This is a racing experience that combines the physical with the virtual. Race Mario Karts with real remote control, but use your Nintendo Switch to control them. Each kart has a camera so you can drive around the house in first person perspective. This creates an enhanced racing experience. Receive a projectile in the game and your kart stops for a moment. Or levels with crosswinds affect your remote control car in the real world.

It uses the associated app, but in a deeper way than you might expect. Scanning the built children unlocks a variety of narratives and games on the phone. Use the camera to search for clues and hidden treasures around your creation. Sometimes you have to put a certain block or character somewhere. Or at other times you have to spin a Lego wheel. Your reward for discovering this is in the app, which adds new challenges over time as the game updates.

Tori Combine comes with toys that you place on a play surface to control the spaceships and catapults in the game. Children can also create and color their own cardboard versions of the toys and use them to control play.

The novelty is that as you move the toys on the gamepad, they exactly match the movement of the game. Add to this making your own colors on versions of these toys that also work on the pad, and this is a magical and unusual experience.

You place a toy creature on the pedestal and it appears in the game. Balance another creature on top of the first to join it. Then different elements can migrate and evolve animals to get more points. Players work together to get the highest score. If the tower falls, you have a limited time to balance it again. There is also a competitive mode in which players balance animals to fight each other.

The Starter Set comes with a large interactive Mario figure that is then used to test the levels you do. The figure “sees” and reacts to the different types of blocks under it, so it knows if it is a coin, fire, ignition, and so on.

After building the levels that come with the sets, you can combine the different elements to create your own. Then you can compete with friends and family to see who can finish with the most coins in the shortest time. The smart thing is, the Mario figure tracks everything for you.

This smart toy has been around for a while. Over the years, it has evolved to introduce new challenges, characters, and cars. The basic premise is that you join the track to design a circuit and then compete with the computer-controlled smart cars using your smartphone. This means that it is fun to be alone and with up to three other people.

The company that created the toy has changed hands, so currently the sets are really inexpensive. As long as you avoid Fast N Furious outfits that aren’t compatible with the new company, this is a really good value and a great smart toy that now has a bright future.

It’s from the same team behind Heads Up. It’s an interesting tech toy, as the smartphone becomes both the technology and the game.

When the child calls or approaches, the phone makes cat noises to give them clues to find it. When found, the phone plays a melody and tells them how long it took and offers a fun fact. There are different cats and animals that you can select to hide. It’s a great way to have fun around the house while adding a video game touch to the game.