Review Archives - Page 8 of 16

Dinosaur Train Toys Review and Giveaway

May 24, 2011 TechyDad Dinosaurs, Fun, Giveaway, Photos, Review, Toys

My boys love the Dinosaur Train television show on PBS by The Jim Henson Company. They also love playing with toys. So when I was given the opportunity to review three Dinosaur Train toys from Uncle Milton’s Toys, I was excited. When I saw that the toys had educational value, I jumped at the opportunity.

Dinosaur Poop

Let’s be honest. Tell any kid that you’re going to let them play with poop at the table, and they’ll look at you funny. But once you take out this product, they’ll be crying for you to open that package quicker.

Of course, the contents are not really poop, but a brown dough-like substance. They come inside of a storage container to keep the “poop” fresh between uses and some pieces of the dinosaur’s most recent meal.

In the case of a carnivore, these pieces are 2 fish skeletons. In the case of a herbivore, 2 plants. An omnivore has one fish and one plant. The pieces can be put together like a puzzle for even more fun.

Once all the pieces have been found, you can flatten the poop and press the fish skeleton or plant into it to form a fossil impression.

You can also get more creative and form poop sculptures.

Of course, this toy can also lead to interesting statements from parents such as “Who wants to play with poop?” or “Keep that poop on the table and not on the floor!”

Hatchers

How would your child like to grow his or her own dinosaur? Hatchers lets your child do just this. Each package contains an egg.

Drop the egg into a glass of water and out hatches a dinosaur.

Ok, not immediately. This is the tough part. The hatching takes about two days. So children get to learn a lesson in patience.

Dino Track Discovery Pack

My boys love games. So it was only natural that they loved playing with the Dino Tracks. Each package comes with three trails. Each card contains a dinosaur footprint on one side and some dinosaur facts on the other. There are also two “egg” cards with suggested games such as follow the trail or try to jump the space of one dinosaur stride. (As you can see, one T-Rex step is just a little bit shorter than JSL on top of NHL.)

Giveaway

Thanks to Uncle Milton Toys, one lucky winner will receive a Dinosaur Train prize pack which includes two packages of Dinosaur Poop and two Dinosaur Train Hatchers. To enter, simply leave a comment below answering this question: What is your favorite dinosaur?

You can also earn bonus entries by doing any (or all) of the following items. Just be sure to leave a separate comment for each item that you complete. (Don’t just leave one comment listing everything you did.)

Follow @TechyDad on Twitter. (1 bonus entry)
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To enter, please follow the rules above within the comment section. Contest starts today, May 24th and ends at Noon EST on June 7th, 2011. You do not have to be a blogger to enter, but must leave a valid e-mail address for me to contact you for mailing address once the giveaway is over. I will select the winner using random.org and contact you via e-mail. You will have 48 hours to claim the prize. If there is no response, another winner will be selected. Open to U.S. residents only.

Disclaimer: The products were provided for this review by Uncle Milton. The opinions expressed above are my own.

Review : Skunked by Marina Games

May 17, 2011 TechyDad Fun, Review

When I first heard of Skunked, I’ll admit, I was expecting some kind of odorous twist to the game. Instead, I found out that Skunked looks like this:

Game play is quite simple. Each player rolls the dice and records their score. As you roll again and again, you add to your score until you either decide to stop or you roll a one. If you stop, that round’s total is added to your score. However, if you roll a one, then your score that round is reset to zero and you must put a chip in the pot. Beware of double-ones. That will reset your entire game’s score to zero. Just to add insult to injury, you’ll need to toss four chips in the pot.

If a player reaches (or exceeds) 100, then the game turns into a high score competition. Each player must match or top the high score on their next turn or they are eliminated. The last player standing gets all the chips in the pot. The player with the most chips after three games wins.

B and I played this one night and it was quite enjoyable. Being a geek, I kept score with a spreadsheet program. It let me add up multiple rows quickly and tally up total game scores. (It was late and I wanted to give my brain a rest from math.) We had fun trying to keep rolling higher and higher scores without hitting the dreaded one. (Yes, I hit a double-one once, but luckily it was on my first roll of a game so my score went down to zero FROM zero!)

This is definitely a game that I would play again. In fact, I might try playing this with NHL next time. (JSL could easily roll the dice but is too young to understand the scoring portion.) In fact, I think the fun factor of this game would only increase the more players you add.

Disclaimer: This post was written for Family Review Network & Marina Games
who provided the complimentary product for review in exchange for my honest opinions.

Review and Giveaway: Aerobie Sprint Flying Rings

May 3, 2011 TechyDad Fun, Giveaway, Photos, Review

Now that spring is here, we can go outdoors for extended periods of time. This means playtime at the park: slides, climbing, throwing frisbees. What could be better? How about tossing an Aerobie around?

You see, NHL and JSL haven’t quite gotten the knack of throwing a frisbee. NHL’s throws tend to not travel far and JSL’s barely leave the ground. So, while we do have fun, there isn’t any distance involved. Enter the Aerobie Sprint flying ring.

The minute the boys saw the flying ring, they wanted to try it out. I had them wait until we went to the park. Good thing too, because that disc can really fly! NHL was able to send it quite some distance. I didn’t measure, but I’d guess his throws easily topped 30 feet. JSL had more trouble, but he also had a few successful throws. His only went about 10 feet or so, but I’d call that impressive for an almost-four year old. As for me? I got some seriously far throws in as well.

This is definitely something you’ll want to play with where there’s plenty of room. At one point, NHL threw the ring towards me when we were too close to the edge of the park and it almost went into the road. After that, I made sure all throws were directed into the park and not outside of it.

We all loved playing with the Aerobie and it definitely attracted attention. Before long, two other kids in the park joined our game of catch. I’d definitely recommend this for anyone with kids (or even just adults) and a large amount of land to toss the ring across.

Giveaway:

Thanks to Family Review Network & Aerobie Sprint, one lucky winner will receive an Aerobie Sprint flying ring. To enter, simply leave a comment below answering this question: What activity do you and/or your children like doing best in your local park or playground?

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Write a post on your blog linking to this giveaway. Leave 3 comments about this to get credit for all of your extra entries. (3 bonus entries)

To enter, please follow the rules above within the comment section. Contest starts today, May 3rd and ends at Noon EST on May 17th, 2011. You do not have to be a blogger to enter, but must leave a valid e-mail address for me to contact you for mailing address once the giveaway is over. I will select the winner using random.org and contact you via e-mail. You will have 48 hours to claim the prize. If there is no response, another winner will be selected. Open to U.S. and Canada residents only.

Disclaimer: This post was written for Family Review Network & Aerobie Sprint who provided the complimentary product for review in exchange for my honest opinions.

Review: Green Lantern Colossal Cannon and Kilowog Action Figure

April 21, 2011 TechyDad Geeky Pursuits, Review, Toys

In brightest day, in blackest night,
No evil shall escape my sight.
Let those who worship evil’s might,
Beware my power… Green Lantern’s light!

If the preceding verse is familiar to you, then you are probably already a fan of the Green Lantern. If not, here’s a quick rundown. The Green Lantern Corps are a galactic police force. They protect and defend the innocent and bring the guilty to justice. They are given rings which they can use (along with their willpower) to create objects out of a green energy.

The two toys that I received to review are the Colossal Cannon and a Kilowog action figure.

Kilowog Action Figure

Kilowog won’t be winning any beauty pageants anytime soon, but this member of the Green Lantern corps is a fierce fighter and has a keen mind. His action figure includes a “blast” green energy construct (which can attach to other constructs) and a Green Lantern ring.

My boys had fun playing with Kilowog, but I’ve got to admit that they were most intrigued by the ring. NHL claimed it as his own and pretended to be a Green Lantern. Of course, he decided to play fair (with some coaching from dad) and allowed JSL to wear the ring a few times. Sadly, the ring was too small for my fingers so I didn’t get to play with it.

Colossal Cannon

This toy, as the name implies, is a big cannon. A child (or.. ahem… grownup) puts his hand inside it and pulls on a trigger inside. This fires off plastic “lantern” projectiles, makes the cannon light up and causes it to make firing noises.

This was a hit and my boys (ahem… and I) kept fighting over who would wield it next. There was just one problem. As you can see in one of the photos, NHL is firing the discs at couch cushions. I rightfully surmised that the cannon’s projectiles could hurt a person and forbade them from using it unless a) it was empty or b) it was pointed at the cushions and away from anyone else.

This worked well until one time when we thought NHL had fired all 10 projectiles. He raised the cannon in the air, squeezed the trigger and out shot a disc. It bounced off our wall and landed without anyone getting hurt or anything being broken. Still, I decided not to risk future breakage and confiscated the discs. I would count this as the only downside to the Colossal Cannon.

Of course, any projectile-shooting toy bears this risk and this can be easily managed by only giving kids the discs under proper supervision. Even without the discs, the Colossal Cannon is fun. Kids can put it on and imagine that they are a Green Lantern firing blasts at bad guys.

Disclaimer: I wrote this review while participating in a blog tour by Dad Central Consulting on behalf of Mattel and received Green Lantern toys to facilitate my review and a promotional item to thank me for taking the time to participate.

Ameba Review and Giveaway: Fun and Educational Kids TV

March 31, 2011 TechyDad Giveaway, Review, Roku, Television

I’ll admit it. As much as I thought I’d be the parent who wouldn’t let their child watch too much television, my kids love the TV. They have a dozen favorite shows that they absolutely *must* see and are constantly asking us to DVR something else. In addition, they’ve fallen in love with Netflix on our Roku player. NHL, in particular, enjoys picking just which episode of which show he is going to watch next. Of course, we prefer it when their television watching habits are educational in nature. So when I heard about Ameba, I was intrigued.

Ameba is one of the many new channels that Roku provides. Unlike others that show old movies or anime, though, Ameba shows educational programming geared towards children. When we first browsed the selection of shows, I’ll admit that I began to get a little nervous. Nowhere was Dora the Explorer, The Wonder Pets or any of the other “big name” shows that my boys are used to watching. Would they take to these new shows or would they turn their noses up at them?

We looked through the Ages 2 – 5 section for a good program for JSL. After awhile, we found Rainbow Fish. This was a pleasant surprise because they love the Rainbow Fish book. We watched an episode where Rainbow Fish and his friends need to welcome a new girl to their school. A girl who doesn’t quite fit in with the rest of the gang. They both enjoyed this show.

After this, we switched over to the Age 6 – 10 section to find a good program for NHL. I noticed Einsteinabot, a program which appeared to be about numbers and math. NHL loves math so we tried this. Once again, I began to get nervous. The program had a fun song, but the look of the show wasn’t as polished as some shows on Nick Jr or Disney Junior. I needn’t have worried, though. NHL began singing along while JSL danced in his seat. When the episode was over, NHL asked to watch the next one and the one after that.

It just goes to show that kids like fun shows. They don’t care if the show uses the latest animation techniques or expensive computer generated imagery. The shows on Ameba might not have big toy lines behind them like Dora or the Disney shows do, but they are fun and educational. (Of course, the lack of a big toy line might be seen as another plus.)

Ameba costs $9.99 per month (though, for the month of April, they’re dropping the price to $3.99) and you can either get a set top box from them or purchase a Roku box for $60 to play it on. I didn’t test Ameba’s box so I can’t say anything good or bad about it, but I highly recommend the Roku box for ease of use and availability of content.

Giveaway:

Thanks to Ameba, not one, not two, but three lucky winners will receive an Ameba set top box and a 3 month subscription to Ameba. To enter, simply leave a comment below answering this question: What education programs do your children watch or did you watch growing up?

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Tweet about the giveaway on Twitter. Be sure to include @TechyDad, @AmebaTV and a link to this post in the Tweet. (1 bonus entry per day) For example: Stream educational children’s shows from the web to your TV. Win 1 of 3 @AmebaTV set top boxes from @TechyDad http://bit.ly/gMRdRH #Giveaway
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To enter, please follow the rules above within the comment section. Contest starts today, March 31st and ends at Noon EST on April 14th, 2010. You do not have to be a blogger to enter, but must leave a valid e-mail address for me to contact you for mailing address once the giveaway is over. I will select the winner using random.org and contact you via e-mail. You will have 48 hours to claim the prize. If there is no response, another winner will be selected. Open to U.S. and Canada residents only.

Disclaimer: I was provided two month’s free Ameba service to review. No other compensation was given. The opinions expressed above are my own. Ameba is also providing the giveaway item to my readers.

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