Sphero is a completely new type of gaming system. It’s the world’s first robotic ball that you control with a tilt, touch, or swing from your smartphone or tablet. You can drive Sphero, play tabletop and multiplayer games, hold Sphero in your hand to use it as a controller for on-screen gameplay, learn basic programming, and even explore augmented reality.
checkout VIDEO Sphero from Sphero on Vimeo.
Sphero is like nothing you’ve seen before. It’s the world’s first robotic ball gaming system that you control with a tilt, touch, or swing from your smartphone or tablet. You can even use Sphero as a controller for on-screen gameplay. Sphero delivers a unique mixed-reality experience with single and multi-player apps that let you engage in the virtual world and play in the real one.
GUY BEHIND IT Ian Bernstein iterviewed about it in robotic-podcast.MP3
Ian Bernstein is cofounder of Orbotix which produces Sphero, a small ball-like robot which can be controlled from your smartphone. Launched one year ago, the robot has been hugely successful and is now available in the Apple store, Brookstone and Target to only cite a few. Key to their success has been a growing community of users writings apps for and making videos of their robots. Demonstrations include swarm control using the kinect or swimming Spheros augmented with “fish tails”. Bernstein has been a hardware tinkerer and robot enthusiasts since age 12 when he attended the International BEAM Robotics Games (see Mark Tilden ROBOTS interviews from 2008 and 2012). He then studied at New Mexico Tech and Colorado State University, all while working at Road Narrows Robotics
