’Toylet’ games make a splash in Japan urinals

Japanese toilets are famed for functions such as posterior shower jets and perfume bursts, but entertainment company Sega has gone a step further by installing urine-controlled games in Tokyo urinals.

'Toylet' games make a splash in Japan urinals

Japanese toilets are famed for functions such as posterior shower jets and perfume bursts, but entertainment company Sega has gone a step further by installing urine-controlled games in Tokyo urinals.

Four types of 'Toylets' games are available to be played during a test period ending this month at four male bathrooms in pubs and game arcades, in a project aimed at drawing attention to digital adverts.

Four types of 'Toylets' games are available to be played at four male bathrooms in pubs and game arcades

Each urinal is fitted with a pressure sensor, and a small digital display is placed at eye level. Digital adverts are shown after the games.

Games include 'Graffiti Eraser' in which a user tries to aim at the pressure sensor in the urinal to erase virtual graffiti on the display.

Or there's Mannekin Pis named after a Brussels fountain depicting a urinating boy which measures the volume of the user's stream.

Another is called The North Wind and The Sun and Me, in which the strength of a urine stream determines the extent to which a virtual girl's skirt gets blown up by a digital wind.

Splashing Battle! pits the user against the previous urinal user in terms of stream strength.

High-tech loos

First-time foreign visitors to Japan are often baffled by the complexity of Japanese high-tech toilets, which feature computerised control panels, usually with Japanese language instructions as well as pictograms.

The Toylets will only be available at limited locations until January 31.

Check-up in Loo
Japanese toilets have long dominated the world of bathroom hygiene with posterior shower jets to perfume bursts and noise-masking audio effects. The latest 'intelligent' model, manufactured by market leader Toto, goes a step further : it offers its users an instant health check-up every time they answer the call of nature. It provides urine analysis, takes the user's blood pressure and body temperature, and measures their weight with an inbuilt floor scale. It can store the data of up to five people and retails for 350,000 to 500,000 yen (Rs 2 lakh to 2.7 lakh) in Japan.