Sphero Mini (Green) – Coding Robot Ball for Kids – Fun STEM & AI Learning and Gaming for Ages 8+ – Tabletop-Friendly

Ball is very small and I purchased this as a stocking stuffer. It’s a great toy though. Easy to use and fun. This can actually be a toy for a kid or an adult. I don’t have a car but I’m sure they would love batting this around.

This hopefully short review will feature 2 parts. A casual fun side, and "I like to develop video games or robotics" side.CASUAL:First off, this will drive on carpet, as long as it's not too thick!This thing this fun right out of the box! It has all sorts of intuitively built functions, albeit with a couple issues.Driving it around, it has multiple fun ways to accomplish this task.The stick controls work well but are finicky. However it's still quite fun. Feels like you're directing a drunk driver around, as it seems to function like a weirder version of a quadcopter drones' headless mode.Frustrating and hard to control, but extremely fun.The other driving modes are weird but neat. It has a tilt control mode, which is hard to get working properly, as it still feels like it has a weirdly programmed headless mode. So it can get confusing.It also has an entertaining "golf" mode. The golf mode is fun but is hard to learn at first. Your swiping of your phone is hard to get used to, because the angle and side you're swiping is asynchronous to the way you aim the actual ball. Swipe any way you want, and it will only go the way you aimed before you swiped.The other driving modes are poorly made gimmicks, not worth mentioning.The games are fun, but the controls make it irritating and sometimes not responsive.Yes, it comes with games. You use the ball as the controller to move a ship across a screen, or drive a car.Very neat!If these were the only functions of the ball, I would give this ball a 3.5 out of 5, or a 4 out of 5. Fun, but eventually an adult like myself will grow tired of it. This concludes the casual part of the review.Are you a game developer or robotics developer? Yes? Enjoy your new toy!If you install the education app, you will quickly find yourself in a funland! It seems to run on javascript, and at the time of this review, I haven't checked that completely. However, I've looked into it's engine.Yes, this app seems to have a javascript powered engine, which functions similar to Unreal Engine 5's blueprints system.THE FUNCTIONS REALLY SURPRISED ME! (but if you're serious about having fun with this ball, buy the advanced version)This ball has axis positioning check features, collision check bools, airborne bool checks, landing from airborne collision check bools, sound effect functions, LED color change functions, variables, functions, loops, and probably more than what I saw in just a couple minutes of looking into the app.It absolutely blew my mind when I looked into the app.I seriously recommend one of these if you want something to mess around with for farts and laughs.But if you want a fuller experience, you should probably buy the 200 dollar version.OVERALL: I love this ball! I can't wait to see what I can do with this coding wise!

The Sphero mini is a super fun little robot. The apps make it a great option for all different ages. The user interface is really simple and easy to understand. I’ve used it with my own kids during homeschooling and with larger groups during a technology program. I’ll definitely be getting more of these in the future.

I disliked when I don't remember where it's facing, because it goes in the wrong direction. Otherwise this is an awesome product!

These are so fun for middle schoolers to adults. My kids loved playing with them so I bought my nephews these for Xmas. They love coding so this fit in with their robotics love! Small and compact. Great quality as it goes off jumps, runs into walls. Great choices of fun accessories too.

The media could not be loaded. I liked this and very cool to start into programming and also play with obstacles.

FINALLY MY CAT HAS SHOWN INTEREST IN A SPHERO TOY!!!I thought I was gonna be all about the branded Sphero toys after a very successful run-in with their new BB-9E but then they went an introduced miniature Sphero balls and I had to get myself one in green. It's my son's favorite color so I quickly rationalized that it's a toy for both of us. But, like with the BB-9E, he's terrified of this thing, too. There was hope for a second there when he found it on the carpet in the morning after I'd played around with it the night before after he'd gone to bed. He brought it to me and his mom and announced, "An egg!" Because it's actually just a hair smaller and obviously rounder than a plastic Easter egg. Feels like one, too. So there was promise. My wife has me load up the app and give it a run for him and he was immediately over it. He jumped on our bed and wanted nothing more to do with it.But you know who loves it? Our cat. That cat's ignored the full-size Sphero, Ollie, and BB-9E but THIS ONE is something she'll stalk around the ottoman.The good - It's smaller but no less solid or speedy than the larger models. I imagined it'd be a significant drop in quality or speed or SOMETHING because it's not only smaller but significantly less expensive than the larger models but I haven't found this to be the case at all. It even runs on our tufted rugs which ave texture/different heights. I'd have been understanding if it couldn't overcome the heights but it hasn't been the case. Your (miniature) mileage may vary, though.The bad - Still terrifies my son. Isn't branded (I'd be down for a mini BB-8) so the app feels light compared to all that the Star Wars models come with. Completely delivers on all that's promised so that's more an observation than a true "bad". I'm gettin' greedy, clearly.The unexpected - Twice now I've had to stop and restart the app because it's tried to load up in portrait mode with half the screen black and the load screen basically only being half there. I couldn't rotate the phone and have it be corrected I just had to stop the app completely and then re-open it. Once open the apps been solid, like all of their stuff, but that did happen twice so it's kind-of, sort-of something that happens. Easily fixed so not a bad, just an unexpected.Off to play with the cat and hopefully not give my son nightmares!

Works. But boring after 10mins