Lego crams an ASIC in a brick to keep kids interested

Not even Legos are safe from the inexorable march of smart technology, as the Danish construction toy stalwart introduced a new tech-in-a-brick Smart Play system at CES this week.  Lego brick sets based around Smart Bricks will be packed with things like light and motion sensors, a speaker, lights, a wirelessly rechargeable …

[Sudosu]

COOOOL!

I would have loved these when I was a kid!

Had the mixed multi-color bin of Legos as a hand me down, but I also got some space Lego as a kid which I actually reassembled last year from instructions I found online (and after fishing out all the fancy grey, blue and transparent pieces from said bin)

When we were 10 or so we bought LED's, resistors, switches and some wire from Radio Shack and built all kinds of battery operated lighting solutions for our creations.

Space Lego Hack - We used sharpies to color the backs of the space figurine's heads so you could rotate them and have a full tint visor in their helmets.

[Joe W]

Nah...

Bring back mindstorms! That stuff was flexible, and now I have an excuse to buy it.

This stuff? Seems not very flexible in the sense of allowing us to do our own stuff with it. It's the ongoing playmobilification of Lego: bigger stupid parts, lots of oh-so-special parts. No, it's not a new trend, but I'm still annoyed.

[Pascal Monett]

Re: Nah...

I will join you there.

I used to have a litteral barrel-full of LEGO bricks of all sorts. I could build planes, spaceships, warehouses, police cars, motorbikes, castles, fire stations, moon bases (yes, I had six moonbase tiles in addition to the dozen regular road tiles) - you name I could do it.

A few years ago, my (at the time) 9-year old nephew was thrilled when he got the Saturn rocket kit for XMas. He spent XMas morning building it, and I was on-hand to oversee the project.

And once it was done ? Well, there isn't much else you can do with it, now is there ?

Once upon a time, LEGO kits were sold with an included manual that showed you how to build the kit as sold, but also included ideas of what else you could build with the pieces included.

That time is gone. You buy a Star Wars A-Wing and you won't build anything else but an A-Wing. It will take a large collection of Star Wars kits to be able to even start thinking of a new something to do with all those specific, specialised pieces.

That makes me sick. LEGO has become the domain of grown-ups who used to have imagination and are now happy to buy the latest, piece-specific set of their dreams. Never mind that their imagination will server them no more, they're just happy to have an X-Wing, a Tie fighter and a Millenium Falcom on their shelves, never to be used for anything but gathering dust.

Pathetic.

[that one in the corner]

Re: Nah...

You are being a bit bleak.

True enough, there are a lot of different "makes one model" sets being released, and these do grab headlines. And the adult dollars. If you go into a LEGO store, those are the ones they want you to see (you being an adult and all that) and see them you will.

But the "Creator 3-in-1" sets are quite popular and get across the idea of "these bricks can be rearranged" whilst still having some good looking models.

And there are plenty of places online that encourage you to make different models.

> That time is gone

There are always good old-fashioned "Classic" sets around, a box/bucket/supersized-2x4 full of, well, classic parts and a book(let) with dozens or more of build ideas. Those never went away. And the Klutz books are all about reusing the parts.

I've bought random LEGO from charity shops more than once (too often, really) and the mishmash of parts from different sets* still left joined together as they were last used says that imaginative play is still alive. And what they do to minifigures is horrifying!

* it is all too obvious when you see the colourful shades from "Friends" sets mixed in with, yes, the greys and blacks of "Star Wars"! If the Empire had made their craft in pastels they might have fared better.

[BartyFartsLast]

Re: Nah...

I think that's as much the stores which stock Lego as the company itself.

They still sell the "basics" sets but finding them outside a well stocked toy store is rare and even in those stores the themed, licensed sets take prime shelf space because brand/franchise recognition sells.

It all boils down to companies making stuff they know will sell but I do like seeing (and have bought as gifts) the "box of bricks" unthemed stuff with fond memories of just building stuff from my imagination

[werdsmith]

Re: Nah...

The Lego of my childhood was even more flexible. A great box of different size bricks, tiles, bases and window/door pieces. I don't think it was ever intended to be anything apart from what I wanted it to be.

I would stretcher bond my way to many variations on bizarrely multi-coloured robust buildings.

[that one in the corner]

Long term support and/or SDKs

Are rarely, if ever, in LEGO Groups' vision.

They have a history of just forgetting all about products as soon as the new shiny comes along. Various generations of Mindstorms and motor systems are kept alive by hobbyists because the physical objects do actually last, unlike the support.

The current generations are dependent upon mobile phone apps (of course they are) with few, if any, signs to the average builder that they could use the bricks & motors in a new arrangement and still be able to control it. Great way to encourage rebuilding and imagination. Plus the obvious fear that those apps will quietly vanish. Hope you enjoyed your app-enhanced "Hidden Side" or "Vidiyo"; "Dimensions" isn't totally dead yet, as you got a physical DVD for your console.

On the positive side, if you happen to be a computing/electronics hobbyist, you will find some hardware that you can get working; if you can find someone who isn't insisting that theirvstuff is "collectable" and demanding a daft price for it! Probably better off getting "compatible" motors etc from Ali Express - and retailers if you avoid the souk - as they use the older, simpler, connectors and play well with all the normal microcontrollers. Connecting those to dumb plastic pieces gets the creative juices flowing.

[leadyrob]

Repeat after me...

Lego not Legos

Lego not Legos

Lego not Legos

Lego not Legos

Lego not Legos

...

[Fpaolini]

Re: Repeat after me...

Are you the chief wizard at the defcon in London around 2yrs ago?

[David 132]

Re: Repeat after me...

No, you’re thinking of the female elf who plays with bricks, Legolass.

[Sudosu]

Re: Repeat after me...

Not to be confused with the poor Elf who has no Lego (there I took the "s" off) Legoless.

[Throatwarbler Mangrove]

Re: Repeat after me...

Obviously, both are wrong, and it's "Legoes."

[Fruit and Nutcase]

Re: Repeat after me...

It's... LEGO

Ref: LEGO Fair Play policy.

Proper Use of the LEGO Trademark on a Web Site

If the LEGO trademark is used at all, it should always be used as an adjective, not as a noun. For example, say "MODELS BUILT OF LEGO BRICKS". Never say "MODELS BUILT OF LEGOs

https://www.lego.com/en-us/legal/notices-and-policies/fair-play

[werdsmith]

Re: Repeat after me...

Remove that ridiculous S from the end of Lego and stick where it belongs on the end of Maths.

[Dan 55]

Re: Repeat after me...

Indeed, Lego is uncountable, like the number of ways USAians commit crimes against the English language.

[that one in the corner]

Re: Repeat after me...

LEGO is most definitely uncountable.

Every time you get the box out, there is a different number of pieces - look, see, I *said* there were more blue bricks! We could have finished making that waterfall last week. But where has that green cheese piece gone this time?

[ParlezVousFranglais]

Re: Repeat after me...

Someone put that green cheese piece back in your Trivial Pursuit box with the other 5...

[Ikoth]

Re: Repeat after me...

The plural of Lego is Lego. Same as with sheep. Oh wait...

[John Brown (no body)]

Re: Repeat after me...

All my sheeps agree. I checked with each of them.

[Notas Badoff]

Say it again!

So when they come out with a Han Solo figure, and you put it next to Leia, the Tie-fighter pipes up with "I know" ? Cuz Han's been frozen in carbonite, again?

[Slow Joe Crow]

What a descent from Mindstorms which was a full on microcontroller that could do something more useful than make noise

[segfault188]

flushing it away

"You might hear our SMART Brick roaring like a jet plane or flushing like a toilet,"

The best thing to do with a Smart Brick is to flush it down the toilet. That way it can't spy on you. </paranoid mode>

[martinusher]

Re: flushing it away

I think the brick is safe enough but there's bound to be a companion 'app' somewhere that ties you to the Lego Mothership and keeps it informed about you and your world. Its also safe to assume that the protocol tying bricks together is likely to be secure and DMCA's so there's no chance that anything you make can (legally) become part of the set. (Your first, and only duty, is that of a consumer.)

[Chris Gray 1]

May well be quite successful

All of this is my opinion - I have no inside contacts at Lego.

1) These are in no way intended to be replacements for Mindstorms or PowerUp. They are greatly improved replacements for the 2x3 light and sound bricks that Lego has been using for years.

2) If you read the article by Lego (https://www.lego.com/en-ca/smart-play) you can find some history of how these were developed. The "chip" inside the 2x4 brick (*NOTE* Lego pieces are described via (short dimension) X (long dimension) (optional X height), just like lumber, plywood, and other construction materials) is an ASIC, not a fancy CPU with lots of RAM and Flash.

3) They are intended to make kid's play more interesting and exciting. They are *NOT* intended for computer geeks. Lego fans might get some if they are interested. I'll likely buy one set just to play around with, but that'll be it - I'm not the target audience.

4) Geeks might buy some to strip the parts out of the SmartBrick, and sell the Lego pieces.

5) The protocol between the ID tiles (2x2x1/3 with no studs) and active minifigs, and the SmartBrick could be released, or geeks will figure it out. That'll likely allow things like different sounds and light patterns.

6) The choice of initially going with Star Wars makes good sense. That theme has some highly recognizeable sounds - lightsaber, TIE fighters, wookie calls, etc.

7) These are an excellent answer to what Lumibricks does (I have the Ore Factory and love it), but what you could do with this new SmartBrick system is going to raise things to another level.

[Jellied Eel]

Re: May well be quite successful

..wookie calls, etc.

Now there's an idea. Proximity sensor that can detect a foot approaching, or pressure sensor to play wookie waaagh after it's been trodden on. Make lego minefileds safe again. But curious what hackers will be able to make them do, which I suspect is 'not much' and the ASICs won't be much smarter than the ones glued inside cards.

[Natalie Gritpants Jr]

Re: May well be quite successful

"an ASIC, not a fancy CPU with lots of RAM and Flash"

ASICs thee days have plenty of room for multiple CPUs, RAM and flash. I assume LEGO have only made one ASIC and its behaviour is stored in some form of non-volatile memory when it's inserted in the brick, or programmed over the air.

[Yorick Hunt]

I wonder...

... If we could re-code the sound effects with snippets from Adult Swim's take on Star Wars?

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: I wonder...

some cool inspiration starting at 3:30 with "toilet sounds" ... plus all sorts of "being thrown" and like sound effects ... good pick! ;)

[petef]

Wot no AI?

[that one in the corner]

Clearly you have never stepped on a LEGO brick going downstairs in the morning:

Aaaaaaa-iiiiiiii yai-yai-yai

[Neil Barnes]

this aging Vulture screams

And this aging commentard... sometime in the last year, as she approached the grand old age of fifteen, granddaughter disposed of her childhood lego.

Less lego, and more legone...

[David 132]

Re: this aging Vulture screams

There comes a time to lego of childish things.

[Anonymous Coward]

6 going on 60

I still have LEGO from when I was 6 years old. The motor set that my uncle bought for me when I was 9 is still working. I am nearly 60.

I bought the Concorde set from a couple of years ago as a birthday present for my Sister. She's over 60!

Keeps the grey-matter functioning in the latter years

[David 132]

Re: 6 going on 60

Same here, albeit with slightly less impressive numbers. I, who will not see 50 again, currently have on my desk in front of me the 8860 Car Chassis kit that I built circa 1981, and the 8865 Test Car that I built just a handful of years later. Also various self-designed cars from 82-89.

And for a birthday recently, relatives bought me the Chevrolet Corvette kit. It took me a lot longer to build than it would have done back in my prime, I tell you!

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: 6 going on 60

OP here.

For Christmas, I bought my Brother's grand kids LEGO sets and a Rubik's Cube (age 8+). The elder one is 7, and apparently keeps solving the thing without much effort/time

[Anonymous Coward]

Proof reading?

"Smart Legos"

Did anyone proof read this before publication?

[Sudosu]

Re: Proof reading?

Do the ASIC's run LegOS?

[drankinatty]

So much for pure imagination...

Back in the day, way back in the day, you had Lego, Tinker Toys, green army men and Lincoln logs. There was no end to what you could make. There were no blocks saying "'I only do a handful of things", you had singles, doubles and if you got the fancy sets, you had the thin zero-thickness blocks that came in many different sizes (basically for serving as bases to longer spans, where you may have a door or other opening that spanned up to three double-blocks. The point being, what you did with any of the toys was what came from unbridled imagination. The things you now basically have to spoon-feed children to develop. There were many of the best toys that didn't even come as toys. A safety-pin and pillow case, and you were superman, batman or whatever hero you wanted to be :)

Having been raised in the no-tech time, and having raised children spanning the no-tech to lots-of-tech times, I'm not certain "tech" adds anything to these type of toys or the toy experience. Sure, there are all tech games, like the video games, that matured from basic Doom to console gaming system during the time I raised my kids, and those were supposed to provide the adventure. But with physical toys to be played with, I'm not sure that the tech doesn't detract from the imagination. I mean you certainly wouldn't want to light the smart blocks and green army men on fire to pretend the dripping plastic from the sacrificial soldiers were incoming artillery (with the super-cool swhoosh the flaming balls of green plastic made as they dropped off the soldier raining down on the enemy fort below :)

I guess if the 4x2 smart-block has an "Incoming" mode - then it just maybe could add to the battlefield creations. Tech-in-toys is hard to do and find the balance between Lego still be Lego, instead of being transformed into an erector-set with odd noises... There probably all made from flame-safe compounds today any way....

Since my kids are long out of the house, I'll have to rely on those still in the fray for feedback.

[Neil Barnes]

Re: So much for pure imagination...

See also Meccano... Lego taught me about interlacing rows of bricks so the house didn't fall down; Meccano taught me how to build a car, or a truck, or a plane, or a rock crawler, or a roundabout, or...

(And I do wonder how these little lego thingies are recharged... I'm seeing a convenient box with a coil of wire around it; drop 'em in, pull charged up ones out of the bottom?)

[nobody who matters]

Re: So much for pure imagination...

"And I do wonder how these little lego thingies are recharged.."

They use an induction charger,

A brief article about the Lego Smart system can be found on the lego website: https://www.lego.com/en-gb/smart-play/article/innovation.

Despite the misgivings of some people, and remembering my own days of Lego (back in the 60s when Lego was still pretty basic), I think the effect of these Smart Bricks will be mainly positive - I would have loved to have had them when I was a child - would have saved hours of trying to make silly noises.......or perhaps children not learning to make the noises themselves is the downside ?

[Jason Bloomberg]

Re: So much for pure imagination...

I think the effect of these Smart Bricks will be mainly positive - I would have loved to have had them when I was a child - would have saved hours of trying to make silly noises

That's what I am thinking too. I can't see any real downsides. I had construction toys as a kid but never Lego and I have always considered it over-priced. But I did have a die-cast push along ambulance that went 'nee-nah' and I loved that. It enhanced rather than limited my playing and imagination as it ferried the forty-foot action figure to the bunker under the coffee table.

This is just a better and more flexible version of that IMO. As far as I can tell the sensor bricks are just 'dumb peripherals' sending detection signals back to a master brick which sends 'play this' commands back so could be very useful beyond Lego. We'll likely find out more once someone sets about reverse engineering them with their Raspberry Pi.

[Sudosu]

Re: So much for pure imagination...

The only reason, as a kid, that I liked Lego for over Mecchano was that Lego creations could be more rapidly disassembled in mock battle conditions.

This was mostly accomplished by dropping or throwing them into each other while making explosion sounds (which can now be done by ASIC apparently)

[that one in the corner]

Re: So much for pure imagination...

> There were no blocks saying "'I only do a handful of things"

Ah, now there is that lack of imagination.

"The Thing" nowadays is to look for and give praise to the use of the supposedly "overly specific" and "only good for one thing" parts in creative ways: NPU or "nice part usage". The number of places that minifigure roller skates and iceblades turn up in "a galaxy far, far away" is legion. Or the infamous bonsai tree full of frogs.

Yes, there are parts, especially in the 4+ range, that are both quite large and glaringly single-use, such as the nose of an aircraft. But then any decent 4 year old is going to find a way to use it (could make a hat, or a brooch or a pterodactyl).

LEGO almost killed itself by going too far down the "parts specific to one set" route, but nowadays even the big flashy kits that are being complained about here do contain plenty of examples of NPU coming directly from the company's own designers.

Not that I believe TLG is in any way perfect: as noted above, they have a pretty bad track record with adding in bits of tech (especially killing off Mindstorms, just after they'd totally separated the for-schools Spike range from Mindstorms, making it pointlessly hard and expensive to get a kit for home that matches the one at school, letting the youngster carry on with their ideas from class; made worse by the way the Spike kits are very much "here is an assortment of parts in odd colours, go for it" whilst the home kits were definitely styled for "make just these designs and once you have put the stickers on they will look stupid if you try going your own way" - yup, Bad Part Usage there).

As for these new parts - I'll reserve judgement until I've seen them in the wild, probably at the next LUG show at Shildon in November.

[John Brown (no body)]

Re: So much for pure imagination...

"The number of places that minifigure roller skates and iceblades turn up in "a galaxy far, far away" is legion."

Like the Star Wars Holiday Special on Ice? :-)

[Mage]

Re: Not even Legos

It's Lego.

Please.

Never ever Legos.

[Natalie Gritpants Jr]

Hope LEGO realize what will happen if progamming these things becomes public

Porn. It's always porn

[J.G.Harston]

Wots a legos? Do I need it to operate my knees?

[BartyFartsLast]

Nice

But, shame it's an ASIC, it would be awesome if it were actually some sort of ARM or RISC-V core that's hackable with no or relatively little effort.

I guess time will tell