Programmable Batmobile Headlines New Lego Tech Line

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This is really neat, I think the last time Lego had any kind of electrical wiring was from the space sets from the 80's. (I could be wrong)
https://www.toysperiod.com/lego-set-reference/space/futuron/lego-6990-monorail-transport-system/

I inherited this set from my older cousin and eventually passed it down to my friends kids who love playing with them.
 


Hmmm, really? What do you mean by rich? Funny how there are hundreds of Lego sets available for under $50. If you mean parents that are SJWs and can't get a job because they don't want to work, then yes, buying Lego sets may not be within their financial means ;-)
 


They have quite a few sets, ranging from sets meant for kids, collectors sets, as well as high tech sets.
The Speed Champions, City, Ninjago, Friends, etc. sets are generally meant for kids and usually range from $20 on up; unless you get the little $5 kits in a bag.
Mindstorms, which are pricey, are meant for high school to early college. We used a Mindstorms kit in my entry engineering course in College.
The $300+ kits are collector kits, and are not designed specifically with kids in mind. I have a couple of those kits and have no intention of taking them apart after they're built due to how complex and time consuming they are.

There are of course exceptions in the lines, like Ninjago City, but it isn't the general. You also won't see a kit like that at a Walmart.

The brand may say Lego, but they are not just one specific market. It's like any auto company. Most make a compact, a truck, a SUV, and a luxury line. Just because luxury lines can approach $100k, it doesn't mean the compact lines are the same price; or the same market.

If price is that much of a concern, consider the Chinese knockoff brands. Just don't expect the quality to be the same.
 

Lego Mindstorms have been around for the last decade or so, which are robotics sets with various sensors, motors and programmable controllers. Sets like this might be targeted more toward a slightly younger audience though...

https://www.lego.com/en-us/mindstorms
 
Oh, and what kind of self-respecting tech site reports on something like this without including the tech specs of this kit?

Before reading the article, I was half expecting it even to have a camera module and some simple computer vision capabilities. Not for $99, though.
 
An absurd comment about "rich kids only." Someone has not been to a store that carries Legos in a while. If you think you are going to walk out with a 7,500 piece three foot long Millennium Falcon kit for $19.99 you are out of your mind. Can't afford that $800? Then go buy Yoda's Jedi Starfighter 262 piece kit for $25.

As the guy said above, there are many different price ranges of kits available by Lego, so the wealth-challenged can be included as well. Lego is a brand and they are not cheap. You want to go big? You gotta pay up. Can't do that? Too bad. I want a Ferrari but can't afford one and I sure don't whine about it.
 

Wow, are those numbers accurate? So, it's still in the neighborhood of $0.10 per piece. If I continue my extrapolation from two data points, then the inflation isn't in the cost per lego, but in the size and complexity of the kits.

Aren't Legos the ultimate hand-me-down? I got them from my sisters, and then we gave them to my nephew. I even downloaded the instructions from many of the old sets and counted out the pieces (by stacking them in blocks) to be sure he could at least build them once. As long as kids aren't too corrupted by all this marketing for Batman, Star Wars, etc. they can still have a lot of fun and actually a chance to create things.
 
Well, I am a VEV (Vietnam Era Vet) with a BSD (Big Swinging Dick) and PTSD who’s worked every day of my life since age 10.

My kids and grandkids get lots of Legos and we keep sets at our house for visits.

*****

<language, please. thanks>
 


Yep! The high end Star Wars large scale collector's kits like Millennium Falcon, Death Star, and Imperial Starship run between $300-$800(USD). They are really for adult hard core SW enthusiasts though and are put in display cases. There's a smaller scale Millennium Falcon for $169 that's about 18" long with 1,414 pieces. They have a cool large scale NASA Saturn V rocket that stands nearly 40" tall for $120 and a large scale Space Shuttle.

The thing about these kits is that once Lego retires them, that's it. No more. Collectors are even buying them and holding on to them as they generally rise in value unopened. (See Shuttle examples on eBay for $450+. They were originally a $199 kit - https://www.ebay.com/p/LEGO-Space-Shuttle-Expedition-10231/149193560?iid=132615074147). The good news is that Lego offers many different sizes and price ranges of many of their more popular item kits like the Falcon, X-Wing, TIE Fighter, etc.).
 

And it's actually a bargain, at that price. According to my formula, its 1969 pieces should've made it nearly $200.

https://www.lego.com/en-us/ideasproducts/products/nasa-apollo-5-21309


If I would buy any legos these days, it'd probably be one of these:

https://www.lego.com/en-us/themes/architecture/products##sp=8

I like how detailed they are, yet with relatively few bricks.
 
This is the age of the "kid koder" and LEGO understands that. Curious how deep the software functionality goes in LEGO systems, I got a copy of a LEGO MINDSTORMS programming guide. I have a 10-year-old daughter who has demonstrated some coding skills already and I'm trying to find the next solid investment for her to both learn from and have fun with. I think since around 2005 LEGO has been doing a great job of releasing more functional products, especially their programmable line, which I got a taste of a few years ago when I took my daughter to one NASA's many mini tech centers that featured a LEGO programmable rover lab. Most of the programming the kids are doing under 10 is in variations of Python, but the MINDSTORMS language, NXT-G, can be extended by other languages using a variety of toolkits for IDEs like Visual Studio, Xcode or even Mono on GNU/Linux. Yeah, this is cool and I hope my kids have fun with it.
 
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