Fisher-Price Baby Playzone: Pull Up Ball Blast
by Fisher Price
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Our Price: $95.00 Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Category: Toy See more product details |
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Toys and Games Reviews of Fisher-Price Baby Playzone: Pull Up Ball Blast
Customer Review: Of all the toys - best loved!
Summary: 5 Stars
First I'd like to say, some of the older reviews for this toy are going to be invalid. Fisher-Price made changes to this toy some time ago, including widening the base to prevent tipping.
My daughter continually returns to this toy for all sorts of learning experiences. She became an expert and pulling up over night (at 8 months) by repeatedly "sitting" to remove the balls from the bottom and then pulling up to drop them down the chute again. The shaft of it has a huge amount of "give" and bends at will to support her as she pulls up. (She's now 11 months, about 21 pounds, and VERY tall). It's obvious it has been purposefully made to do this, and with the new wider base, is very well engineered. She figured out how to activate the music, and loves to do so and watch the spinning "ball dispenser" on the top. She also loves just playing with the balls by themselves!
The only drawback I find is that when Fisher-Price made changes to it, they apparently took out a lever that baby could turn as the ball is rolling down and change the ball's direction. The lever would push the ball into the shaft mid-way down the sprialing ramp and it would fall immediately to the bottom through the hollow shaft. I purchased this toy in part because another reviewer of the old model said her child loved to be able to affect his environment by choosing to turn the lever. The new model does not have that feature; mine still has the hollow shaft with a hole half-way down and sometimes my daughter does put the ball directly in the hole on her own. Maybe when she's old enough I'll just teach her to push the ball in as it's rolling down or something.
If your baby is readily crawling and you want to encourage him/her to pull up, this is definitely the toy to get. My daughter is now walking and still loves to use this toy as a "base" to walk to-and-from, and still plays the music, and plays with the balls both with and without droping them down the ramp.
Customer Review: The best present I've given my daughter so far!
Summary: 5 Stars
My daughter's first birthday was yesterday, and I searched all through Babies R Us looking for the perfect toy for her. Of course, I know at her age anything would have made her happy, but I wanted to get her something she'd really enjoy. I almost put this back, because she has a similar toy at her grandparents' house. I am so glad I didn't!My daughter was too tired to enjoy this toy last night, but today she played with it for an hour after I got home, and apparently for a couple of hours while my husband was home with her. When she puts a ball down the chute, and the lights and music play, she gets this enormous smile on her face- this makes this toy well worth the $X I spent on it. She's already learning about the cause and effect of where the ball goes- I've caught her a couple of times looking through the base to see if there are any hidden balls (and there are sometimes, and she goes bonkers trying to get to them). She seems to get great enjoyment out of knowing that her actions cause the lights and music; she giggles a lot anyway, but her giggles went into overdrive while playing with the Ball Blast.
I don't know how long this will last in terms of her development, but the point is she's greatly enjoying this now. I only gave the durability 4 stars because it seems to be a teensy bit flimsy. My baby is very small (she's one, but she's still wearing 6-9 month clothes), so if she tries to pull herself up with this, the plastic is sturdy, but I don't know how well that would work with a larger baby.
I've never bought a Fisher-Price toy that disappointed, and this is no exception. This is a great toy for a one-year-old; the sense of empowerment she seems to get every time the ball rolls down the ramp makes the purchase well worth my while. I'm thankful to the folks at Fisher-Price for inventing this little gem!
Customer Review: Looks sturdy but is very awkward to put together
Summary: 2 Stars
I am so disappointed with this toy. I'd been seeing this toy on the market for at least two years now, and as an alternative to Tomy's Ball Party toys(which I could not find at the time), I purchased this for my 1 year old son for Christmas. My son loves to play with small (but safe) balls, and I really thought he'd enjoy this.I ended up pulling the toy out of the box before Christmas on a fluke, and I had to put this together. I was surprised to see that I had to put it together to the extent that I did. It did require a screwdriver. Well, for one thing, where one of the "feet" was supposed to snap into place, plastic had not been removed properly, and therefore the toy did not fit together like it should. I had to leave the foot off, but I did manage to get the other three on. Then putting the spiral ball track on was awkward, aggravating and a little tricky. It took quite a bit of strength to "pop" the tabs into the proper places. I was so angry trying to put it together.
Once it was together (imperfectly because the pieces were awkward and not completely formed properly), my son played with it for about a minute. The music got annoying. He just wanted to carry the balls around. You can't just drop the ball into the track from the top and watch it go around the spiral track. . . the child or parent has to push the noisy music button or push the ball through. I'm sure after a while a smaller toddler might catch on to that, but my son just wanted to be able to drop the ball and watch it roll.
I am returning this toy. I am 100% unsatisfied with it for my house. It takes up too much room for a toy that my child hardly will ever play with.
By the way, I did purchase the TOMY Ball Party Bounce toy which was on display in an educational toy store. . . my son played with it and loved it!
Customer Review: We saw new skills by Day 2
Summary: 5 Stars
Our son received this toy as a first birthday gift. He was very excited about the noise and lights from the moment the top came out of the box. After it was put together, at first he would mostly hit the button, and only incidentally knocked the balls in. Then, he started pushing the balls in intentionally. This was sort of a new thing for him, but not revolutionary. Then he would take balls out of our hands and put them in the right place and push them down. This was a big deal because he was not (still is not) very into putting anything "in" anything (other than his mouth). But the big event came the next day -- he picked up a ball out of the bottom and put it in the top himself. He was playing with this toy completely independently. This may not sound like much to you, but for our son, this was a really new concept. Usually, when all the "pieces" are out of the toy, he just moves on to a new toy. Picking things up from one place and putting them in another with intention was not something he had done before. We are now working on more "in" concepts -- like putting toys IN the toybox. Still not happening, but at least I have hope for the future.
Oh yeah. We also experience that the ball comes out of one shoot the majority of the time, but we aren't too bothered by that. If you would be, I think it is an issue. And I don't think we put it together wrong, so that's not it.
Update after 1 month: our son still loves this toy, and plays with it whenever its out (he got too many toys for his birthday, so we rotate them into his play area). He is still a non-walker (he cruises), but he can pull himself up safely on this toy, even though it is light weight, because the base is so wide.
Customer Review: A Great Toy... that could have been better
Summary: 5 Stars
The Stand Up Ball Blast by Fisher-Price is a good product overall. The toy features fun music along with lights and sounds. The music is enough to put me in a good mood and keep me entertained for at least 5 minutes, so I'm sure your child would enjoy it just the same. The good news for parents is that there is a volume control located on the bottom of the product. (As far as I'm concerned every product should have these three settings "quiet, quieter, and mute"). The product has a large and sturdy base meaning it's not easy for the child to simply knock it over (which is important for a product designed to help your child stand). On the downside, the yellow plastic where the balls roll down is not the most well built and I found that I could pull apart the plastic at the joints without much effort. I don't believe that a small child would be able to do this, but I would have expected better construction from Fisher-Price. A second design flaw is that the batteries are very difficult to replace. Instead of having the battery compartment on the bottom of the base (which would have been far too simple and made too much sense), it is located on the under-side of the red top. This means you either have to struggle with a very small screwdriver between the red top and the yellow plastic below, or take the red top off completely (which I found somewhat difficult taking off and putting back on). My advice would be to buy batteries that will last for a long time and hope that they never run out of juice. In the end I would say this product would be a great addition to any young child's toy collection. It will keep them entertained and will be worth the money you spend on it.