Lots of fun for children and adults too!
Written: Aug 08 '06 (Updated Aug 08 '06)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: No real direct competition with the same functionality for this age group.
Cons: Remotes are not durable.
You will go through batteries like crazy.
The Bottom Line: Nothing like it for this age. Recommended to anybody willing to spend up to $300 for all the accessories that you'll be wanting to buy later. Deserves 3.5 stars.
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| chretiensucks's Full Review: Fisher Price GeoTrax Rail and Road System Workin' ... |
My three year old son is addicted to trains. For the longest time he’d carry a wooden Thomas with him everywhere he went (including the daycare). This train would run on wooden tracks. Problem with wooden tracks is that they don’t stay together well and they are expensive!
For his birthday his grandmother bought him a FisherPrice Geotrax train set, and he loves it!
Rails versus gears
There’s something you should know about this set that is quite ingenious but also causes some small operational glitches. All the pieces are constructed from hard, durable plastic. Some of the tracks (green) which form ascending and descending slopes as well as bridge tracks not only have the two rails for the train wheels but a row of teeth in between the rails. The battery powered locomotive has a gear which fits into these teeth to assist with the climbs. Don’t worry, the gear is high enough that the trains can operate on regular floors without tracks if desired. One problem is that sometimes after the ascent, the train gear can have problems catching onto the teeth properly and it takes a few seconds for it to finally latch on and continue its movement. That’s partly due to the tracks no fitting together perfectly. You really have to push down hard sometimes – harder than a 3 year old can.
Assembly
Generally, the other track pieces are easy to snap together. They lock in place and generally don’t come apart too easily. A screwdriver is required to put in the three AAA batteries into the remote and three AAA batteries into the engine. And if your child plays with it a lot, count on going through those batteries fairly frequently.
Operation
The remote control for the locomotive has two positions, forward and stop. We actually have multiple sets. This one doesn’t include the station depot for placing your remotes but if you have a set that includes this, your remote will also generate sound effects for the train in use. And each train has it’s own unique sound effects. For example a steam engine will have the sound effects generated by the smokestack, and a diesel engine may have the sound of a foghorn. Some of the newer trains even have a built-in speaker on the remote so that you don’t even require the remote station to produce sound effects.
Depending on the sets that you have, many of the cargo trains can carry various types of freight, from boxes, to logs, to boulders and there are cranes, that can be used to place these right onto the trains.
Durability
We’ve had these things for over a year now and the durability of the track pieces and the engines are very good. Basically, they should last for a generation providing you don’t leave the batteries in them until they corrode. The remotes are another story. The spring mechanisms in them wear out fairly easily and when they do, you basically have a more difficult time locking the locomotive into a stop position. If you’re handy enough, you can take the remote apart and play around with it but Fisher Price should have had this fixed with later models, and they haven’t. I’m sure it’ll be a common problem.
Like Gambling?
The problem with these set is that you’ll almost always want to combine other sets. We certainly did. On top of that, we accessorized with a clock tower and mile high mountain which are just too cool to put down on paper.
Conclusion - What I look forward to
Geotrax is perfect for young ones, the pieces are large and perfect for small hands. Basically my son was able to take full advantage of everything at 2 years old.
As Christopher gets older and is able to play with more sophisticated toys, he usually wants mom or dad to join in and play with him. And I’m more than happy to oblige.
The main gripes I have with Geotrax is the reliability of the remotes and the proportions of the tracks. It’s kind of difficult to explain, but you can’t just make simple figure 8 tracks like you can with a wooden Brio Track or Thomas. Generally you always seem to need additional pieces that you never seem to have (how convenient for Fisher Price).
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 170
Type of Toy: Trains
Age Range of Child: 3 to 5 Years
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Epinions.com ID:
chretiensucks
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Member: joe unpronounceable
Location: GTA, Ontario, Canada
Reviews written: 42
Trusted by: 3 members
About Me:
How do people with more than one child do it?
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