Heroine Katniss sports a bow and arrow, and does plenty of damage with her accuracy in the UK release of the blockbuster Hunger Games today. Since opening in the US kids (of all ages) have been signing up for lessons at Archery clubs, that's far too faddy for us, just pick up the finest toy bow/arrow kit around in the shape of the fine Z-Curve launcher and have yourself some grin inducing fun. A couple of round-nosed projectiles that easily reach 80 feet and a sucker dart that'll pretty much latch on to any flat surface (foreheads not included), we ...
We are, according to the Guardian, running low on Helium and one scientist in particular is putting the blame squarely on the party balloon industry and, that'll now include our favourite flyers the Air Swimmers. Pressure on stocks aren't likely to let up anytime soon from our end, we're eagerly awaiting the arrival of the Bass and Whale version of these surreal R/C's - Air Swimmers are the only brand that'll not have you trying to cancel your credit card transaction. Here's an Angry Bird version too (pictured) selling only in the US righ now, looking forward to a video ...
ARCHOS have shown their hand in the Tablet market for kids this morning wading in with this, the Child Pad. It joins the MEEP and Kurio although it could well steal a lead as it is launching at the end of March, the others have a TBC date and late September. In the looks department all seems perfectly acceptable, it 'll run on the 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich software has 1GHz processor and 1GB of RAM - And it'll be just £99. Kids friendly features include access to the Kids App Store powered by AppsLib which is filtered down to ...
Yup, the licensing wagon rolls out once more for the Angry Birds mob and this time we're treated to a quadruplet of the crew, red bird, yellow bird, king piggy and white bird as USB flash drives. They're each able to carry around 4GB of your precious data and we think hat wanting to fling them into a structure of Jenga bricks or LEGO will be overwhelming, so buy one (or more) and get on with it. £14.99 a piece from FIREBOX
When Mattel took on the board game last year it was met with shrieks of delight from bird lobbing fans, within just a couple of months version two was amongst us, we eagerly await the next installment. From iPod docks, PC speakers, noise producing plushes and a raft of other beak based accessories nothing new or very exciting to see here, it is with unbridled enthuisiasm that we bring you Angry Birds, The Outdoor Action game from Tactic. From May and for about £25 you get the main game, that's a playmat, blocks, pair of Angry Birds, a pig and ...
Lets face it, until just now you'd never realised how much you wanted a solar powered waving minature figure of Her Maj, did you? Pick yours from either pink or blue or buy both - Head THIS way for your purchase and to pick up some interesting facts about this great lady, our favourite is that she has opened 15 bridges in the UK!
We're unlikely to see the veritable amount of tat that surrounded the Royal wedding last year, we're hoping that celebratory and commemorative kit will all attempt to be as classy as this chess set (over optimistic perhaps). Each piece is handpainted, it truly is a glorious piece of kit that's certain to find favour with those who refer to parts of their abodes with terms such as East and West wing. It'll set you back almost £300 HERE for those interested parties.
We've been treated to a fair few Scalextric licences over the years, James bond ones were pretty good, Toy Story didn;t float our slot-car racing boat, this pair of beauties has us grinning from ear to ear. Why we've had to wait for so long to get Star Wars and Scalexctric to tema up Darth only knows, and frankly we don;t give a Yoda because it's finally happening - Exactly when we're no sure. So, we have the Micro 1:64 scale Death Star Attack set with a Lord Vader Tie Fighter battling a Luke Skywalker X-Wing, the spaceships have working ...
A firm favourite of ours for the outdoors, Swingball can be played by anyone, mastered by few and now turns its sights on a more sedentary crowd with the arrival of a desktop version. Likely to be around the £10 mark it’ll be a novel way to settle on who makes the tea, refills the photocopier and so on situations. Whilst you are unlikely to be able to give it the full welly you might on the standard version this will require a different deftness of digits.
Yup, the licensing wagon rolls out once more for the Angry Birds mob and this time we’re treated to a quadruplet of the crew, red bird, yellow bird, king piggy and white bird as USB flash drives. They’re each able to carry around 4GB of your precious data and we think hat wanting to fling them into a structure of Jenga bricks or LEGO will be overwhelming, so buy one (or more) and get on with it. £14.99 a piece from FIREBOX
The assembly of interlocking pieces to form an image of some sort has been with us in its commercial form since one John Spilsbury thought the public might buy them, and buy them they have. There isn’t much you can do with a jigsaw in terms of changing the dynamic is there? More pieces, smaller pieces, bigger pieces, giant jigsaws, more difficult sets (think Baked Bean variety) and now Ravensburger have showcased a game-changer. Spotted in Germany this Augmented Reality set is first pieced together and then, by moving the app-loaded iOS handset over the top, items from within the picture come to life. We’ve seen it up close and were mighty impressed, due dates are not forthcoming as yet, neither is a name for this puzzle which will likely introduce a whole new generation to putting pieces together.
We’ve not too much info on it, well whats to talk about really, several shades of Silver cover the surfaces, completing this one should be a challenge after the brilliant bright colours of the original. For us, this one screams paper weight, sure its all silvery and perhaps even trying to shed its geek image and become, erm, sexy? Make your own minds up, Rubik’s Ikon is £12.99 from John Adams.
We have seen a few 3D puzzlesover the past months, these new ones from Wrebbit (we’ll get to the bottom of that name creation soon) are these landmark builds, each one a 750 piece plus affair, not easy by any means but deeply satisfying when finished. From the Taj Mahal to Big Ben there’s a few to choose from and are about the biggest in their class, and priced between £20-£40 when launched in June over at Amazon.
Fans of the tear jerking blockbuster by Spielberg are in for a treat as the lead horse Joey has been unbridled at Toy Fair today. Select from the Classic Series range at 1:12 scale for around £40 or the Traditional Series range at 1:9 scale (limited run of 3,500) for about £50. Each Breyer “Joey” model is hand-decorated and packed alongside a copy of the now famous book by Michael Morpurgo
To Tweet or not to Tweet that was once the question, well early last year it was largely being just mused over by many in the toy industry, gladly however today most toy firms are in the 140 character club with some even setting up accounts for individual products – Toy town is most certainly on the Twittersphere. We’ve been doing it for years, and today, we only went and got ourselves an award for doing it, yes, Toyshopuk, the finest toy based establishment on the interweb gave us the Best Industry Commentator award, we blushed at first but now we’re beaming. Join us in our quest to make toyland as interesting as we can in 140 chatracters or less HERE
The smash Apple iOS and Android Fruit ninjas comes to life with this fab bit of fruit lopping fun. The real life version of the game see’s you take hold of one mini ninja sword and attack the 20 pieces of plastic fruit. Pick up a mission card and select your target fruit then get chopping. This is definitely the year of the “appcessorie” and this is definitely the place to discover the latest on release. London Toy Fair press releases so far have us a list of almost 20 to share with you next week. If you’re a fan of the app, but not so much this game then perhaps a real life Fruitg Ninja plush is for you, complete with squelchy sound FX. BUY!
Exciting times ahead for Team Toyology, we’re off to the fine city of Nuremberg in a couple of weeks to make a documentary about the place and how it transforms during Toy Fair week. If you’re over there and fancy a catch-up with us or indeed any UK toy companies then check out this new website from UK Trade and Investment (UKTI) who are working closely with the Birmingham Chamber of Commerce at the show. This new initiative will help visitors organise your time at this incredible event and lets you make appointments with UKTI supported exhibitors. Check it out – www.spielwarenmesse.ukti.gov.uk.
Subscribe to our newsletter
Use the form below to search the site:
Still not finding what you're looking for? Drop a comment on a post or contact us so we can take care of it!
A few highly recommended friends...
All entries, chronologically...
