Someone else mentioned sims - Mujoco is pretty common and you'll want to learn ROS anyway. Also robotics doesn't mean just arms, you can play with navigation an

Someone else mentioned sims - Mujoco is pretty common and you'll want to learn ROS anyway. Also robotics doesn't mean just arms, you can play with navigation and perception algorithms with a single camera. Good off-the-shelf arms are low thousands last time I looked. You can DIY for $1-2k https://www.anninrobotics.com/robot-kits https://www.anninrobotics.com/robot-kits