For grown-ups
PlopTots is a wordless town toy for ages 3–5. Your child taps the land and a block drops; a few neighbour rules decide what it becomes. Beside the river it is a boathouse. On top of another block it is a tower, and three high it gets a bell. Three side by side along the street become shops.
A tram rides the street and plays a note for every building it passes, all on a five-note scale, so any street your child builds sounds good. A building two high goes up a little (a fifth); three high goes up a lot (an octave). There is no goal, no score, almost no words and no timer.
Two old ideas sit underneath. Towns grow by neighbour rules: what a building becomes depends on what is next to it, the idea behind Christopher Alexander's A Pattern Language and the town-building toy Townscaper. And the five-note scale is the one Carl Orff's music teaching gave children, because in it no note is wrong.
Sit beside your child and say the space words out loud as they build: on top, beside, between, under, next to, in a row. Ask what they think will happen before a block lands. After a few quiet minutes the town goes to sleep, which is a good moment to stop and print the town as a play mat for real blocks.
This town is your family's Hometown. It is kept on this device. CityForge's The Town can open the same town later, so an older brother or sister can plan the street your child planted. To pass the town on, copy its code below the town; nothing is sent anywhere.
What it never does
- No accounts, no ads, no tracking — anything kept stays on this device.
- No streaks, timers to beat, points to chase or leaderboards.
- No chat, and nothing anyone types is sent anywhere.