Physical toys that work with digital games and apps are all the rage, with Skylanders already a big hit with young gamers, and Disney’s Infinity on the way hoping to repeat the trick.

Something to watch next year: Mixels. It’s a new thing from an intriguing partnership: Cartoon Network and Lego. There’ll be TV cartoons, toys and “an app-powered gaming experience” for children.

Specific details of the games and the Mixels characters are scarce for now, although the companies have said that the Mixels creatures “can be mixed and combined with one another” – hence the name. The toys will be “mini building sets”, capitalising on Lego knowing a thing or two about that area.

Anyway, we’ll be interested to see how Mixels shapes up when the toys, then the apps, make their debut in 2014. And as we said, this is a big trend: expect many more apps-with-toys (or toys-with-apps) to be angling for a slot on your kids’ birthday and Christmas lists next year.