Adventures with Avatars

"Who dares to teach must never cease to learn." (John Cotton Dana).

Has anyone tried or used avatars to motivate writing?

Have tried using Voki's to create a character who has lots of adventures, although without prompting, there wasn't a great deal of motivation. Had better success with using a Voki to recite a poem, the idea of creating a virtual character to read out their own poems motivated even the most reluctant writers to have a go. The children seem to like creating their virtual character and to just say a message rather than using it as a stimulus for writing. Although, to even write a mesage 'that can be talked back' they have to use correct spelling and practice typing.