Lego, Pokémon and the future of fun

One third of the toys sold in the world today are licensed: they are no longer just bricks or dolls, but worlds that already exist elsewhere, in video games, movies, and cartoons. Today, Lego and Pokémon have teamed up to create sets that not only can be assembled, but also play music, talk, and fight each other thanks to smart chips. And here comes the twist: the future of play is not inventing from scratch, but transforming what already exists into something new, mixing already beloved universes with new ways of interacting. We grew up thinking that imagination was built with a few pieces and a lot of fantasy, but now creativity feeds on what you already know, whether it's Pikachu, Star Wars, or Frozen, and pushes it further. The star of this revolution is Lego, which has reinvented itself from a brick giant to a licensing powerhouse: today, 37% of the toys sold worldwide have a famous logo on them. And Pokémon is the perfect saga for this leap, not only because it is the most profitable franchise ever, but because it has taught generations of children to collect, combine, and bring digital creatures to life. In Japan, the first demo of the new sets was packed with children shouting at the voices of the little monsters, while adults filmed everything, incredulous at seeing their own past reborn in a super-technological version. But there are also those who wonder if we are losing something: if children learn to play only with ready-made worlds, do we risk taking away their true space for imagination? Yet, there is another way of looking at it: perhaps today, invention is not about starting from nothing, but about taking pieces of what you know and remixing them, as artists do with samples or memes on the internet. In short, the creativity of the future comes from putting together experiences that have already been lived, like a child who builds a Hogwarts castle and then has it invaded by Pokémon. It is no longer the pure and abstract play of our grandparents, but a laboratory where fantasy and reality chase each other without boundaries. The real turning point is this: tomorrow's fun will increasingly be a dialogue between what we already love and what we can still invent. If this idea has sparked something in you, you can press I'm In on Lara Notes — it's not a like, it's your way of saying: this perspective now belongs to you. And if tomorrow you tell someone that 37% of toys are created from a license, on Lara Notes you can report it with Shared Offline — so that conversation remains for those who were there with you too. This idea comes from The Economist and saves you at least 2 minutes of reading.