Alarmo is... Interesting

AI-Generated Summary (TL-DR):

The Nintendo Sound Clock: Alarmo is a straightforward alarm clock that offers a unique feature set, including alarm sounds from five popular Nintendo games. Setup is easy, allowing users to configure the date, time, and sensor settings based on bed size and distance from the clock. The alarm functions with a gentle sound that escalates, and it features a fanfare when the user gets up. However, some initial issues with the alarm dismissing prematurely were attributed to user error during sensor configuration. The selection of alarm sounds is limited, and navigating through options can be cumbersome, especially with the potential for more games in the future. Despite these drawbacks, the Alarmo is praised for its volume and effectiveness in waking users. Notably, it does not require a smartphone for setup, making it accessible for users without one and ensuring functionality even after potential discontinuation by Nintendo. The device is considered repairable, adding to its long-term viability. Overall, the reviewer highly recommends Alarmo, viewing its $100 price as justified by its features and reliability.

I wasn’t expecting to have a lot to say about the Nintendo Sound Clock: Alarmo alarm clock. It’s actually a pretty simple device once you have it set up, but it’s simplicity may be both it’s greatest strength and it’s biggest flaw.

Setting it up is pretty simple: You set the date, time, alarm, and alarm sound. Among the alarm sounds comes with multiple options featuring five games: Super Mario Odyssey, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, Pikmin 4, Splatoon 3, and Ring Fit Adventure. You have the option to choose any of the sounds, you can have a selection of sounds for a given game selected at random, or you can randomize all the options given.

During this setup, you will also be asked to set the sensor. This is quite simple — it asks what size bed you have (Full, or “Queen or King”) and it will ask you where the clock is positioned, and how far away it is from the bed in 4-inch segments, up to 20 inches. You can measure this using the Measure app on your iPhone, or an equivalent app on Android, if you need to. Once set, you will be asked to move away from the sensor zone so that it can make sure nothing is moving within that zone that shouldn’t be.

Once set, you can connect Alarmo to your WiFi and log in to your Nintendo Account. From there, you can press the “Download More Alarms” button, and configure the system to get the time and date from the internet (I think I could have done this before, though).

In fact, there’s quite a few settings in the settings app on Alarmo. This is where you’d set the various Volume levels, modify the sensor zone, the Screen Brightness, the Dial LED, etc.

All of this is controlled by that giant white dial on top of the alarm clock. You can spin it to make your selection, and press it in to confirm your selection.

So all of that is great, but what happens when it’s actually time for Alarmo to.. well, alarm? It’s pretty much exactly how Nintendo describes the alarm should work. It makes a gentle sound at the beginning, and after a few seconds a “visitor” arrives to make the alarm *really* sound. As you move, the visitor gets quieter and quieter until it gets back to the gentle sound, and when you get up, it plays a fanfare. If you get back in bed within an hour, the alarm will sound all over again.

This doesn’t work absolutely perfectly, but I’m open to the idea that some of these discrepancies come down to user error. This is especially true since… well, I actually did experience one major issue that ultimately came down to user error:

The alarm simply did not work the first two days.

That is to say, as soon as the alarm went off, it would near-instantly dismiss, playing that fanfare. The first night, I assumed I simply didn’t hear it because I only had around three hours of sleep. Then the second night, I actually woke up before the alarm clock was set to go off. This was how I knew something was up. It was immediately dismissing itself, and struggled to tell that I was still in bed.

Why was this happening? It’s quite simple. I misconfigured the sensor zone. I told Alarmo that I had a full-size bed, when in reality I have a queen-size bed. Oops.

But this does present one of my complaints that I have about Alarmo: I should have been able to catch this during setup. That is to say, part of the setup should have been to run a test alarm. It should have had me enter into my bed, and then after a minute or two, run an alarm. That way I could test if it was detecting my movements properly. But this option simply isn’t present.

There’s also the issue of… actually selecting the sound. You see, if you want to select a sound from… say, Pikmin 4, you have to scroll through all the sound options from both Super Mario Odyssey and Breath of the Wild. Imagine in the future when there are more alarm options for more games. Imagine if they added options for The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom, Super Mario Party Jamboree, Mario & Luigi: Brothership, and Donkey Kong Country Returns? What about Super Mario Bros. Wonder, WarioWare: Move It, Pokémon Scarlet and Violet, and more? You’d think the alarm selection would have you choose the game, and then show you all the sounds available for the game?

In fact, given the extensive library of games on the Nintendo Switch, the fact that there are only five games available feels… kind of lacking. Remember when I said there was a button to “Download More Alarms”? Well, you’d think this would open up some sort of online shop where you can choose a wide range of games to download to your system. But no, there isn’t. Instead, this button just runs a software update. When Nintendo releases more sounds, this button will just download all of them.

So, I mean, of course there are only five games available at this time. Any more might make this selection way too cumbersome. This is something Nintendo is going to have to change sooner, rather than later.

Indeed, it’s also quite weird that two of the games listed are… kind of old. We get Super Mario Odyssey, but not Super Mario Bros. Wonder? We get Breath of the Wild, but not Tears of the Kingdom or Echoes of Wisdom?

By this logic, the other options would be Splatoon 2 and Pikmin 3 Deluxe, but instead, they make the logical choice of giving us the more recent Splatoon 3 and Pikmin 4.

And why is Ring Fit Adventure in here? Yes, it’s a good game, but it seems to me like a pretty random choice. Why not Everybody 1–2-Switch? Why not Snipperclips? Why not Hyrule Warriors? Why not Mittopia? Bayonetta? Metroid? Pokémon? Kirby? Detective Pikachu?

Overall, I am pretty happy with this purchase. Despite its flaws, it’s the loudest alarm clock I have ever had. I’ve been looking for something to replace my iPhone alarm, since it’s been running silent for many mornings for some time. My Google Home Mini has been alright, but this looks like it’s going to be more successful at waking me up. Never mind the fact that it has the built-in option to change the sound that plays each morning!

Even if I ultimately end up disabling the sensor-based features in the future, this alone is likely going to make this alarm clock worth it. Getting up in the morning is the second hardest part of my day, next to going to sleep at night.

And it does actually come with an hourly chime if you want it. It does have sleep sounds, but I find silence to be more effective for me, I’ll likely disable this one in the future.

If there’s one thing that I massively appreciate about Alarmo more than anything, it’s the fact that it doesn’t require a smartphone to set up. This is huge for me! A standalone internet-connected device that doesn’t require me to pull out my iPhone just to get it working.

This isn’t huge because I’m unwilling to use my iPhone for setup. In fact, I really wish this was available as an option. Rather it’s huge for two major reasons:

1. This alarm clock can be used by those who choose not to have a smartphone
   
2. This alarm clock is guaranteed to be perfectly functional after Nintendo decides to discontinue it
   

Remember Spotify’s Car Thing? This was a device that would connect to your smartphone to interface with the Spotify app. It was a massive commercial failure. As a result, it’s obvious Spotify isn’t gonna want to continue supporting it. They had the option to push a software update to turn this into a generic Bluetooth speaker with a neat user interface. Instead, they decided that after December 9th, all Car Thing devices are simply going to stop working.

This is something that concerns me every time a new smart device is released that really seems like it can improve my own lifestyle. There are a lot of these devices that I would love to integrate into my household. Nest Thermostats, Philips Hue Smart Bulbs, even the Level Lock+. But how do I know these devices will continue to work long into the future, when the respective companies either discontinue the devices, or stop existing?

This even goes into why I purchase my Nintendo Switch games physically instead of digitally. If you purchase your games digitally, Nintendo can take them away from you at any time. But a physical copy will always belong to you, as long as you don’t duplicate it and then sell it secondhand (a major problem to be discussed in another day).

I don’t have to worry about any of this with Alarmo. I never had to connect this thing to WiFi if I didn’t want to. Everything works perfectly fine totally offline. And that’s wonderful! Because this device will be discontinued in the future — whether it’s 10, 20, 50, or even just 5 years, it’s an inevitability. Nintendo will stop supporting this thing at some point. And that’s okay. Because this device does not need Nintendo’s support in order to function. From what I’ve seen in videos, this thing isn’t even all that hard to open up if you know what you’re doing. I’ll update this post when more information comes out about this, but this feels like a pretty repairable device, something that has been lacking in the tech space for some time.

Would I recommend you get this alarm clock? This is a resounding YES. The $100 price tag may seem steep at first, but the volume of the alarms, repairability, and the confidence that this will continue to work even after Nintendo ends support for this device makes that price tag more than worth it. Even if you do not want the sensor-based features, that’s fine, you can turn this off! If all you need is a loud alarm clock, and like the idea of hearing your favorite Nintendo sounds in the morning, this is a product worth considering.

Stay Safe, and Keep Exploring!

Originally posted on Screenbones Stories.