfortunately I didn't have an older non-Samsung phone on me with a hard menu button to test my theory, but I did get my hands on an a Samsung Rugby (which isn't listed as compatible) to somewhat prove my theory that it will work as long as you have a hard menu button, and the Rugby has no problem whatsoever. If you have a Nexus, Moto X, or many other phones that don't have a hard menu key, you are SOL. You will be able to manually pair it via the built-in Bluetooth settings on your phone, but the app won't recognize it. It has to be done through the app, which is tragic. The development team gets a big fat F- from me.
Now that we got that out of the way, once you have a working phone, the controls are pretty straightforward. Most of the other Attacknids (non app controlled) come with a basic remote controller that works over 2.4 GHz. You will have the same exact control as if you had one of the other models, only it's touchscreen.
The left side has the directional controls. By tapping the top, you can move forward (whichever direction the Battle Brain is facing), and by tapping down, you will move backward (the opposite direction of whichever direction the Battle Brain is facing). You can tap to the right to rotate the Battle Brain (and Dart Blaster) clockwise, and tapping to the left will make it rotate counter-clockwise. You can also move diagonally by tapping in between the forward, backward, and rotational controls.
The right side deals with the Dart Blaster. The blue button will elevate your Dart Blaster and the yellow button will lower it. The red button will fire. They also offer a green button that serves two purposes. Pressing it alone will shine a search light showing you where your Dart Blaster is aiming. However, if you press it followed by one of the elevation buttons, it will move the Dart Blaster in smaller increments for further fine-tuning.
Other than just learning how to control the Attacknid, the app itself works great. The buttons work and it always moves in the proper direction. I never had a force close either. The only complaint I have is the developers did a poor job in the making it compatible with most Android phones.
Modes
There are two modes available: Training or Attack. In Training, you basically roam around wherever you want and shoot at things for practice. You can setup your own assault course. The packaging includes five practice cardboard targets ranging from small to large (pictured below). You can set them up in various places in your room or use other things. If you are going to battle another Attacknid, you will want to set it to Battle Mode. In Battle Mode, you will see three lights on the Battle Brain. With each direct hit of your Battle Brain, one light will go out. On the third hit, power will shut down, which means you lose. I am not all that skilled at controlling robots like these, but I think it's actually more fun to play in training mode. You can create your own set of targets at various heights. You can even make a game out of it by giving different point values for each target depending on how small or big they are. The other to consider is how many people will you know that have an Attacknid for you to battle with?
Closing
I think the Attacknids are a blast, but I would think twice about getting this version. Using your phone (assuming you have the right one) is cool, but do you really want to have to pull out your phone every time you want to play with it? It's not going to block phone calls either. I think it makes more sense to buy one of the other models that come with a remote control. The con is that you will need 2 more AA batteries, but if someone else like your kids don't own a phone and want to play with it, he or she won't have to borrow your phone while you are trying to send a Tweet. The other disadvantage is price. This Brookstone exclusive goes for $129 (normally), which is $50 to $60 more than other models. You can but two Attacknids for that price. However, Brookstone has them on sale for $59.99, which is more palatable, but I still would go with another version that offers a remote control. If you really want to control your Attacknid with your phone, than I wouldn't hesitate on this current sale because I have no idea when it will end.
More info: Combat Creatures / Brookstone Sale
