Child Toys News

A Manchester City fan has realised his dream of building a Lego replica of Maine Road stadium - four years after the club’s former home was demolished.

Gary Standford, 37, of Salford, spent more than £1,500 on about 500,000 pieces of Lego for the project - which he started 13 years ago.

The Maine Road ground, in Moss Side, was demolished in 2003 when the club moved to the city’s Eastlands complex.

But Mr Standford says he does not plan to replicate the new stadium.

He said that he dreamt of building the 3ft (91cm) replica when he was still at school and a big fan of Lego.

“I built a small-scale model but as I got older the Lego was put away in a box and I forgot about it,” said Mr Standford.

“For 12 years I never even looked at it. But when I moved into my own place I came across the box and found plans of Maine Road tucked away inside it.

“It was then that I decided to re-build a larger more exact model of the ground.”

Mr Standford worked on his replica about five hours a week and had to mould his own plastic for the more technical parts.

But like the club itself, Mr Standford’s model has endured a difficult history.

Potter bother

He had to bring the project to a standstill when the Harry Potter films stopped his supply of vital sky blue bricks from Lego in Denmark.

“When the Harry Potter films came out, the sky blue bricks were licensed for the Harry Potter model only - so I couldn’t buy them separately,” said Mr Standford.

“I had to adapt and also used burgundy bricks, the colour of City’s away strip, and took the bricks from the Star Wars models and figurines which were out at the time.”

He says he is thrilled with the final model even though the club moved to the City of Manchester Stadium in 2003.

“I was sad to see the end of Maine Road but I really like the new stadium.

“Despite it being a challenge and a real learning curve I don’t think I’ll be building a model of the new stadium as well.”

A school with a national reputation for success in a major Lego competition has done it again.

The Year 6 team from New Lodge School returned from the First Lego league UK finals in Birmingham having won one of the categories and being placed third overall.

By winning the award for their research project, the 10 New Lodge pupils qualify for the European championships in Norway at the end of May.

Their success follows similar achievements in the competition over recent years, but it is especially poignant this year  as it will be the last time New Lodge takes part.

Dwindling numbers in the pre-prep department of the Chichester Road school means New Lodge will close at the end of the school year.

However, all that was put to one side by the team of 10 and 11 year olds as they competed with more than 400 others in the competition designed to promote engineering, science and technology skills.

This year’s challenge required teams to design, build and program Lego robots to complete missions related to nano technology.

They also had to research and give a presentation about the potential uses of nano technology in the future.

Head teacher Sandy Watt said: “The Lego robotics challenge has always been an exciting and exhilarating part of school life for pupils.

“We are absolutely thrilled the team has won a place in the European championships.

Sindy, the 40-year-old British fashion doll, is to get her most radical makeover in a relaunch planned for next year. Licensor Pedigree is to differentiate the brand from US rival Barbie and make Sindy a more realistic role model for young girls.

The new Sindy launches in autumn 2004 and will no longer have the height and long legs she shares with Barbie. Safeway shoppers will be the first to see the revamped incarnation later this month when a smaller six-inch version of the doll, under the sub-brand 100% Sindy, goes on sale. The range includes clothing and cosmetics.

100% Design & Development, a joint venture between Pedigree and New Moons licensing company, will handle marketing for Sindy’s relaunch and is in talks with ad agencies. Pedigree was the original licensor in 1962 and re-acquired the Sindy licence from Hasbro in 1999.

In LEGO Star Wars Mobile, players take on the role of Anakin Skywalker as he battles to rescue Senator Palpatine from the evil General Grievous. Searching for Obi-Wan, players must solve a series of puzzles and move through 18 levels of action using their lightsaber against battle droids, droid commanders and droidekas. Only by mastering the Force can players move LEGO objects and build new pathways to explore the ship.

Mini Hilary Duffs are soon to go on sale in toyshops.

The Red Carpet Glam Hilary Duff Doll - wearing a polka-dot dress and red satin sash - will be available in early 2007.

‘Hilary is a great role model to girls,’ says Jamie Wood, Mattel’s vice president of Barbie marketing.

‘Not only is she a stylish entertainer, actor and fashion designer, but she also shows girls that there are no limits to what they can do.’

The 5ft 1in star will be following in the footsteps of Beyoncé Knowles and Reese Witherspoon, who have also had Barbie dolls made in their likeness.

Every once in a while it can be nice to take a little break from gear and gadgets that scream cutting edge and spend a little time with something that’ll take you back to your happy childhood, the days when making a purchase wasn’t followed with the premonition that your new pride and joy was destined to be obsolete at birth.

We’ve got some fond memories of our old Lego sets, especially after we perfected a design for a Lego-nightstick capable of dispensing Lego-justice on our Lego-playmates.
We might not have resorted to injecting violence into the Lego experience to keep things exciting if we were kids today and had our hands on Lego’s update line.

Lego announced today two new Battle Packs of characters and basic conveyances. Episode III inspired Droids and Clone Troopers will be available, each for $9.99. They might not be Leia in Jabba’s palace regalia, but they sure beat generic bald men with vacant smiles and yellow skin.

‘Eragon” is a dragon fantasy aimed at adolescent audiences, adapted from a book written, remarkably, by an adolescent boy for adolescent readers. Other age groups need not apply.

Older, more experienced audiences will know they’ve seen most of it before, and with superior dialogue and more enriched characters. (I’m thinking primarily of “Dragonslayer,” but “Eragon” also echoes “Star Wars” and myriad other famous boy adventures.)

In terms of narrative, “Star Wars” is the most obvious model, since “Eragon” involves a young farm boy who becomes a great warrior, helping a rebel army battle an evil, corrupt empire. The boy, Eragon (Ed Speleers) even has an Obi-Wan Kenobi-type mentor, here named Brom (Jeremy Irons), to help him learn the ways of the Dragon Riders. These are gallant knights who ride their beloved dragons against injustice, represented here by a dictatorial king (John Malkovich) and his own Darth Vader, the villainous Durza (Robert Carlyle).

Praise must be given to the most effective dragon yet brought to celluloid. She’s more believable than most of the humans in the film. The director, Stefen Fangmeier, was the visual effects go-to guy for such films as “Master and Commander,” “The Bourne Identity” and “The Perfect Storm.”

A video game champion has been crowned as today “Gears of War” made history by becoming the fastest-selling next-gen game of 2006 and the fastest-selling exclusive Xbox game of all time.

Microsoft Game Studios and Epic Games Inc. today confirmed that “Gears of War,” the Xbox 360-exclusive title, has sold more than 2 million copies worldwide since its release six weeks ago.

““Gears of War” clearly has won the battle for the title of the must-have game of the year,” said Richard Teversham, Director of Platform & Marketing, Home and Entertainment Division EMEA. “Its phenomenal success is one of many reasons why Xbox 360 is the ultimate place to get together with friends to play this Christmas.”

“We’ve always held high hopes for ‘Gears of War,’ but we never expected such an overwhelmingly positive response from critics and gamers all over the world,” said Michael Capps, president, Epic Games. “I can’t describe how stoked our team is right now. Our fans can absolutely count on Epic to keep delivering new gameplay through Xbox Live.”

In addition to being the must-have video game of the holiday season, “Gears of War” continues to rage on the Xbox Live battlefield as well, with more than 1 million unique gamers engaging in 10 million online gameplay sessions and unlocking an impressive 7 million achievements. On top of being the No. 1 title on Xbox Live, “Gears of War” has driven new members to the network; paid registrations per day have skyrocketed more than 50 percent since the game’s launch.

“Gears of War”

More than 80 publications around the world have crowned “Gears of War” the best next-generation game of the year. At the recent Spike TV Video Game Awards that aired Wednesday evening, the next-gen-defining title garnered four awards, for Best Multiplayer Game, Best Shooter, Studio of the Year (for Epic Games) and Best Graphics.

New Games on PlayStation Portable

First-person-shooting game “Medal of Honor Heroes’’ and role-playing game “Tales of the World’’ will be released for PlayStation Portable on Dec. 20 and 21, respectively.

The two games feature all the characters from their previous series.

Developed by Electronic Arts, “Medal of Honor Heroes’’ involves a gamers playing a commander and completing a series of missions in the World War II. “Tales of the World’’ by Sony allows gamers to customize their characters, which they can download from the Internet.

“Sudden Attack” Female League to Begin

Ongamenet, cable channel for games, will hold a first-person-shooting game “Sudden Attack’’ league for female gamers from Dec. 22 for six weeks.

Titled “Sudden Attack Ladies League,’’ the tournament will begin with eight teams, consisting of five players each.

The winner team will receive 3 million won with the runner-up team winning 1.5 million won. A “First Lady’’ prize will be also given to a player who plays the best based on an Internet poll by game watchers.

While some kids were home watching SpongeBob on Saturday morning TV, about 300 youngsters ages 9 to 14 were using small robots to test their knowledge of nanotechnology at Canton Country Day School.

The eighth FIRST LEGO League Nano Quest Challenge, which involved 18 teams of kids from across northeastern Ohio, culminated an eight-week project involving research, design and programming to compete in the regional tournament. The winner will participate in the FLL World Festival in Atlanta in April. Children from 34 nations will eventually compete on an international level.

“Every FIRST LEGO League challenge helps students discover how imagination and creativity combined with science and technology can solve real-world problems. This year’s focus on nanotechnology introduces them to a new frontier of science and technology,” said Dean Kamen, founder of FIRST, which stands for For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology.

The students used custom-built robots in timed competitions aimed at showing teamwork, troubleshooting and problem solving, said Paul Monks of the school at 3000 Demington Ave. NW.

“It’s very complex, but it’s fun to program,” said Nicholas Greene of Beachwood, who attended the competition last year. Teammate Joshua Cheston, who also attended last year, said, “the tasks and obstacles are a little different, but we chose a different design. That design worked.”

The competition was the fourth for Cathi Friddle, a home-schooled 15-year-old from Canton.

“I love it,” she said. “You can impress (the crowd), and you learn a boatload. The big thing is teamwork. And this year, we learned a lot about nanotechnology. We went to (Ohio University) and met with some of the professors.”

Beside her, Bailey DuBois, 13, also a home-schooled Canton resident, was competing for another team. It was DuBois’ third year.

“I like the competition,” DeBois said. “The presentations are fun.”

Presenting their work to the judges and a crowd was only one aspect on which they were judged.

The “missions” this year included manipulating individual atoms, testing stain-resistant clothing and operating a space elevator on a small platform with small robotic toys.