Rock 'Em Sock 'Em Robots

Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots.

“Hey! You knocked my block off!” I wonder if Mattel could use that as a marketing/advertising slogan now…

A few years ago for either Christmas or my birthday, I was given a gift by my brother's family. Rock 'Em Sock 'Em Robots was a perfect gift. I keep the gift in my room so the kids won't instantly destroy it. I mean, I want to play with it sometimes...

The kids wanted something to do this afternoon, some activity to fill the void of boredom. The second oldest had an idea (I presume, and I feel I’m on solid ground with this presumption that he would have rather played video games, but that’s a Saturday/holiday activity…). He asked if he could get out the fighting robots game. I thought that was a great idea.

In our house, many times any organized game or activity ends in tears, and angry kids, which in turn creates angry parents. This afternoon the kids started off well—good times, laughter and fun. There was a point when it could have gotten ugly, but…this did not happen. Kids happy…parents happy.

And here we see the red robot knocking the plastic block off the blue robot (even Mattel marketing portrays the red robot's superior dominance). It's the just way it is...

Picture used w/o permission from Mattel

My son just brought in the game and all is right with the world. Maybe if my kids could live vicariously through the robots, taking out their aggressions using plastic pieces, metal springs, and brilliantly simple mechanics, we’d have less tears and ugliness. We can dream…we can dream…