52Toys’ Beastbox

It’s about time I told you all about Beastbox. Created by a company called 52Toys (pronounced Five Two Toys), Beastbox is a line of robotic animals that transform into two-inch cubes. Yes, I know, that makes them technically the third transforming robot entry on this list, but these are not made by Hasbro and are very cool, so we’re doing this.

There are apes that transform into boxes. Also parrots, wolves, lions, sharks, monkies, owls, insects, dinosaurs, hippos, rhinos, and more, all changing from these highly detailed mechanical animals into these sleek little high-tech boxes.

What makes them perfect for me, an obsessive collector of robot things, is that each character comes with a clear plastic box that is designed to interlock with other boxes. You can connect them side-to-side and top-to-bottom. You can build walls of these colorful plastic animal boxes. They don’t take up much room, and they generally cost around $20 to $30 apiece, so it’s easy to budget myself one a month, and then go over that budget. The only downside is these are imported, so you’ve either got to grab them from a specialty toy store or roll the dice on AliExpress.