Rolling sneak. 
World news is thick with stories about flying drones spying on an unsuspecting public. These are largely reports of military or law enforcement drones flying over the Middle East, Africa and the Southwestern United States. But what about terrestrial drones that can spy on your big sister or hassle your pets? If you don’t have access to a multimillion dollar machine and your flying skills are a bit rusty, the Rover 2.0 spy tank is here.
Don’t tell your sister.
Brookstone’s Rover 2.0 is an iOS and Android-controlled camera-enabled spy tank. The sneaky little pod transmits video and sound to the smartphone apps controlling the device. It’s the high-tech surveillance equivalent of sitting next to a door with a water glass pressed against the wood. We got our hands on a pre-production version of the Rover 2.0 and took it for a spin around the Wired office.
See with your hands and your eyes.
The Rover 2.0 offers some minor improvements over the previous model. It still captures photos, just like its predecessor. But the new Rover also brings video capture to the mix. The photo and video quality isn’t the greatest, but considering the shooting angle of the photos and video are from shoe level you’re not exactly going to use the footage as Facebook profile pics. The new app uses sliders instead of buttons to steer and accelerate the tank. The sliders are better than the buttons of the previous app but offer very little in the way of speed control. The tank has two speeds: Stop and go.
One of its best features was also in the original Rover: night vision. The Rover 2.0′s stealth mode turns off all the devices lights and turns on infrared night vision. It’s the ultimate in sneaky, assuming your intended target is hard of hearing. The little tank still makes quite a bit of noise rolling around. So, it’s more of a mostly stealth mode.
Hall trek.
Rover’s biggest issue is a short battery life. The little tank isn’t rechargeable; it runs on AA batteries. And because remote vehicles are power hungry, after just a few sorties, you’ll need to head down to the store to buy more batteries.
But those shortcomings don’t ultimately matter very much. The Rover 2.0 is a toy, not an actual spy device. You won’t see them roaming the halls of embassies stealing state secrets. Instead, it’s a fun way to hassle roommates and siblings, and of course your cat. And the bottom line is that it’s fun, even if James Bond never had to buy packs of AAs.
The Rover 2.0 will launch in October and will cost $150.
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