Sony’s Aibo Robot Is Done Playing Dead

There’s a new version of Sony’s fabled friend. Welcome back, Aibo.

The artificially intelligent bot was ahead of its time when it was first introduced in 1999, but now it’s got a lot of competition. Sony claims the new Aibo can form an emotional bond with family members, and replicates many actions of a real dog. It’s similar to the Jibo robot, which claimed to be the “world’s first social robot for the home," or Pepper, the four-foot humanoid robot.

Aibo is a definite upgrade from earlier versions, which can now gather data to adapt to its environment. But this time around, it will have to work much harder to become man’s best bot friend.