Then it does ... something with that information.
From the promo it almost looked as if that data was fed to an LLM that could then generate an audio response that fits to the play scene. Something like "You are a <Lego Star Wars minifigure>. You are <sitting> in a <vehicle: air plane>. The vehicle is <turning along the Z axis>. What do you say?" (Where the stuff inside the brackets is inferred from the nearby beacons and the rest would be a fixed prompt template)
But that would require the bricks to have an internet connection, and I have no idea if that's the case.
It's still a neat toy, but way oversold.
https://www.les-archives-de-joe.net/article-108-lego-espace-...
Except now it has an accelerometer too, and the sounds are more than just a siren, so your spaceship can make a swoosh noise when you fly it around. This is what we wanted.
It definitely doesn't look like it's aspiring to be the programmable environment that Mindstorms was. There may be a way for a tech enthusiast to make custom smart cards and logic, but I wouldn't count on it. Would be happy to be proven wrong.
>proprietary Neighbour Position Measurement (NPM) system uses precision copper coils to let LEGO SMART bricks sense distance, direction, and orientation between multiple LEGO SMART Bricks.
Until it can trigger motors it doesn't feel super exciting to me.
Hoping there will be an alternative to using a phone app for:
>Firmware updates and diagnostics are handled via the LEGO SMART Assist app.
Very interesting!
I had Lego Mindstorms and Gen X had Logo/Turtle.
With AI perhaps programmable logic will go the way of toy steam engines and crystal radios, and with it the worldview of those who grew up seeing the world as logic flows
Your last paragraph is spot on though.
Good to see a move away from trying to bring a tablet/phone into this kind of play.
>... LEGO SMART Bricks can talk to each other directly - no app, central hub, or external controller required.
My son loves Lego Mario and the app. He'll even go through the building instructions of kits he doesn't have just to see how they are built. The instructions in the app are super clear, animated, and the model can be rotated at any step to check whether the real-life model is correctly built.
Going back to paper instructions after using the app is a pain.
Like physical bricks that can be moved IRL and then you have it synchronized with a virtual environment.
Lego used to have kits with electronics and motors but were always too expensive for me to afford…
Also, another chance to post this old school version:
Of all the ways "smart" could have been injected in to Lego these days, this is as robust as it gets.
It shouldn't be hard to print pieces that can snap together. In all kinds of colors and all kinds of forms.
I imagine the adventure of printing new pieces would be a fun thing for the kids and the parents. And when the kids are old enough, they can print pieces on their own. And a bit later design pieces on their own.
Would there be any downside to this approach?
I have some news for you. Lego piece tolerance is nuts. I think it is down to 2 micrometers. You can't achieve that in consumer 3d printers.
Now, you can make something that kinda works like lego but it wont have the structural integrity for advanced builds.
disclaimer: i'm not a materials scientist, just a tinkerer who 3D prints and wishes they had the capability to do injection molding.
Just think of how many 3d prints you've seen that consist of multiple parts friction for together.
But.
Modern consumer printers are way better than decade ago but they still sort of suck if you want any fine details.
"It shouldn't be hard to print pieces that can snap together."
It's actually quite hard to print pieces that are functional and look nice.
Modern consumer 3D printers sort of suck for small details still. If all you print are Lego Dublo sized parts. And print them from ABS. You might succeed _sometimes_.
PLA the cheapest default plastic for filaments for extruders loses fit quite fast (I've tried). So ball joints etc will get loose pretty soon.
"Would there be any downside to this approach?"
Well, the adventure currently is the printing part and it's mostly not fun but one of those activities masochistic engineers (like myself) take up as a hobby.
The consumer 3D printers are improving! Maybe one day. But the material physics are not that comforting there.
That being said, it should be feasible to make something that allows easily programming Arduino and raspberry pi to interact with legos, similar to how their Mindstorms line worked. That would be the best of both worlds.
