[SanjayMehta]

FPGAs are a good way to get into Verilog. The Arty-7 series from Xilinx/AMD is affordable.

Another option is the BeagleV-Fire which uses a Microchip RISC-V plus FPGA.

You could also take the Arduino route which has dozens of options.

[yepyoukno]

The ESP32 is the new Ardiono!

[SanjayMehta]

Played with the old Tensilica versions, haven't seen the RISCV one yet but you're right. ESP32 is probably a better option today than Arduino.