October 25th, 2009 by Stinkhead
My son is absolutely in love with everything Yo Gabba Gabba…. strangely his favorite thing is the hearing the theme song over and over, so anyway, I’ve wanted to get him a few YGG toys. Here is our rundown of the building system made by MegaBloks and the DJ Lance Rock Boom Box is not only our favorite set, but our favorite Yo Gabba Gabba toy out there. Period. Read our review of all of these sets and see the over 40 pics below! (And stay tuned for upcoming video demo)
Individual Environments
As you know the primary set on the show is the table with the four backgrounds. You can pick up a set of bricks for each individual set. Muno’s caves, Foofa’s field, Brobee’s woods, and Toodee’s um, glacier? (Plex doesn’t have a backdrop on the show, so he doesn’t have a set here, but he does come with their rockin’ bus). Each set comes with ten pieces, including a posable character. Each figure swings their arms when you press down on the peg on their head. (This peg is also the right size for gripping a block). Their hands are also sculpted to hold a handful of accessories. The packaging features a try-me window so you can see how these guys move when you press their peg.
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Each of the bricks get a sticker of a secondary character from the show, such as the bat toast, and the bouncy happy gumballs. Brobee comes with the plate of food and a cup from his famous “There’s a Party in My Tummy” skit. It’s fun to set up the environments like the display on the show, but very soon the child will be building towers and other structures with the bricks.
The character pieces are spot-on and lovingly sculpted. The dancey dance feature is nice, but you can also split them at the waist and swap their lower halves. My son loves carrying these guys around.
These sets are usually $10 a piece, but we recently picked up Toodee for $8 at Target. So they may float around on sale leading up to the holiday. They’re totally worth it. But read on…
Plex’s Tour Buggy
One of the larger sets is the Tour Buggy. Loosely based on they yellow buggy that they occasionally ride around in, but built up with speakers, some arches, and stage pieces. Here you can get Plex to complete the set, but you also get Muno. So, if you’re picking out just a few sets to buy, take a note that you get a Muno with this set as well. I like the different playsets you can build up with these pieces. You can recreate their buggy from the show (and they all fit on board), you can build up the tour bus, you can re-arrange the pieces to look like a rock concert stage, and wherever else your imagination can take you. We’ve seen this set for $20.
DJ Lance Rock’s Boom Box
This is our favorite Yo Gabba Gabba set on the market, by any manufacturer. You get a child sized replica of the key prop from the show, so you child can pretend to be DJ Lance, the center panel is electronic and plays four musical snippets (and some sound effects) straight from the show. On top of that, the three front pieces all clip on and off easily so you can store the pieces including the characters inside. My son loves carrying this around and pressing the different sound clips. Over and over. The speakers have two pegs on them, perfect for holding any of the characters, and the “speaker” spins around (my son even played “DJ” by spinning the speakers like a mix master) There are pegs on the bottom, and lots of different pieces for building up a “Dance club” atmosphere. You also get a brick with the boom box on it, this oddly, is a favorite of my son’s. Like he can carry around a pocket sized version of the larger one?
The center console plays sound snippets from the show. One button plays a portion of the Theme song, another plays “Party in My Tummy”, another plays “We like to dance” and the last one plays “Run, run, run” There is also a button with Plex that makes sound effects. I appreciate that there is a “quiet” mode that plays the sound at a lower volume, and an Off position.
With this set you get Brobee and Foofa, and the package lets you hear the sound clips and try out the dancing figures. So you get this set that is part building block playset, part toy-straight-from-the-show, part toy that plays music, and a carrying case all in one. The overall execution is brilliant because it feels natural, nothing was compromised or forced to give this much play value. This set is just under $30, and totally worth it. If you buy one Yo Gabba Gabba toy this season, this is the one to get.
I like how this set will grow with your child too. There is the role play aspect that my son is about now, and then it provides hours of play when your budding architect starts building other structures and acting out musical numbers and playing with their favorite Yo Gabba Gabba characters. (We call them “critters” in our house. They’re not people, but they’re not monsters or animals….hmmm)
Overall
I’ve been shopping around for the best Yo Gabba Gabba toys for awhile now. I really liked the versatility of these sets, and the appeal of Yo Gabba Gabba characters. I liked the amount of characters represented. But the larger sets really encourage a show or performance aspect. Not only do you play around coming up with new structures and play sets, but then you have speakers and a guitar, and the right environment for putting on a show with the characters. There was a lot of thought put into these sets and it pays off. Be sure to look at the pics below to see all the pieces you get with each set. And stay tuned for our upcoming video demo.
Megabloks provided some sample sets for our us to review. You can see more info at their official web site.
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