"Probably my favorite thing about the Lego Smart Play system unveiled this week at CES is that it was designed for kids, first and foremost. In the past 10 years or so, Lego has increasingly courted an older audience with more expensive and elaborate sets. But when it was time to bring more advanced technology to Lego, the idea right from the beginning was more social and interactive play."
"If you haven't heard about Smart Play yet, its a way for Lego to make its sets more interactive. A Smart Brick filled with sensors makes it so sets can respond to each other, know when they're moving, play sounds and know when the corresponding Smart Minifigures are near them. Tiny Smart Tags, meanwhile, help the Smart Brick know the context of how it's being used - whether it's in a helicopter, car or duck for example."
"But a big part of the creation process was making the Smart Brick as flexible and powerful as possible and then seeing what scenarios could take advantage of it. "We wanted to build a really powerful platform," he said. "What we shouldn't do is say, 'this is what we think we're gonna need.' We needed to say, 'let's create something that has a lot of capabilities that we can then figure out how to use.'""
Lego Smart Play centers on child-focused, social and interactive play rather than catering primarily to older collectors. The system uses a Smart Brick packed with sensors so sets can respond to motion, play sounds, and detect nearby Smart Minifigures. Tiny Smart Tags provide contextual information about how pieces are being used. The company invested roughly eight years developing the platform to maximize flexibility and capability, aiming to create scenarios that take advantage of the hardware. The approach prioritizes agency and evolving play experiences for kids, while the added technology raises potential cost concerns for parents.
Read at Engadget
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]