Whether you’re actually a kid or just a kid at heart, there’s never been a better time to love amazing toys like the ones we cover at The Verge. Big toymakers are capitalizing on adults’ disposable income and a recent wave of nostalgia for the ‘80s — the heyday of toys — like never before. Meanwhile, crowdfunding and 3D printers are letting tiny startups get in on the action as well.
From the makers of TinyTV: the $50 Thumby Color and $30 Thumby. Raspberry Pi Pico chips run at just in the low hundred MHz, displays are 0.85 or 0.4 inches respectively! But that’s enough for MicroPython games you can code in a web browser, or even real Doom on the OG Thumby (find installers here). More in my full story.
It costs $60 and ships October 1st.
Oh, I had such high hopes for the Piaggio G1T4-M1N1 (“Gita Mini”). An officially licensed Star Wars bot that follows you around, dodging pedestrians while carrying 20 pounds of cargo and playing The Imperial March on its party speaker? Heck yes. But a single walk to the park showed me that this $2,875 bot doesn’t have enough smarts. (I couldn’t fit all its fails into one video!)
Or would you? The weird little toys are a nightmare to buy so we took matters into our own hands.
Labubus — those kind of scary little dolls with teeth that people are obsessed with — are hard to come by these days. It’s no surprise that the knock off industry is filling the gap; what is funny is that the fake dolls (“Lafufus”) are popular, too. For some Labubu owners, the authenticity of their doll doesn’t even matter. It’s part of the fandom experience all the same.
I backed the TinyTV 2 on Kickstarter back in 2022, and it’s a delight! When you change the “channel” with its tiny remote or working dials, it’ll realistically flick to the middle of your next video just as if you were watching it live. (It syncs timestamps!) Yeah, it’s $60... but a gift or treat, perhaps? They also sell the transparent one.
Kim Kardashian’s side quests don’t always make the most sense, but Deadline reports that she’s attached to produce and star in Amazon MGM’s new movie based on the Bratz dolls, which somehow feels very right.
Lego may have long ago surpassed the popularity of Meccano but Pete Wood demonstrates why the over 100 year old mechanical building toy still has devoted fans.
Meccano Martian Mission is a recreation of the 1979 Atari game Lunar Lander but without any screens. It’s an entirely mechanical creation with levers and dials used to control the thrust of a landing craft trying to safely touch down on a recreation of Mars’ rugged terrain scrolling by.
This September, Bandai will open a Gundam museum in Japan, where you can not only watch staff members manufacture Gunpla kits inside its factory, but also create a plastic mini mech of your own, as spotted by IGN.
You’ll get to design the concept of your model, pick a color scheme, create plastic runners to house the individual parts, and even make the packaging. Time to buy a plane ticket to Japan!
In 2021, Lego collaborated with Adidas for a brick-built version of the brand’s iconic Superstar sneaker. This year the company has partnered with Nike for a 1,180-piece buildable replica of its Dunk sneaker that includes hidden storage, swappable lace colors, an exclusive minifigure, and a display stand featuring a spinning basketball.
The set is available for preorder starting today for $99.99, and expected to ship starting on July 1st, 2025.
To help commemorate the 75th anniversary of Charles M. Schulz’s Peanuts comic strip, Bandai will soon be releasing a new Tamagotchi Nano featuring characters like Snoopy, Woodstock, and Harriet you can take care of and interact with — presumably without the risk of them dying if you’re negligent.
The Peanuts Tamagotchi includes a red silicone case shaped like Snoopy’s doghouse and will feature additional characters from the comic like Charlie Brown, Lucy, and the piano-playing Schroeder.
Following brick-built versions of the Simpson’s home and Apu’s Kwik-E-Mart, Lego is releasing a 1,635-piece Krusty Burger on June 4th, 2025 for $209.99. The set opens to reveal a full interior with a kitchen, dining room, play area, restroom, and drive-thru window.
It also includes Krusty’s clown car amongst other Easter eggs like El Barto graffiti on the outside, and seven minifigures: farmer Krusty, Homer, Bart, Lisa, Sideshow Bob, a squeaky-voiced teen, and Officer Lou.
Available for preorder starting today for $69.99 and shipping on June 1st, 2025, Lego’s latest Pixar set recreates the studio’s Luxo Jr. lamp mascot which first appeared in a short film in 1986.
The 613-piece set includes a fully articulated replica of the lamp and a ball that opens to reveal Easter eggs inspired by Pixar Disney films. By removing two panels, Luxo Jr. can also be posed to look like it’s balancing atop the ball.
“Is this the maximum speed? Should we just crash?” the F1 drivers laugh. Then, they do — and Lego bits fly everywhere! Such a brand stunt, and yet I’m so jealous. More on the cars here.
It’s slightly smaller than the 2,354-piece Discovery set that debuted in 2021, but Lego’s new Space Shuttle Enterprise is part of a larger 2,417-piece set that includes a buildable replica of the Boeing 747 that NASA used for testing and moving its shuttles around the country.
The $229.99 Lego Icons Shuttle Carrier Aircraft will be available for purchase starting on May 15th for Lego Insiders, and May 18th for everyone else.
Available for preorder today for $59.99 and shipping on May 1st, 2025, Lego has announced a 700-piece buildable version of the iconic Star Wars logo created by graphic designer Suzy Rice.
The black support structure supporting the yellow lettering is covered in detailed Lego greebling, while inside the letter T you’ll find a tiny hidden Star Destroyer pursuing the Tantive IV.
If you had any doubt where GI Joe’s antagonist would stand on the blockchain, Hasbro has repurposed this clip from S1E21, “Money to Burn.”
Following a 6,167-piece recreation of the elven sanctuary Rivendell released in 2023, Lego is revisiting The Lord of the Rings with a new 2,017-piece version of the Shire. The set launches on April 5th for $269 and includes nine minifigures: Frodo, Samwise, Merry, Pippin, Bilbo, Gandalf, Mrs. Proudfoot, Farmer Proudfoot, and Rosie Cotton.
Interactive play features include a dial that can make Bilbo disappear and a burning letter that turns into the One Ring.
Japan has shown the world that wonderful things can be distributed through a vending machine -- from tiny Nikon camera replicas, to Nintendo controller keychains. But I’m especially jealous of these server rack replicas discovered by Viktor Shpak featuring miniature Dell servers and Cisco switches plus tiny cables to connect them all together.
You can also buy them online it turns out, but you’ll be paying far more than what a Japanese gashapon machine charges.
Lego leaked a new Lord of the Rings kit called The Shire in a since-removed event posting on its site spotted by Jay’s Brick Blog. The kit focuses on Bag End, the home of Frodo and Bilbo Baggins in the fantasy series.
The even was for an April 5th signing by the model’s designer at Lego’s flagship London store, according to the article.
3Doodler, known for its 3D-printing pens, has announced a kid-friendly version of its Chef 3D pen that prints with candy instead of plastic filament. The new 3Doodler Candy, arriving later this year, swaps a power cord for a 45-minute rechargeable battery and uses gluten-free vegan isomalt capsules instead of sugar.
The candy comes out of the pen at 45 degrees Fahrenheit, so it’s safe for kids aged six and up to use.
One of the most iconic electronic toys of the ‘80s is returning, but instead of pressing glowing buttons to repeat an ever-growing pattern, the Simon Jump Game Mat requires you to use your feet. The gameplay is similar to the original Simon, but players are now presented with a sequence of colored lights right from the start, which you have to dance out on the mat.
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ICYMI: If you’re on the hunt for a new handbag and want something chic that doubles as a reliable distraction during awkward dinner dates, Nik Bentel Studio’s new RC Car Bag is exactly that. You can’t drive an Hermès Birkin bag across a table.
It is still kind of hard to believe that Amazon MGM is producing a live-action Masters of the Universe movie starring Nicholas Galitzine as He-Man and Jared Leto as Skeletor. But it’s true, and Deadine reports that Morena Baccarin (Deadpool) and Jóhannes Haukur Jóhannesson (Vikings: Valhalla) have signed on to play The Sorceress of Castle Grayskull and Fisto, respectively.
