The four-legged Lego Mindstorms Gelo is one of five programmable, computer-controlled robots that are included in the Robot Inventor kit.
Lego; Illustration by Stephen Shankland / CNET
If you’re interested in programmable Lego robots, this is good news: for the first time in seven years, there is a new Mindstorms kit. The 949-piece Robot Inventor kit for $ 360 ($ 330) includes instructions for building five different robots. As you would expect from Lego, you can use it to build anything you want. And it could be just the thing for parents hoping to keep the kids busy in the house.
Lego started with simple plastic building blocks, but in 1977 the Danish company started adding more advanced engineering kits with more sophisticated gears, struts, axles, and other mechanical components. When they first arrived in 1998, the Mindstorms kits added to the mix computer. They are controlled using software that you can create using Lego developer tools that run on iPhones, Android phones, Windows, or MacOS PCs.
The latest Mindstorm upgrade was the EV3 computer, a more advanced model that runs the Linux operating system and was introduced in 2013. After a long pause, Mindstorms announced the Robot Inventor kit on Friday. The flagship is the new Intelligent Hub with six input / output connections, a 5×5 LED display, an acceleration sensor for detecting alignment and movement, Bluetooth and USB connectivity and a loudspeaker.
The kit fits a widespread effort to familiarize children with STEM subjects – science, technology, engineering, and math. STEM efforts are widespread in schools, but companies are trying to take advantage of parents’ desire to do more at home.
Robots, which can be more exciting for children than characters on a computer screen, have long been a tool for teaching programming. The new Mindstorms kit could be a good summer project for kids who are stuck at home during their time Coronavirus pandemic and can’t go to summer camp or visit grandparents.
The Mindstorms kits can be intimidatingEven if you just follow the instructions, my colleague Scott Stein found out. And if you have younger kids, you can check out the Lego Boost robot projects that arrived in 2017.
With the Robot Inventor Kit you can create five models.
Bust can hammer obstacles, grab things and fire arrows when it senses movement. Charlie can give high fives, play drums and dance. Tricky is a sports bot that can bowl, play soccer and hit a basketball. Gelo can walk on his four legs and avoid obstacles. And MVP is a remote controlled vehicle that can serve as the basis for things like buggies or cranes.
Some of their behaviors result from grafting on accessories such as grabs, cranes, towers, brick eaters, and hammers.