THE Official Tamagothi FAQ!!

(Updated bi-centennially, or as the need arises. The last such dire catastrophe occurred on 12-12-98.)
Q. Where can I get a Tamagothi??

A. Unfortunately, The Official Tamagothi Homepage is a result of too much sun (or too little as the case may be). Therefore, Tamagothis don't actually exist. This means that they are not available in any store, online, or through tantric ritual. Sorry. Deal with it.

Q. You lie!! There's an awesome Tamagothi program, made by Berto Alvaro, right here!

A. Oh, you mean THAT Tamagothi! Heh heh... well yes, actually, it is available there, currently in perpetual beta release, but it's still not available in stores. Really.

Q. I own and operate my own huge electronic toy manufacturing company, and have just taken enough psychoactive drugs to believe that Tamagothi toys have the potential to be the next great marketing craze. I want to give you large amounts of money / royalties simply for the rights to the brilliant concept that is Tamagothi.

A. Please contact me. Remember to have a copy of your psychiatric release papers at hand.
Q. In the infinite number of alternate dimensions in which Tamagothi toys are enjoyed by children everywhere, what do they look like?

A. They are little plastic coffins with a screen in the middle, a speaker underneath, and three little buttons.

Q. And what colors do they come in, hypothetically?

A. The original, limited release colors were black, jet, and ebony, with a rare one-in-a-hundred colored onyx. This caused a great deal of confusion among collectors. The first unlimited release came in black with silver trim and crimson buttons, crimson with silver trim and black buttons, silver with crimson trim and black buttons, silver with black trim and crimson buttons, black with crimson trim and silver buttons, crimson with black trim and silver buttons, and an extremely rare, one-in-five-hundred colored avocado. Collectors were extremely displeased.

Q. Just as a reminder, we're talking about alternate universes here, and despite all this Tamagothi electronic toys still don't exist in the real world as we know it, right?

A. Right.

Q. So how do you know all this?

A. I can see through time.

Q. I have discovered a method for traveling sideways through time simply by shaving my body hair into arcane symbols. Therefore, it is possible that I could bring a large shipment of Tamagothis through the boundaries of reality for mass sale in the United States and abroad, and would like to give you large amounts of money simply for the territorial rights to do so.

A. Please contact me telepathically. Be sure to have a copy of your psychiatric release papers on hand.
Q. I am writing you from an alternate universe in which Tamagothi toys are very popular with us youngsters. What I want to know is, how do you know when your Tamagothi is dead?

A. It stops moving.

Q. That's it? No little angel or ghost or rotting corpse or anything?

A. Nope. That's it.
Q. Are you aware of the fact that you misspelled "ephedrine"?

A. Yes.
Q. I inherited a primitive clockwork Tamagothi from an ancestor. i was left a letter explaining how it worked, etc; the last paragraph of this letter mentions "easter egg" functions, where you hold down several of the buttons at once and weird things happen. unfortunately, the last part of the letter has been burned away by the eldritch fires of the damned. how do i get my Tamagothi to produce the mysterious Gothibabe, and how do i get her to take her clothes off? --nikolai

A. What you have is actually a very early variation on the Tamagothi known as a CenoByte. CenoBytes very closely resemble Tamagothis, except they tend to have more piercings and less hair. Unlike Tamagothis, CenoBytes actually did receive a limited distribution, and are still available from certain vagrants and in seedy Moraccan cafes. The "easter egg" feature which your ancestor hinted at is a different version of the "Murphygothi", wherein instead of a little Murphygothi appearing on your screen and singing to you about fish-cakes, a dozen tiny hooks shoot out of the device and imbed themselves in your skin. Unfortunately, this painful little surprise tended to cut down on the "replay value" of the CenoByte, and despite a quick retooling wherein the tiny hooks were replaced by a mechanical vampire spider (reissued as the "CronoByte"), sales continued to rapidly dwindle and our company was forced to sink into torpor, where we stayed until awakened by the "death-rock" band next door, and the incessantly beeping virtual pets in the house across the street.

Q. Okay. What about that naked thing?

A. To make your Tamagothi remove its clothes, simply enter the "Nude Code" from Tomb Raider 2.

Q. What "Nude Code"??

A. I hardly think this is the proper forum in which to discuss such things.
Q. Who is this "Murphy" anyway?

A. Peter Murphy was, and is again (ressurected band! How goth is that!?) the lead singer of the rock band Bauhaus. Most people "in the know" would agree that he is the gothest man alive. Other top contenders for gothest man (or woman) alive include David Bowie, Robert Smith, Siouxsie Sioux, Andrew Eldritch (but only before he suffered a severe head trauma and decided that the Sisters of Mercy needed to sound more like Poison), Danielle Dax, Edward Kaspel (even though noone's ever seen him), Johnny Cash, and Jesus (dead or alive status depending).

Q. Hey! Speaking of Edward Kaspel, you never mentioned the Legendary Pink Dots anywhere! What gives?

A. Well, actually, I couldn't really think of any category the Dots easily fit into, so I thought I'd just mention them here instead.

Q. You know, you didn't mention the majority of the bands on the Cleopatra record label either.

A. You're right. I didn't.
Q. Hey, what's with this strange new rumor that there are two new breeds of Tamagothi, and you've started work on a sequel project?

A. You mean the rumor that I just started by posting this question?

Q. Umm... yeah.

A. Poke around. I'm sure you'll turn up something.
If you have a question about Tamagothis and/or the Official Tamagothi Homepage, then it's far far too late for me to do anything about it, and you should seek psychiatric help.
If you have questions about the Tamagothi Shockwave Game, please send them to skarblade@gothic.net instead, since he wrote the thing and I have no idea how it works. Thanks!