Make up a spell, print it as a rune and give it to your sister. It works for her too.
6–12 years · Ø 30 mm rune for kids 6+, Ø 35 mm version for younger onesMy 6-year-old daughter hands her big brother a small green stone with a spiral carved into it: “This is my spell. It’s called Fireflius.” He sets it on his own Book, circles his wand twice, and his room lights up in her blue while her wind chimes ring out. “My spell works on your Book too!”
Drag two runes into the sockets (or just tap them). Each rune carries the whole rule on its chip. Code checks whether the two fit together, and if they do, a card for the new spell prints out.
Put a rune in each socket.
// left socket: empty // right socket: empty
The wand recognizes gestures by itself (MPU6050 accelerometer), no network needed. When a spell is recorded, the child performs the gesture three times and the code stores the pattern. The wand holds three spells at a time.
Runes get collected, given away and swapped like trading cards, except the kids invented them. Combinations open up a whole tree of new spells. The duel gives siblings a contest, and the collection on the shelf is there for everyone to see. The spells keep working (the spell book is permanent), so the toy doesn’t fade like a one-off wow.
A six-year-old says a rule in plain words, and a minute later it is safe, runnable code. Without an LLM this would take menus or block programming.
The step up from the Rule Box, an earlier round-1 idea, is that the program is a physical object that carries its own code: you can give it away, combine it, and it works without a network.
~220 × 160 × 60 mm, shaped like an open book, two Ø 32 mm sockets for runes, printer slot in the “spine”. MMU: leather brown + gold ornaments.
280 mm, hollow, spiral (two-color MMU), translucent PETG tip as an LED diffuser, handle with a battery compartment closed by an M2 screw.
Ø 30 × 5 mm, raised symbol in a contrasting color (MMU), NTAG215 dropped in during a print pause under 1.5 mm of plastic. Ø 30 mm is just under the EN 71-1 small-parts cylinder (31.7 mm), so they are for kids 6+ and not for siblings under 3; there is a Ø 35 mm version for younger ones.
| Part | What for | Price (CZK) | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| ESP32-S3 DEVKit (LaskaKit) | the Book’s brain | 448 | electronics list, sec. 4 |
| RC-522 ×2 | reading and writing runes in both sockets | 98 | #30 |
| NTAG215 (10 pcs) | runes | ~120 estimate | #31 NTAG213 only has 144 B |
| INMP441 | push-to-talk microphone | 98 | #27 |
| MAX98357 + 40 mm speaker | the Book’s voice | 187 | #48, #50 |
| CSN-A2 thermal printer | spell cards | 928 | #67 |
| ESP32-C3 SuperMini | the wand’s brain | ~100 estimate | — |
| GY-521 (MPU6050) | wand gestures | 79 | #10 |
| Vibration motor | the spell’s “click” | 49 | #61 |
| Li-Po 400 mAh + TP4056 | wand battery | ~120 + 20 estimate | — |
| WS2812 (1 pc) | glowing tip | ~10 estimate | — |
| Total | ~2,260 CZK (about €90) | ||
The boundary: the model only translates a sentence into JSON and invents names. Validation, spell power, whether a combination fits, duels and casting all run in code, with no LLM at runtime. Actions come in two tiers: wand actions (work anywhere) and room actions (only at home, limited to a whitelist of the kids’ room devices in Home Assistant).
Saved spells run offline forever, and the rune carries its own code, so it works at a friend’s house too, as long as the friend has a wand. Whitelist: no locks, no heating, no other rooms. Parental time lock (after 8 pm, quiet spells only). Print bigger runes for younger siblings.
Compared with v1: a spell is now a portable physical object with its code inside, which brought in collecting, gifting, combining and duels.
One of eighteen finalist toy ideas in the Toy Workshop, generated by AI agents, picked by a dad.
Made by Ondra Malacka with Claude agents · malacka.cz