The Sphero Mini Soccer available for £49.99 via Amazon and other retail locations.
One of the latest creations from Sphero who create a number of robotics products such as the Sphero Bolt, Sphero’s Star Wars BB-9E Droid and Sphero Mini all that have been reviewed by us. In this review, we have been testing out the Sphero Mini Soccer which is the upgraded version they have basically put a football print cover over the top of what is basically just a Sphero mini.
Not only do you get the football covered Sphero you get 8 mini cones to help test your skills and help you tackle new challenges and also take on training routines via the app.
Set up is very easy inside the packaging you have 3 instructions printed on the packaging. It will advise you to print for an hour it will have a green light when charging and a blue light once charged. You only need to charge it for an hour to get going and you are provided with a Micro-USB cable.
You can also buy an additional activity kit that comes with a fun shell, barriers, arches and pins to take on 15 additional activities. The Sphero Mini Soccer comes with two apps you can download on either IOS or Android. First up is the Sphero Play which is the app that allows you to try the routines and challenges that are pre-set.
The Sphero Edu app allows you to customise instructions and get down to learning to code in an easy to use manner. All you have to do is click and drop style and once you’re more confident you can learn block-based programming which leads to your child learning basic JavaScript in the future.
Once you download the app and have charged Sphero make sure your Bluetooth is one and you’re in the app and follow the instructions and it will automatically connect.
I personally found the Sphero Play app very easy to use but unfortunately I struggled to even connect to the Edu app on this occasion but in the past, I found the app very helpful for teaching the basics of code. Moving back to the Sphero play app the default is the joystick where you drag a circle around and the little football moves in that direction. There is also a number of different controls like the slingshot amoung others.
In the settings, you can control the colour and the sound and speed and within the Sphero Edu app that can be done via coding instead of just jumping on the settings.
So overall, the Sphero Mini Soccer is a great little upgrade to what was already a great device to teach kids basic coding with the added element of that football makeover and with the added cones allows for you to learn tricks and my kids very much enjoyed playing with this device and I could see them leaning basic coding. The Sphero play app is a great app that not only 8 different drive modes but also has 3 in-app games that you can play over and over. At £49.99 this is a perfect Christmas gift for kids 8+.
The Sphero Mini Soccer available for £49.99 via Amazon and other retail locations.