mmcphee's Full Review: Fisher-Price Fisher TRIO Critters
Money burns a hole in my 4 year old son's pocket. As soon as he has a few dollars he is ready to spend it. Recently with $10 to spend and not a lot of choices at Target, he finally settled on Fisher Price Trio Critters.
What are Fisher Price Trios? Trios are a new building system from Fisher Price. Trio is a reference to the building pieces, which are "sticks, bricks and panels." The bricks are ¾" squares that can be snapped on to other bricks on the top and bottom. Bricks can be single hollow boxes or several boxes built together into rectangles and other shapes. Panels and sticks can be snapped into holes on the tops and sides of the bricks. Fisher Price Trios are recommended for children ages 3-5. They are many different sets, with different themes, and all of the sets can be used together.
What You Get Four chose the Critters set, since it was the largest set he could get for his $10. This set includes 54 pieces: bricks in green and orange, straight and curved sticks in yellow (some with eyes on the end) and orange-red wing shaped panels. There are also instructions for building six different creatures.
Our Experience Of course when any new toy comes into the house all three kids want to play with it. For about 45 minutes my children actually worked together to build some Trio Critters. Seven had no trouble orchestrating the play and getting Six and Four to methodically build the creatures in the included pamphlet. I was surprised at the limited amount of building instructions; just a pictorial list of parts, their quantity and then the final model, no step-by-step instructions. These simple creatures posed no problem for Seven to follow, but younger kids might need more instruction.
Fisher Price Trios'worst feature is also their best feature. The blocks, sticks and panels require some force to assemble and disaasmble. While Fisher Price claims Trio is an "easy" building system, it is actually far more challenging than other snap together toys for preschoolers, like Duplo Blocks or Kid K'Nex. However, once children get the pieces together these Crazy Critters actually stay together well enough for my kids to actually be able to play with what they built. Seven and Six had no problem putting any of the pieces together although both are over the recommended age range. Four struggled for a while and was frustrated at first, but after a few play sessions he eventually got the hang of snapping all of the pieces together. At times he still needs help to take the pieces apart but he has plenty of people in the house to help him with that.
The pieces are fun to build with and when my son plays on his own he prefers to build his own imaginative creatures instead of the suggested models. He makes "scary" 3-eyed bugs that he "crawls" up my leg as I cook and spiders to frighten his sisters. There are lots of building possibilities. And, as with most building sets, lots of pieces means lots of picking up and the pieces hurt when you step on them. What the world really needs is a building set that can pick itself up! Still, I am sure we will be adding to our collection with additional Fisher Price Trio building sets.
Final Thoughts Fisher Price Trios are a combination of Kid K'Nex , and Duplo Blocks and yet they manage to be different enough so Trios do not feel like just a duplicate of building toys we already own. My son loves the creatures he can build. Children may need some help snapping pieces together and taking them apart, but their creations will be stable enough for them to enjoy. Overall a good building toy.
Easy to build, so many ways They can build all kinds of crazy creatures, or create things all their own 54 pcs Included - Build up to 6 crazy creature...More at Amazon
Easy to build, so many ways They can build all kinds of crazy creatures, or create things all their own 54 pcs Included - Build up to 6 crazy creature...More at Amazon Marketplace
Easy to build, so many ways! Easy-click bricks, sticks, and panels make building a snap. Kids can build all kinds of crazy creatures, or create things...More at Sears
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