In the event you’ve ever dabbled with a Rubik’s Dice, you realize it isn’t the simplest puzzle to crack. However regardless of the difficult nature of the sport, it’s endured longer than most different toys of its technology—suppose Tamagotchis and Recreation Boys.
The Dice has seen huge progress and success in its comparatively lengthy lifespan on the earth of video games, promoting roughly 500 million items because it celebrates its Fiftieth anniversary this yr since structure professor Erno Rubik found it—one thing he says has defied his expectations.
“It is a curious fact—one that surprises me as much as anyone—that for so many decades, during a time of an unprecedented technology revolution, fascination with such a simple, ‘low-tech’ object has survived. And, in fact, this fascination has evolved,” Rubik wrote in his guide Cubed, printed in 2020.
How Rubix’s Dice cracked the code for fulfillment
The Hungarian professor based the colourful Dice—whose fundamental configuration entails a three-dimensional 3×3 grid that’s twisted and turned so every of its surfaces has the identical colour—in 1974, when he was simply 29.
Rubik, now 79 years previous, all the time had a proclivity for puzzles, and his educational background in artwork and sculpting turned useful devices in creating the primary prototype of the Dice we all know at this time.
“I got an interest from [a] young age about problem-solving, challenges, chess problems and so on,” Rubik advised Fortune in an interview.
Though he had created one thing that intrigued him, he couldn’t remedy it for a month.
However as soon as he did, it marked the start of the Dice’s journey—first, to outlets in Hungary and shortly after, the remainder of the world.
“At first, it was important to prove to myself that it’s possible to solve. So, I thought well, if I can do it, somebody else can,” Rubik mentioned, referring to the Dice philosophically as a mirrored image of life itself.
“The question is, how do you find your way between so many possible positions and how can you find your way back?”
The complexity and paradoxical nature of the Cube makes it greater than only a sport (that was solved by a 21-year-old in a file time of 3.13 seconds final yr).
The Dice’s earliest enhance in gross sales got here within the Eighties, when Rubik took his creation to a good in New York—within the three years that adopted, roughly 100 million Cubes had been bought, making a frenzy that Rubik had by no means anticipated or seen earlier than.
Rubik describes the Dice as a device that’s helped him perceive folks.
Different teachers additionally regarded it as such, together with cognitive scientist Douglas Hofstadter, who wrote of the Dice in 1981 that “it is an ingenious mechanical invention, a pastime, a learning tool, a source of metaphors, an inspiration.”
With 43 quintillion options for the Dice, it may possibly initially really feel like an not possible process to sort out. However the Dice’s potential to confound folks can also be what’s drawn fans over time, creating a complete universe of its personal.
Folks have now solved the Cube blindfolded, competed in worldwide championships for it, used it to display AI breakthroughs and way more.
It’s additionally earned a spot in popular culture, from that includes in a Spice Ladies music video to showing in Will Smith’s The Pursuit of Happyness.
All that has helped preserve the Rubik’s Dice recent in folks’s minds.
COURTESY OF SPIN MASTER
How Rubik’s Dice is staying related in a digital world
The Rubik’s Dice, in tune with its shape-shifting potential, has managed by means of the many years to adapt and create a distinct segment for itself regardless of different tech-driven types of leisure.
It’s this eternal high quality of the Rubik’s Dice that made its acquisition in 2021 a “no brainer” for Spin Grasp, the corporate’s senior director of video games Sam Suzs advised Fortune.
Nevertheless, the corporate additionally realizes the significance of catering to the digitally-savvy youthful viewers.
“It’s a challenge for the brand because it’s been around for 50 years. There’s been so many ways it’s been tried to be reinvented,” Suzs mentioned. “They [Spin Master] were trying to find ways to keep the iconic form and shape, but introduce new ways of play and new ways to interact with the Cube.”
Spin Grasp launched the Rubik’s Phantom Dice, which reacts to the person’s contact to briefly reveal the colour of a tile, including a brand new problem to the Dice by testing the participant’s reminiscence.
This variation, Suzs mentioned, appeals to cubers who wish to up their abilities, and to gift-givers who acknowledge the brainteaser in its unique kind with the added novelty.
The recognition of the Dice is mirrored in its robust gross sales—in 2022, 5.75 million items of the official Rubik’s Dice had been bought globally and that determine was up 14% year-to-date, in response to figures from knowledge agency Circana shared with Fortune by Spin Grasp in December.
The long-lasting Dice additionally occupied the lion’s share of the brain-teaser video games market, with a complete of 42%.
The realm of digital cubing can also be rising, Suzs identified, with new developments in Bluetooth-enabled cubing permitting gamers to compete in opposition to each other from totally different elements of the world.
The Dice additionally has its personal app for these wanting to resolve it on their private gadgets.
Spin Grasp has leveraged collaborations to maintain the model related and in demand—as an illustration, it just lately launched a special line of Rubik’s Cubes in honor of Disney’s one hundredth anniversary.
The corporate has new launches by means of 2024 to make the Fiftieth-year milestone for the Rubik’s model, together with partnerships with Marvel and Good day Kitty.
“We’re doing all sorts of unique collaborations that we think will appeal to kids and adult collectors,” Suzs mentioned.
As a model that simply hit its golden jubilee, it nonetheless feels younger, vibrant and alive because it transforms to new instances, whereas staying true to its roots. That’s maybe why its founder doesn’t like speaking in regards to the Dice previously tense.
“I think we can speak about the Cube not in the past. The Cube is in the present,” Rubik mentioned.
