Obviously,
there's a lot of hype around it. Like,
Lego was selling this thing hard.
It's fixing it.
As a Lego child who grew into a Lego
parent, I kind of have mixed feelings
about Lego, the iconic toy company,
focused on creativity and an
imagination, adding smart features to
some of their sets in the form of a
smart brick. But I can see the appeal of
a new version of Darth Vader's TIE
Fighter that reacts to how you move and
play thanks to the smart brick, the
smart tag and a smart Darth Vader.
Everything has smart tech in it now.
It's just it's weird and lots of people
have been talking about this since uh
LEGO announced it at CES this year. It's
just weird to have LEGO, the company
that is all about, you know, like not
needing all that weird bells and
whistles to to add this feature. I mean,
I feel like it it's smacks of uh
investor pressure or I don't even know
if they have investors. I think they
must they must.
>> LEGO is private company.
>> Lego is private. So, it's not investor
pressure. It's something some kind of
pressure. Anyway, oh, look at this. So,
so this is the the open box right here.
And here is the smart brick itself. So,
um yeah, it looks like a Lego brick in
two parts. Obviously, we got this kind
of transparent thing on top and the
opaque body with the electronics inside.
I don't see any way to like open it cuz
I believe that there is no way to
replace the battery if it if it if it
dies. It's a got a 45 MIA battery that
apparently only lasts 45 minutes and
takes a while to charge. Comes with a
USBC toa cable. Interesting. fairly
large uh pad for that little smart
brick. It's it's unclear at the moment
whether you could charge multiple bricks
on this, but it certainly seems like
that should be possible given how large
this pad is and how small the actual
brick is. Okay. Oh, and it lights up.
You see that? And then when I took it
off, it made a little sound.
Wow. Worth it just for that. You cannot
buy standalone smart bricks at the
moment. They only come in a very limited
number of sets, which are actually quite
limited still compared to the
functionality that LEGO was talking
about them having at CES. We'll talk
about that more once we get everything
built, but um yeah, there's a bit of
controversy around this right now.
Anyway, we're going to build this now.
And
I got I got some Lego cred. I had a big
giant bucket of Lego as a child. Our
Lego pieces at home are organized uh by
color and by size. So like big green
pieces, mediumsiz green pieces, small
green pieces. Okay, so I guess I am a
I'm I am more of a Lego guy than normal
people. Oh, this is a smart play guide.
There's an instruction manual just for
how to do the smart stuff. You do need
an app. We have that set up. Oh, it will
glow green when it's fully charged. It
says right here it's going to take 2
hours to charge the brick. And then the
rest of this book is just all that
stuff. Okay, cool. Let's go.
Man, I got to say, I didn't think I
would ever get to build Lego for my job.
Wish that I wasn't building Lego's most
controversial product ever.
I feel like the building is part of the
play. That's what makes Lego so cool is
that you can build any toy you want and
then you can play with the toy. But the
building the toy is also really fun.
Oh, smart tag. Okay, it's time to put
the smart tag on. It's got a little
picture of the of Darth Vader's tie on
it. It looks like there's very little
electronics or anything in there,
although it it has extra little numbers
that aren't there normally. I actually,
one of the reviews I read of it, too, is
that it it um notably does not sound
like Star Wars.
>> Oh, really? I'll be the judge of that.
I'm kind of a Star Wars dork. Or I was
before the duck times. Smart tag on.
Okay, back to speed building.
I've never seen whatever piece this is
before. Just like a flat paddle. Fun.
I said we cannot go in there.
I have like been
struggling
and I appreciate the beauty in the
complex system.
I mean, that's the death that's the
argument for the death penalty, but
Okay, we're at the smart brick part.
We're still recording everything, right?
Yeah. Ooh, and it's green. Okay, into
the back right on top of the of the
smart tag here as shown.
Whoa,
that didn't sound a ton like what I
remember the Darth Vader. Oh, yeah. It's
reacting, though.
It It seems to know that I'm kind of
turning it, too, cuz it's a different
kind of sound. Okay. Anyway, I kind of
want it to stop doing that now, though.
Okay, so I'll take the brick out.
Okay. And then what does it say? Oh,
that's how you shoot the blasters. Okay.
Wait, hold on. There is no back to it.
What? I don't like that. So, you you put
the smart brick in there and now it's
saying that it's it's complete like
that. Like you just there's just a big
hole in the back of the TIE fighter.
We're venting atmosphere.
Is that the only way to turn it off? Is
it to take the smart brick out? That's
weird. I did not connect it to the app,
though. So, let's let's try doing that
first. Add your smart bricks. Oh, okay.
So, you can have two on the charger.
There we go. That answers that question.
Smart brick added. Okay, we got the
smart brick connected. The tie is built
except for the big hole in the back, but
you know, that's what it is. And Brad,
you finished building the other the the
other parts that do have some
interactivity with the whole system. and
we will figure out how the whole
experience is enhanced
with our resident Lego expert Robert
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Circuit. Robert,
>> hello there. Were you in there the whole
time?
>> Yeah, I had some snacks and
Um, Robert,
>> yes,
>> you're a Lego you're a Lego uh
>> big Lego fan.
>> So, what do you know about the smart
brick? First of all,
>> I've heard bits and pieces. Um, I've I
heard what
>> pieces.
No, I've heard little bits about it. Um,
I heard there's obviously there's a lot
of hype around it, like Lego was selling
this thing hard and then it kind of came
out and everybody went, "That's it."
>> Okay. See, I I haven't paid attention to
it since CES when they announced it.
>> Yeah, there was obviously CES and then
they had a bunch of uh like content
creators promoting it. They had a bunch
of like celebrities like they had
Anthony Daniels uh who played C3PO uh in
a promo for it and then it was just like
it's here and then that was it.
>> Okay. So, it's not really up to snuff of
what uh what was expected like uh even
just like the sounds that this thing is
supposed to make just sound terrible.
Have you heard it yet?
>> Yeah. So we did. So this is number one
thing that was weird is that this is
this is the complete build. It's just
got a big chunk missing from the back.
>> Yeah, that's definitely been like one of
the biggest complaints is like it's just
the sets just feel incomplete. Like Lego
has tried to incorporate technology into
sets before. You've got like uh Super
Mario, Hidden Side, Video, and those
sets at least like on their own felt
like a complete set. This just feels
like you're missing part of the set and
it's like stupid expensive.
>> Right. Right. It's like I'm paying 70
bucks for
>> an incomplete ship.
>> Yeah. And so that you can put the smart
brick in the back.
>> Oh yeah. Cuz you Yeah. You So you've got
Darth Vader in there. So this is one
thing I I have I have I I've heard is um
you've got obviously like the tiles in
there or the tile on top. Yeah. that
represents the ship, but then you've
also got Darth Vader in there. And they
are supposed to talk and like work with
each other. So, it's like if you've got
two characters next to each other, they
might talk back and forth. Or if you've
got a character in a ship, you'll have
the ship sounds and that character's
voice.
>> So, I had it I had the smart break in
there and it was making the sounds. I
didn't have Darth Vader in there. So,
now Darth Vader's in there. We'll see.
Let's see what he says.
>> Oh,
>> okay. That was at least part of the
Imperial March. So now I haven't done it
yet actually, but you see this little
tab or the red the red trigger thing?
Pull that.
>> Pull that.
>> Oh, okay. There we go.
>> And I can verify those are not the those
are not the tie laser sounds.
>> No, cuz like what if you have a
lightsaber? Okay. No,
>> hold on. Oh, right. The characters
apparently speak, but they don't speak
English.
>> Yeah,
>> it's just kind of like simlish or
whatever.
Yeah. So,
>> Darth Vader, but like instead of saying
like, "Luke, I am your father."
Spoilers. IT'S LIKE
ANYWAY, OH, and you can turn the volume
down. We're at the highest volume,
which, you know, thankfully it's not too
loud or as a parent, I appreciate that
the highest volume is not it's not
earsplittingly loud. That's nice.
Charged, not registered, connected. But
then as soon as you take it off there,
it's so honestly actually at first I was
kind of like wait what? I can't even
connect to it while it's in the toy. But
like now I'm like actually wait this is
good because there was concern about
your toys being connected to the cloud
or something and like recording your
like kids voices and stuff. But
>> I mean it's nice to see now that like
okay it is disconnected as soon as you
take it off the charger. It's not
connected to anything when it's in
there. It's just only doing local only
stuff.
>> Mhm. The one thing that they that does
actually that's that's like sort of a
connection uh is if you have uh multiple
of these bricks and that and they say
you have like another set with like
another ship and that they will talk to
each other. I saw this one video of
somebody trying it and they had uh they
had the TIE fighter and the the X-wing
and they were they were shooting at each
other and that um but like the weird
thing was like TIE fighter could be
shooting way over there and it'll still
hit like it just detects that it's like
within range not like it's not
directional. It's just like if you're
within I think it's like supposed to be
like 15 feet or something like that.
wheel ship sounds. But
>> what were people expecting that like
it's going to be like perfect like laser
tag? Like you're going to point at that
like it's oh you missed and
>> I feel like the way that Lego hyped it
up that's kind of where the expectations
were saw.
>> Were you someone who like saw this and
you were like yo this is hype.
>> No, not really. I kind of expected it to
flop.
>> We've only experienced a tiny fraction
of what's possible here. That's just
kidding. We've experienced most of it.
But I'm going to reinstall Oh, hold on.
We got to put the
bubble. It sounds like a computer.
>> There are some characters from what I've
seen that it actually doesn't sound
terrible on. But when you're expecting
Darth Vader to come out and you get
that, that sounds like the like the
probe droid
>> more than Darth Vader.
>> Yeah. Or pro Yeah, the probe droid. But
these do something. These these
interact.
>> Yeah.
>> This is like the repair tool.
>> It's fixing it.
That's That's terrible.
>> Let's Let's put it up here for the mic.
>> It just keeps going. If you hold it,
>> we suffered a lot of damage in the last
battle.
>> It's missing the whole back half of the
ship. Like,
>> in theory, this is the color sensor at
work.
>> There's a color sensor. So, I didn't
even think about this, but the the smart
brick has an ambient color sensor, and
that's how it's knowing that this is for
repair because this is a green. This is
a normal green Lego piece right here.
>> And so we got a green pen. And
>> that's that's wacky. Okay. So now so now
you need uh this is like the refueling
sound. Now in case you all in case you
ever wanted to know how Darth Vader's
tie what it sounds like when they refuel
it.
That's sort of liquid. Sort of.
>> Do they use liquid fuel? Don't they use
like energy cells or something? Should
know this as like a former Star Wars
nerd.
>> I'm wondering if we take it off of the
smart tag and then put the colored items
beside it. What will it do then?
>> No, the color doesn't do anything to it
if it's not on the smart tag because
this is like just a generic smart brick
>> and it becomes the the TIE fighter smart
brick when it contacts that that smart
tag. So, like we got the TIE Fighter
here. There's a there's an X-wing. And
these are kind of like mini like that.
That's like the proportions are off on
that. It looks like kind of like a mini
like a like a mobile game version of an
X-wing.
>> Yeah, a lot of people have compared
these to like uh 4 plus or junior sets
in terms of like their scale and that.
>> This I mean, you know, I can see the
appeal of this if that works, but not if
they're not using the real lightsaber
sounds. Like it's got to be like,
>> you know,
>> that was pretty good.
>> I know. I had to show off my lightsaber
set.
>> There's gonna be a bunch of different
sets with the smart brick.
>> But uh important distinction is so these
ones come with one smart brick. This one
comes with two. These don't come with
any smart brick. They're smart brick
compatible.
>> That's it. Then like I can only imagine
the number of like grandparents and
parents like their kids like, "Oh, I
really want to get the smart brick." And
they see this, they're going to buy it
and their kids going to go, "Where's the
smart brick?
>> That's confusing." And like the fact
that like especially for something as
big as like the Millennium Falcon. Like
this one I think it's I think it's 100
US does not come with a smart brick. You
have to buy at least another $70 set cuz
this is the cheapest one that comes with
a smart brick and it's 70 bucks, right?
Although if the smart brick came with
everything, then all of the smart sets
would be, you know, prohibitively
expensive.
>> And but this is a way to kind of like
roll out the the smart ecosystem with
slightly cheaper sets that just have the
smart tags. But it is gonna be it's
definitely gonna be gonna be confusing
for people buying toys being like is
this gonna is this gonna make the pew
pew and the sounds which I argue they
shouldn't even be thinking about anyway
cuz that's not what Lego is all about.
But you know we've talked about that.
>> Yeah. As of right now they don't sell
the smart brick on their own. So if you
want to get one for one of these you
have to buy another set. But as for why
they don't sell them separately the only
thing I can think of at the moment is
like this is the first wave. So it's
like maybe that's something they'll
eventually do. I can imagine them being
like, "All right, it's just gonna be the
norm that this set comes with a smart
tag." Because like the smart tag itself
is just this tiny little piece.
>> It's just a tile.
>> Like it looks like it barely has any
electronics in it at all. It's probably
quite cheap to produce as far as far as
like a a smart thing goes. So, you know,
it's probably fine for them to just kind
of throw those in the sets
>> and then start building this ecosystem
so that eventually people have smart
bricks and people have smart tags and
but I again I've made the case that I
don't think like I I don't care about
that. But
>> I don't think it I don't think we need
it,
>> right? Like
>> that's really what it comes back down to
for me.
>> It's all part of like the imagination of
having fun with it. going around making
the the the blaster sounds yourself,
making the ship sounds. Like, what I
like about LEGO as a company is that
they will continually kind of like
explore ideas like this.
>> But I would be lying if I told you that,
you know, I would rather have them
instead of doing this, uh, you know,
bring back Bionicle,
>> you cowards.
And not not those weird replacement
things that you oh the hero hero
factory. No. that. Bionicles. Bring
them back. Do it. So, what do you guys
think of the Lego smart brick and the
kind of like weird way that Lego is
rolling it out. Uh, do you have any
sets? Do you plan on buying them? Do you
want to see Robert come back and do more
Lego videos cuz he loves this stuff?
Yeah. And if you're looking for
something else to watch, uh, go watch
the ShortCircuit about the Star Wars
TV, cuz why not? Love you. Bye.