
Capsela, the game that changed my life - jfroma
http://joseoncode.com/2012/02/01/capsela-the-game-that-changed-my-life/
======
keenerd
> In this vide you can see even a remote control that I never had. I read also
> in wikipedia that there was a model with an interface to Commodore 64, a
> Lego Mindstorms predecessor!

Lego Logo predated Capsela and was mostly inspired from Seymour Papert's 1980
book, Mindstorms. It ran on an Apple II through a special daughtercard and was
amazing.

I got to play with Capsela as well, but only ever the basic kit without any
expansions. Mostly because of the astronomical price of the parts. I wouldn't
be surprised if there is someone with a 3D printer trying to design a
printable modular motorized construction kit.

~~~
jfroma
Thanks for sharing this bit of history. Very interesting given Seymour Papert
is the inventor of Logo.

Do you have any link, reference or picture about lego logo?

~~~
keenerd
The kit was never sold to consumers, schools only. So there were limited
numbers and not much information. This was the best I could find:

[http://www.applefritter.com/content/lego-tc-
logo](http://www.applefritter.com/content/lego-tc-logo)

My memories of it are a little fuzzy. I only got to use the system for 1 year,
when I was nine years old. There was no assistance, I had to open the Apple
and set up the driver card myself, taught myself logo too. I spent every
recess inside just to get more time on it. (The kit went to a different school
every year.) Unfortunately I didn't grok algebra until the following year, so
my programs were essentially simple lists of commands with no math and (at
most) limit-switch logic.

~~~
jevinskie
I recall using Logo in 3th grade at a Purdue University CS summer camp
program. The camp was 1 week long and we stayed in the dorms like real
university students - very cool! However, I don't recall any Apple computers.
I think it interfaced to a PC using a serial cable. The next year the camp
upgraded to Mindstorm kits and we used pbForth instead of the GUI RoboLab.
pbForth's author, Ralph Hempel, came down from Canada to teach the camp. It
was a true treat! Imagine a bunch of elementary students successfully learning
Forth in a week!

------
GuiA
I remember these, they were semi-popular in France when I was growing up in
the 90s. Sadly Santa Claus never brought them to me :(

Similarly engaging toys:

Meccano
([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meccano](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meccano)),
a French brand of metal rods, plates, gears, etc. that you can assemble
together to form functioning small scale models (usually of vehicles). E.g.:
[http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f4/Meccano_0...](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f4/Meccano_001.jpg)

K'nex
([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K%27Nex](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K%27Nex)),
my personal favorite as a child- rods and plastic connectors that you can use
to build vehicles, small scale models, toy guns, etc. I really liked them a a
kid because while LEGO are more about building static dioramas/models, K'nex
is more about building dynamic/usable contraptions. For example they had
really cool kits to make solar powered robots that would crawl around and were
very easy to modify; unfortunately these days they seem to be more focused on
branded content (e.g. Mario Kart, Angry Birds).

Logiblocs ([http://www.logiblocs.com](http://www.logiblocs.com)), plastic
blocks from the UK with electronic components encased in plastic that are easy
to plug together, allowing kids to assemble projects such as alarms or a basic
voice recorder. E.g.:
[http://www.logiblocs.com/images/understanding_spytech.gif](http://www.logiblocs.com/images/understanding_spytech.gif)
. Their website seems to be stuck in the 90s :)

Littlebits ([http://littlebits.cc](http://littlebits.cc)), in a way a modern
reinterpretation of Logiblocs - electronic components that snap together using
magnets, sold as kits.

And of course Lego, but no need to talk about these :) Although the LEGO
Mindstorms series should get a special shoutout.

Those are all the ones I can think of, but I'm sure other HNers will have
contributions. I wonder if there's room to do a construction toy these days,
given LEGO's titanic market and mindshare. I was very excited about Goldie
Blox recently, but I thought it fell kind of flat - their models aren't very
extensible/modifiable in the way that LEGO or K'nex or Capsela are.

~~~
terhechte
Another Addition: Construx:

"Unlike other building toys such as Lego, Construx feature beam-like pieces of
varying lengths that snapped on to cubical connector knots in order to build
large shapes. These are relatively secure even though no nuts or bolts were
used. Panels allowed assembly of flat surfaces. Hinges, motors, wheels, and
other movable parts expand the number of different shapes that can be built,
and make moving creations possible."

I had two motors and could build simple robots. Due to the long size of the
pieces, one could build truly gigantic things. I build really big helicopters,
AT-T Walkers and whatnot. I played with this much more than with Lego. Also,
the pieces had a bit of a 80ies future style look, which fit well for all the
Sci-Fi things I was building.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Construx](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Construx)

[https://www.google.com/search?q=construx&safe=off&biw=1202&b...](https://www.google.com/search?q=construx&safe=off&biw=1202&bih=670&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=pD2dVLyxHsS0UdKChPAK&ved=0CAgQ_AUoAQ)

~~~
po
I absolutely loved Construx growing up. I also had the motor box for it and
distinctly remember my father explaining how gear ratios can increase torque
by trading off turning speed using the rubber o-rings and yellow pulleys. One
advantage Contstrux had over Lego is that once assembled, they were pretty
rigid and sturdy toys. A great creative toy for kids.

------
smanuel
Fortunately Capsela is still alive:

[http://www.captoy.eu/toys/iq-key-and-
capsela-358/](http://www.captoy.eu/toys/iq-key-and-capsela-358/)

~~~
stinos
Thanks, came here to ask if this still exists. No children but I'm probably
going to buy a set. Mainly because of the floating devices: I used to have
close to the entire range of Lego Technics, but there was none of the things
which could float.

~~~
eitally
I read the comments to see if anyone had posted this yet. I Had a few small
sets of Capsela when I was a kid and by far the most fun was making
watercraft. I will forewarn anyone, especially those with kids, that if you
let them play with Capsela in the bath -- with soap and dirt and grime and
whatever else -- they will get nasty and perhaps unrecoverably ... maligned.

~~~
davidw
Yeah, I think that's what killed mine for good. The floating things are cool,
but don't use them with the electrical pieces!

------
kalleboo
The toys I remember best from my childhood were all the building toys - LEGO,
Capsela, k'nex, and this one where you built towers with beams and blew them
up with a timed bomb. I had cars and action figures and such as well but can't
really picture them and remember as well as the construction toys.

------
facepalm
It looks very interesting.

I just want to mention "Fishertechnik" as another alternative to Lego. Not
sure how common it is in the US, but it seems to be available on Amazon:
[http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_c_0_10/191-8762533-9514...](http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_c_0_10/191-8762533-9514645?url=search-
alias%3Dtoys-and-games&field-
keywords=fischertechnik&sprefix=fishertech%2Caps%2C652)

As a kid I enjoyed it much more than Lego. It is more about gears and motors,
and back then there were also specialized kits about electronics, pneumatics
and robotics.

~~~
facepalm
Opps, just realized I misspelled it, it's called Fischertechnik, not
Fishertechnik :-)

Also as an additional point: one reason I liked it much more than Lego is that
the system for connecting the pieces is much better. It doesn't fall apart (as
Lego is prone to), so it's possible to make machinery that actually does
stuff.

------
DaveSapien
This was brought into my school when I Was 7 or 8 for an afternoon.

Working with my classmates, it was the first time I didn't feel like an idiot.
I just simply 'go it' and knew how it worked.

I was quite let down when they took it away, and fobbed me off with an excuse
that I can't remember now.

It would take me over a decade to find that part of me, but we got there in
the end.

Thanks for the reminder (and the name) of this great toy.

------
bane
Oh gosh, I think I had a Capsela set. I didn't recognize the name but the
pictures brought back a nostalgia wave.

I don't think I ever got into them in the same way I got into tinker toys or
lego though.

------
JunkDNA
LOVED these as a kid. I loved building all sorts of fans and paddleboat
things. Only bummer was that my mom who knew jack about electronics was hyper-
paranoid that I was going to electrocute myself playing with them in water. I
used to sneak them into the bathroom and put them in the sink behind her back.

------
nilsbunger
I tried to create a perpetual motion machine out of Capsela when I was 9 by
connecting a propeller to the wheels, so the propeller turns when the wheels
move. I was really puzzled when it didn't work! But I still remember that
machine clearly 30 years later.

------
slashnull
I had Legos, K'nex, Meccano, a _lot_ of Legos, Capsellas, lose PVC pipes I
screwed around with in the bath, some roller coaster ball thing I forgot the
name of, two spaceship things featured in Lego mag, and probably another
modular toy system I forgot about.

Capsela was really cool, but I mostly remember that the tolerances or the
connectors were loose enough that some didn't connect properly, and some other
just stuck together forever.

And now I program.

Correlation not causation, _but_...

------
tlrobinson
I remember being upset my parents wouldn't buy me video games or action
figures like GI Joe, Ghostbusters, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and whatnot,
but looking back I'm really glad they bought me LEGO, Meccano, Capsella, etc
instead.

I know LEGO still exists of course (despite LEGO's focus on movie tie-ins,
Technic and Mindstorms still seem like good products) but are there other
similar newer products worth considering?

~~~
benjohnson
Perhaps look at Snap Circuits - they're sort of like electrified Legos:
[http://www.snapcircuits.net/](http://www.snapcircuits.net/)

------
gdubs
Wow, so _this_ is what this toy was. I got several non-working pieces from a
yard sale when I was in 5th grade, and had no idea what to make of it -- other
than it looked seriously cool. Since it was non-functional, the pieces mainly
became incorporated into Lego play-time.

Really neat to see the full extent of the product.

~~~
angersock
I had a small starter kit (basically, just a little two-legged blue robot that
walked around using some clever rack-and-pinion gearing), and played around
mostly with one at a friend's house.

Fast-forward 10 years, I've just graduated high-school, and I find a massive
box full of them at a garage sale, for cheap. Floaters and chains and
everything. Coolest damned toy in the world. :)

------
danellis
Wow, I had this too. Thanks for the nostalgia trip! I loved this way more than
Meccano, but not as much as Lego.

------
gregrata
It was discontinued, but looks to be available again here (old parts or
comparable with new)

[http://www.iqkey.jp/](http://www.iqkey.jp/)

------
xorcist
Not Icelandic, Swedish!

Anyway, I too had one of these and what I loved most was that you could build
boats with propellers.

~~~
jfroma
Thanks! I'll fix the post.

I loved propellers and floating vehicles although I didn't have a pool to test
it out back then.

------
fit2rule
For me it was Capsela and Gakken Denshi Blocks:

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gakken_EX-
System](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gakken_EX-System)

Denshi blocks were one of the most significant educational toys that I had as
a kid growing up in the 70's and 80's, and many an afternoon was spent with my
Space 1999 Eagle model, a Capsela "moon base", and me "inside with the
computer" (Denshi blocks) commanding 'the system'. Ah, to return to those
halcyon days when modular toy systems gave my systems-management skills a
sharper edge. ;)

~~~
jfroma
Wow I didn't know about denshi blocks, very nice and powerful. Thanks for
sharing!

~~~
fit2rule
You're welcome! I await the Denshi Block revival and subsequent recognition as
one who was there and that, and all that. ;)

Seriously, if you do anything with Denshi blocks, let me know. I keep trying
to get my local hackerspace denizens to reproduce the casing and update it
with the 3d-printing and the laser-cutting and all the other potential energy
to be applied, but there are always so many other interesting things to do ..

------
bullman
Curious - Is calling a building toy a "game" a regional dialect thing, like
soda vs pop? I have never heard of Legos, K'nex, Tinkertoys, etc. referred to
as "games" before.

~~~
jfroma
Yes, I've been thinking about this and it was my mistake, it doesn't make
sense to call it Game in English nor in Spanish (original article).

Game (juego) is often used here as a synonym of toy like in "board game". I
call it "juego de construcción".

------
evantahler
I remember these fondly! I also remember overflowing the bathtub in the name
of science more then once with those water modules.

So what's the equivalent toy these days?

------
dllthomas
Hey, I had those! They were neat. I don't know that I'd have said "game" \-
"toy" is probably more appropriate.

~~~
jfroma
Thank you very much, few others pointed out the same mistake. I'm not a native
English speaker and I wrote this first on Spanish, although in Spanish is also
a toy or construction toy.

I just fixed in the article without breaking the url.

Thanks again

~~~
dllthomas
Happy to help :)

------
davidw
I just spent the past hour playing with a capsela clone that we got our
daughter for Christmas :-) I had these as a kid too, although the legos were
better in some ways: less prone to destruction and more "abstract" in tht you
could create anything you could imagine.

[http://iq-key.com](http://iq-key.com) is the manufacturer.

------
JonRB
I had Capsela (I, for whatever reason have always called it Capseula) as a
child, too. Some of it was donated to me by a neighbour and some was
purchased. That, along with Lego and knex made up my 'constructive' learning.
I also had logiblocks, which allow you to build basic circuits, and I was very
fond of them indeed.

Thank you for this flashback.

------
Htsthbjig
This is the great thing about 3d printers, as Linus Towards said: _" if I had
one of these (3d printers) when I was a kid, I would have done amazing crazy
things"_.

We teach little kids basic freecad, openscad design and give them communal
access to the printers too.

Some of them are really great designers. It is amazing when they start
thinking on their own.

------
richardw
Loved this in the 80's. Wonderful thing about this toy is that it was very
accessible, you could do something fun in one or two capsules and grow from
there. No need to build an entire model before something works. Adding e.g.
gears took seconds, which gave a very intuitive feel for the mechanics.

Lego, Meccano, Capsela. Great childhood memories :)

------
danmaz74
For me, it was Lego Technic that played the role that Capsela played for the
OP. One of my fondest memory as a child was when I created a mechanically
programmable excavator 3-joints arm by mixing ideas from some of the suggested
models... I just wished that modern-day Lego didn't have so many specialized,
single-use parts.

------
hartror
I wanted one of these so bad when I was a kid. I did have a couple of these
awesome science/engineering type of toys, as well as a load of lego.

The one that stands out in my mind still was a little solar steam "engine".
Once heated by the sun would draw water through it with a loud "putt putt
putt" sound.

------
dharma1
I had this when I was a kid. Stuck the wires into a mains socket once, sent
sparks flying, blew a fuse and probably closely escaped electrocuting myself.
Oh well, lesson learned about 230v AC at an early age.

And yes they were ace. What's the modern equivalent for a 5 year old? Maybe
something with a robotics spin?

------
dybskiy
Oh wow, thanks for some nostalgia! I grew up in Ukraine and played with this
:). It wasn't exactly the most reliable thing (like lego bricks are, for
example), but definitely fun memories!

------
KillerRAK
Absolutely LOVED Capsela! Eventually, I started applying a lot of the
modularity concepts to my Lego Technic projects by recreating the gearing sets
and interconnects in Lego. Great stuff!

------
kennywinker
I also had this toy!

Another lesson applicable to coding that this toy taught me was about the
basics of standards, compatibility, and lock in. I believe I only had single
set of Capsela, and no matter how hard I tried I couldn't get them to
satisfyingly inter-operate with lego, mechano, or any other building-toys.
Getting more was a non-starter (pre-internet). My dad had brought it back from
a business trip to SF where he visited FAO Schwarz, and I'm not even sure they
sold other sets.

~~~
aptwebapps
There was definitely more than one set. I remember that I had one and my
friend had a different, larger set. According to wikipedia [0], they've been
rebranded and are available (in Japan at least) [1].

[0]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capsela](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capsela)
[1] [http://www.iqkey.jp/](http://www.iqkey.jp/)

------
snarfy
I had the big kit. It was one of the most awesome toys. I looked into buying
one again but there seem to be a lot of poor reviews of the newer versions.
They don't make them like they used to, and the old versions are pricey retro
items. I thought about 3D printing something similar, but for the amount of
time involved it's worth it to buy the real thing.

~~~
jfroma
Also I wouldn't recommend buying a used set. The joints can't hold two pieces
together after some time.

~~~
beedogs
From what I remember as a kid, they'd develop little cracks along the facets
of the connectors, which killed the friction that keeps everything stuck
together.

~~~
jfroma
Exactly, these cracks are made when disassembling models, sometimes is very
hard to remove the connector

~~~
mantis369
That's one thing I can say for Robotix: the pieces that move are virtually
indestructible.

------
mergy
Geez. I want to say this is 1985. I had a bunch of Capsela kits. I really
loved them. Thanks for bringing back some wonderful memories.

------
apricot
Oh my god. Those manual scans gave me a serious case of the flashbacks. I must
have spent hours reading it when I was in grade school.

------
warble
I had this too. Great stuff. I'll have to see if I can get one for my kid.
She's digging lego's right now.

------
StephenFalken
Back in 1994, this LEGO Technic set [1] impressed me beyond anything else
related to toys until and after that time.

[1] [http://www.leg-technic.hu/images/sets/6/lego-8880-super-
car....](http://www.leg-technic.hu/images/sets/6/lego-8880-super-car.jpeg)

------
dapatil
This brings back happy memories. I had a few of these growing up in India.
Definitely the best toys I had!

------
naner
I also had these when I was a kid (and Legos, K'Nex, Erector sets, model car
kits, etc).

These didn't have as much of an impact on me as some of the other toys. There
isn't really as much flexibility as there is with sets like Legos or K'Nex.

------
jcromartie
I just found a completely new, unused (things are still in plastic baggies)
Capsela 400 box at the thrift store. This is one seriously great toy. I don't
know whether to let my daughter play with it or sell it on eBay...

------
nmb
Thanks, I'd completely forgotten I had this as a kid until just now.

------
davidgerard
My school had this in the late '70s! It was fantastic fun!

------
tricolon
For some reason, I used to play with some non-functioning Capsela capsules
along with my Lego sets. Thanks for writing this; I didn't know what they were
called.

------
XorNot
Man I had one of these when I was a kid! It was great!

A trip down memory lane when I was looking for my old Legos and found this
(well part of it) in the box as well.

------
oconnor0
I knew that name sounded familiar.

------
whistlerbrk
k'nex changed my life

------
biomimic
I used to have this set.

