Thames & Kosmos Pinball Machine Maker STEM Experiment Kit Toy of the Year Finalist, Gumball Rally l Explore Physics, Force, Motion, Gravity, Simple Machines

This was a great activity for STEM-loving kids. My boys had a lot of fun assembling it and seeing how everything worked together. It kept them engaged and gave them a sense of accomplishment once it was finished. A really fun and educational build.

This thing is the best gift I bought for Christmas for my 9 year old. He loves legos, but he builds them and then they sit on a shelf. This he built by himself, and he loves playing with it! It is a great little pinball machine. The gum doesn’t taste good, and falls on the floor easily, so it’s more for game pieces. Even my cat is obsessed. And the game is modular. You can move the pieces around to change the game up. I love Thames and Cosmo. I have purchased from them in the past and their customer service is amazing. My son accidentally broke a piece on a mechanical hand toy, and he wrote them an email and they sent him a new piece. Even at full price of 39$, this toy is 100% worth it.

This is very cool and very fun. Getting it put together the first time is rather complicated and requires side cutters (wire cutters) to remove the pieces from the moldings. The instructions are fairly simple but not as good as Lego’s. We have a very bright 6 year old but there’s no way he would be able to do the setup. But once it’s together it’s very good. The 9 year old immediately started strategizing and moving pieces around so he could have success. Had to remind them that if they chew all the gumballs there wouldn’t be any left to play the game. Fairly sturdy but needs some adjusting as play goes on.

We purchased this for our 10 year old grandson. He absolutely loves it and gets hours of playtime from it.

"We are beyond pleased with this purchase! It’s rare to find an activity that truly engages both an 8-year-old and a 5-year-old, but this nailed it. It was straightforward enough to be fun to build, yet challenging enough that we all felt a genuine sense of accomplishment once it was finished. Best of all, it’s a blast to play with afterward. Seeing their faces light up when they realized they built their own toy was priceless. Then the fun time. The boys spent hours playing nicely together and trying to achieve new goals each time. Highly recommend for a family project!"

Easy to build with clear instructions. Comes with lots of gumballs but they are not perfectly round so they don't roll that well. Also the design of the pinball machine makes it almost impossible to get the ball in the 2nd level and the flippers are not at a good angle so almost every ball goes to the right or left and almost never up the middle. The balls also get frequently stuck due to poor design of some of the obstacles. My kid never plays with it after the first couple days.

As kids get older it becomes harder to find birthday gifts that are age appropriate and fun. My son loved building this, and it becomes a fully functional pinball machine which is super cool. It’s now my go to gift for birthdays 10-13.

Easy to assemble my 7 yo grandson did it mostly himself. He has a blast trying to get a good score then having gum to chew

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