An interactive choose-your-own-adventure superhero, Sphero's Spider-man has mad skills but perhaps lacks staying power.

Sphero started out with an educational focus, building programmable robots like Sphero and Ollie, but these days the gadget maker is more focused on movie tie-ins with cuter faces but less functionality and educational value.

Following in the tyre tracks of the $500 Sphero Lightning McQueen, the $250 Sphero Spider-man falls squarely into the toy category – which isn't in itself a bad thing, but at this price you need to be sure the novelty won't wear off.

Interactive benchtop speakers are clearly the Next Big Thing, now that Apple is jumping on the smart speaker bandwagon with Amazon Alexa and Google Home. If you've spent time with an intelligent speaker then you might be underwhelmed by Spider-man's smarts, but it's important to remember that Spider-man is aimed at little kids, not big kids.

So what does Spider-man do?

He chats away in a voice that sounds a lot like current Spider-man actor Tom Holland, taking your children on interactive adventures, telling jokes or just hanging out and sharing superhero anecdotes.

He's not voice activated like Google Home, you need to press a button on his chest first, which means Spider-man doesn't keep listening all the time and he doesn't send anything up to the cloud for processing. He can also stand guard over your child's bedroom, using his motion detector to ward off intruders with witty one-liners.

Spider-man stands 20cm tall and comes with a charging base, which would sit nicely on a bedside table, and he's good for around two hours off the charger. He's covered in basketball-style rubber and can cope with a bit of rough and tumble, but he's still quite solid and it would hurt if you copped him in the head.

Frustratingly Spider-man is designed with only a single user in mind. You need to choose the child's age, superhero name and special power move when you set him up, which requires an Apple iOS or Android device. There's no way to change the child's age and you can't use the app to create multiple profiles so different children could work through the adventures at their own pace.

At this point Spider-man is sounding like a modern-day Teddy Ruxpin, but less creepy because Spider-man's eyes change but he doesn't have facial expressions. Thanks to WiFi access he can download new content and also let your child choose what happens on their adventures. I had to put on a childish American accent to get him to understand me every time I spoke to him, but my 10-year old daughter had more success.

All talk

The ability for your child to control what happens during their adventures adds to Spider-man's longevity, assuming the novelty doesn't wear off. While Spidey talks a lot, he doesn't actually do much.

Spider-man is aimed at children eight and over, but I'd say he's best suited to slightly younger kids. Much younger than six or seven and some kids won't want to sit still and listen to Spider-man, they'll just want to run around and play with him like a toy.

Some of Spider-man's adventures take advantage of his accelerometer, requiring you to move him around, but it's a shame Spidey doesn't have a "Kapow" sound effects mode. Then little kids could run around making up their own adventures while Spider-man made web-shooting noises and spouted catchphrases.

Meanwhile kids much older than nine or 10 might grow bored with Spider-man after a while, considering that his stories and jokes are quite basic and a little cheesy. You can use a smartphone to choose activities, but nothing interesting happens on the screen.

So what's the verdict?

Considering he'd be a perfect fit for a bedside table, it's surprising that Spider-man can't act as a nightlight, alarm clock, radio or wireless speaker. Nor can he perform even the most basic of Google Assistant-style searches, like asking if it's going to rain today. Any of these features would make Spidey a lot more exciting and useful for children, making it easier to justify the price tag.

As it is, Sphero's Spider-man looks cool but needs to be more of an action man to ensure he doesn't end up gathering dust on the shelf.