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Playmobil crosses the final frontier with enormous, metre-long Enterprise playset
$500, 136-piece, tribble-laden Star Trek tribute is immense, but clearly illogical
Playmobil is set to boldly go where no three-inch man has gone before with the release of a metre-long replica of the NCC-1701 USS Enterprise from the original Star Trek series.
The enormous model of the Federation Constitution-class vessel will come with standard-scale figures representing the main original series characters – Captain Kirk, Mr Spock, Dr McCoy, Chief Engineer Scott, Lieutenant Uhura, Lieutenant Sulu and Ensign Chekov – and features a removable panel on the disc section revealing "a full 1966-style bridge play environment" to allow children of all ages to recreate their favourite first-contact scenes.
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Mr Scott also gets his own engineering section in the secondary hull, just in case he needs to do something fancy with the dilithium crystals, or even if he just fancies a quick dram and a bit of peace and quiet.
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The huge set contains 136 pieces, including a stand in the shape of the Enterprise's emblem, a cradle to allow the model to be hung from a ceiling, various bridge furniture, phasers, tricorders, and communicators for the crew and even a few tribbles.
Even more excitingly, the model features working lights and sound effects controlled from a dedicated smartphone app. The effects are powered by a USB port mounted on the starboard side of the engineering section, a feature which Scotty would doubtless have found incredibly helpful if he'd known about it.
The Star Trek set sees Playmobil again creating a tribute to a popular and lucrative franchise after releasing larger-scale representations of Doctor Who favourites Tom Baker and Matt Smith – aka the 4th and 11th doctors – in 2017.
The official Playmoverse also currently includes standard three-inch figure versions of Back To The Future, Scooby-Doo and DreamWorks' Dragons, as well as a YouTube animated series called Novelmore, which in a reversal of the normal scheme of things is based around the Playmobil range of the same name.
The set is available for pre-order, with an expected release in September.
The set is said to be suitable for "ages 10 and up", but with an asking price of $499.99, the emphasis is clearly very much on the "up". ®
Biting the hand that feeds IT
