Today I’m not a CNET journalist. Today I’m a Pokemon trainer.
Under a railway arch in London, just down the road from where the CNET UK team used to play Pokemon Go on our lunch breaks in 2016, I’m now holding my very own Eevee, preparing to take on Charmander in battle.
I’m still playing, of course, but this time with Lego. As the company announced at SXSW London on Tuesday, it’s continuing to expand its Smart Play universe with the addition of a slew of recognizable characters from the world of Pokemon.
Lego is introducing 12 new sets — two all-in-one playsets with a Smart Brick included, and ten smaller sets with the Smart Brick available separately. They range in price from $15 all the way up to $120 (full pricing and availability below), meaning there should be something available for Pokemon fans on any budget.
Lego debuted its Smart Brick back in January at CES 2026, marking the first major update to the fundamental Lego parts since the introduction of the Minifig in 1978. The Smart Brick is a standard 2 x 4 Lego brick, but with an application-specific integrated circuit, or ASIC, chip inside. It also packs sensors, speakers and LEDs, allowing you to transform compatible Lego builds into entirely interactive toys.
Put a Smart Brick into one of the Pokemon, and a tag inside the model will spark the Brick to light up and make noises unique to each character. Lego has worked hand-in-hand with the Pokemon Company to ensure the traits of each creature is reflective of what you might know of them from elsewhere — TV or games, for example.
In introducing its Smart Play system to the world, Lego has struck up partnerships with popular franchises to help familiarize children with the mechanics of the Smart Brick. At CES, the company showed off Star Wars Smart Play sets, and Pokemon is the second partnership to come to fruition.
This is the most expensive set at $120.
It was a no-brainer collaboration, explained Julia Goldin, the Lego Group’s chief product and marketing officer, in a briefing ahead of unveiling the collection to the world — after all there’s an 80% crossover between Lego and Pokemon fandoms, with multigenerational interest in both.
All of the Pokemon Smart Play sets are interoperable — making them appealing both to collectors and to children who want an extended universe of creatures to battle. That’s how, after throwing a Pokeball to capture Pikachu in the long grass and driving Squirtle around in its car, I ended up in battle with Charmander.
Eevee vs. Charmander: What it’s like to play with Lego Pokemon
I tapped my Eevee against a training tag to enable training mode and whacked it furiously against a target. It flashed white and green and sang to me, letting me know it had leveled up and was ready for action. The Smart Brick inside the Pokemon knows when another Pokemon is in proximity and in battle mode. Moving them around violently makes them fight, and whoever has the more powerful Pokemon and best move will win the battle.
Lego VP and Head of Smart Play Sam Coates and I waved our Pokemon next to each other in midair to enable battle mode and we were off. I thrust my Eevee at his Charmander, narrowly avoiding collision, and he pulled back in a defensive maneuver. I spun Eeevee up in the air, as though I was preparing to pitch a baseball, and then hit out at Charmander again. This time I was successful,and Eevee glowed and tooted out a victory song.
I asked Coates what would happen if our Pokemon had butted heads. They’re robust, he said, encouraging me to test out Eevee’s durability. Guiltily, I bashed its movable ears against the table and they remained fully intact. Still, added Coates, “we have had some messy play tests where it’s been quite a lot of destruction on the carpet.”
Sorry, Squirtle! Better luck next time.
To play as Coates and I did, you’ll need two Smart Bricks, one in each Pokemon. But neither Squirtle nor Charmander come with them included. Instead, you’ll need one from another set to play. (Eventually you’ll be able to buy Smart Bricks separately.)
I wondered aloud about the logic of selling 10 of these sets without the key interactive piece, but they’re also designed to be played with in the old-fashioned way.
“From a design perspective, what we want to do is to really ensure that the analog playset is wonderful to start with,” said Jill Lin, Lego’s head of interaction design. I had to admit, even without the Smart Brick, the sets were charming and appealing. Lego invented 20 new shape elements just to bring the Pokemon models to life.
The Lego sets are also designed to be played with in analog mode.
The Smart Brick introduces another dimension, but in early research sessions with children, Lego learned that what children wanted out of the toy was open-ended, rather than goal-oriented play. It’s for this reason, said Lin, that training levels for the Pokemon reset every play session, or every time a Smart Brick is removed.
“Every single training [session] is the moment you bond with it, and… every single play session, it’s a start of new imaginations, and also the new world,” said Lin. “Some of the stories that the kids tell in their head come alive.”
Pricing and availability for the Lego Pokemon Smart Play sets
The 12 new Pokemon Smart Play sets are all available for pre-order from today, but won’t actually be available until August.
The collection includes the following sets:
When Lego released adult Pokemon sets in March, record pre-orders reportedly crashed both the Lego and Pokemon websites, so if you want to get your hands on a set, consider acting fast.
