I read an article that said HexBugs are one of this year’s hottest toys, so I bought a bunch for Toys For Tots.
Now that I see them, I’m thinking 
Are the kids really into them?
Ooooh, I hadn’t heard of them before, but they sound pretty cool. They’re cheap, they’re collectible, they can be treated like a pet, and they do cool stuff. Gender-neutral, too. What’s not to like?
I think this is the answer to my thread about Christmas gifts for a bunch of kids ages 3-17.
Awesome. That’ll be great for our office gift exchange.
I don’t have kids, but I gave one as a gift to an equally geeky friend. I guess she liked it okay.
My son got a couple for his birthday last month, along with a little tray and some ramps for them to bounce around in. They’re kinda fun to look at for a while, but I think the appeal is adding your collection together with your friend’s collection so you can have a dozen of them running around at once.
It looks like different models do different things… the Nano and the Ant pretty much just run around and bump into things. The Crab looks pretty darn cool… it will turn away from loud noise, and stop moving if it finds a dark place. It’s sort of adorable, in a roboty kind of way. I’d squee if somebody gave me one.
The grandson (age 6) got the Nano for his birthday and he loves it. He was playing with it last night, having it cruise around the box he made for it. He wants more.
I asked my kids about them last night. The older kids hadn’t heard of them at all. My youngest son said that one of his friends had one. I hadn’t heard of them at all before this thread. So I don’t think they are exactly one of the hottest toys this year like that article said.
That said, though, they do look like fun.
I’ve had a nano for about a year now. I haven’t touched it for a while, but even for an adult, it’s kind of a cool/geeky thing once in a while. I’ve got a serving platter that turns out to have about the perfect slope to the sides. The nano will bounce it’s way towards the edge, but the slope will deflect it back down.
I don’t know about how popular they are this year, but last year at Christmas when my niece and nephews (12-15 yrs) were playing with it, they had never seen one before.
Hey wait, the different models do different things from the others? Shit, I’d have a ton of these if I’d known that. Instead I thought they just walked (or lurched, like mechanical walking tends to be) forward in a straight line and that was it.
Uh huh. The Inchworm even has a remote control.
So I happened by the toy department last night, and they’re almost twice as expensive as they were this time last year.:eek: