Meet your monster

That pesky, eerily buffed-up animated Ray Winstone has ruined it for us.

Yes, thanks to the glossy new Beowulf movie, we can't lay eyes on the words 'Moshi Monster' without putting on a medieval Cockney growl and bellowing, "Ov come ter - um - adopt yorr MONSTA". Still, it's hard not to coo over this fluffy new virtual world thingy - harder even than it is to imagine Ray in pink fluffy slippers.

Moshi Monsters is the latest bit of cleverness to issue forth from Mind Candy, who brought you the thoroughly baffling multimedia global treasure hunt Perplex City. It's mainly for wee 'uns but since it's at the beta testing stage - something little Astrid just wouldn't understand, no no - you've got the perfect excuse to go and tinker with it yourself. For research purposes (we're pros, we are) we adopted our own beastie, a shaggy pink sasquatch-type chap called a Furi. We gave him some ice cream. He said "Yum!". We tickled him. He wriggled most gratifyingly. And now we've regressed completely and cannot tie our own shoes. Halp.

You or the tiny person in your life can join by getting a secret code from one of the MoPods available from the site or Firebox. Just remember not to over-tickle, or tantrums may ensue, and you will know about it.