Raspberry Pi and Lego have a long history together. Not only have various manufacturers created Raspberry Pi projects using Lego bricks, but there is also the Raspberry Pi Build HAT that allows you to control motors and sensors from everyone’s favorite single-board computer. The upcoming FigPi microcontroller takes this union to the next level by using Raspberry Pi silicon (an RP2040 processor) on a circuit board that looks like a Lego astronaut minifigure.
FigPi is the brainchild of Ben Shockley, an engineer who has already created a similar microcontroller board called the Mini SAM M4 that is powered by an Atmel SAMD51G19A CPU. He sells the Mini SAM M4 for $25 to $30 on his site, minifigboards.com (opens in a new tab) in a choice of colors black, red, green, purple or blue. Shockley has yet to announce pricing or availability for the FigPi, as he teased the new board via his Mastodon account.
Looking much like a classic astronaut from Lego Space (or Benny in the Lego movies), the FigPi has a number of fun features, including a 9-light RGB LED matrix, a reset button, and two Stemma ports. at the rear. The board is powered by a microUSB port which is also located on the back. The boot button on the front is programmable, so it can serve both its native function and whatever you choose for it.
We don’t know if there will be GPIO pins, but the front picture (we haven’t seen a picture of the back) doesn’t show any pin holes. The original Mini SAM M4 minifig board has 26 GPIO pins, as you can see in the image below, comparing the two boards (Mini SAM M4 is on the left and FigPi is on the right).
Like its sibling, the FigPi will be programmable in CircuitPython. In his post, Shockley called out Adafruit and its programming language, saying he couldn’t have built it without them. CircuitPython lets you do everything from control lights, motors, and sensors to turning your board into an HID device, like a keyboard, mouse, or game controller.
The rear Stemma ports should allow users to connect a ton of different boards, including a wide variety of sensors.
Other than the lack of a price or release date, we don’t have final specs for FigPi. However, we expect it to be available via Shockley’s site and if it’s anything like the Mini SAM M4 it will come in a variety of colours.
